Loyola Law School (L.A.) - Class of 2011 Forum

[Herbellis]

Was anyone less than impressed with the neighborhood around campus? It's a little scary, I was able to buy some crack at the house across the street, so that's a big selling point.
I live in Westwood and the commute is going to kill me.

[gm907]

Was anyone less than impressed with the neighborhood around campus? It's a little scary, I was able to buy some crack at the house across the street, so that's a big selling point.
I live in Westwood and the commute is going to kill me.

In all seriousness it's not crack den bad. There is a children's school across the the street. The neighborhood is mostly lower middle class latinos, with some koreans and blacks. When i visited I saw three homeless people (all very old. one asian, one latino, one black) smoking marijuana outside of the parking entrance.

The thing I don't like is there is no where to eat, unless you drive. We are going to be tied to Sonia's. All in all, you don't have the ambience of your average school. I loved, absolutely LOVED, my UG campus and neighborhood. I doubt I'll feel the same about Loyola Law School.

[snowboarder2713]

Funny piece of information I found out from watching the History Channel for too long. LLS is located in the Pico-Union District, which is the same district the violent international gang MS-14 started a couple decades ago. Yes, many of them are gone now ('cause the got deported and hence why it's an international group now), but at least we can pretend we're tough to impress the ugrad girls from the neighboring schools.

It's a little scary, I was able to buy some crack at the house across the street, so that's a big selling point.

And did you actually buy some crack?

[PugPug]

I think I'd rather not be aware of that information.

[PugPug]

Just curious, how worried are all of you about the Loyola 2L internet debacle? Or that Pepperdine is now higher in the rankings?

(I'm not trying to be a Negative Nancy/Debbie Downer. I always have concerns about everything so I was wondering what you guys felt).

[Herbellis]

For the record, no, I did not buy any crack across the street. The point is, I could have. I don't want any misunderstanding so ten years from now I get swiftboated as I run for elected office. Say no to crack!

[Herbellis]

Just curious, how worried are all of you about the Loyola 2L internet debacle? Or that Pepperdine is now higher in the rankings?

(I'm not trying to be a Negative Nancy/Debbie Downer. I always have concerns about everything so I was wondering what you guys felt).

What debacle?

[Herbellis]

Was anyone less than impressed with the neighborhood around campus? It's a little scary, I was able to buy some crack at the house across the street, so that's a big selling point.
I live in Westwood and the commute is going to kill me.

In all seriousness it's not crack den bad. There is a children's school across the the street. The neighborhood is mostly lower middle class latinos, with some koreans and blacks. When i visited I saw three homeless people (all very old. one asian, one latino, one black) smoking marijuana outside of the parking entrance.

The thing I don't like is there is no where to eat, unless you drive. We are going to be tied to Sonia's. All in all, you don't have the ambience of your average school. I loved, absolutely LOVED, my UG campus and neighborhood. I doubt I'll feel the same about Loyola Law School.

Maybe I'm just judging on first impression. I grew up in San Leandro for Gods sake! I know shady hoods, and even I was a little scared when I cruised onto campus. We'll see. Thanks for the input though. Good luck!

Links I found:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pico-Union ... California

http://picounion.blogspot.com/

http://lalife.com/Pico-Union_Historic_District

[gm907]

FYI for people who haven't visited, this is a picture of Loyola's exact street (Albany.)

--LinkRemoved--

On the left is Loyola. That fence on the left is what keeps outsiders off campus. To the right you see a house, and next to the house (not shown in the pic) is a children's school.

Yes, it is a bad neighborhood. Check out this link about the slums of Pico Union http://lawfuel.com/show-release.asp?ID=14022 Probably not "you'll be stabbed within 5 minutes if you walk off campus" bad though.

[snowboarder2713]

I'm not worried about either. The L2L person IMO is just stating what many students that aren't excelling in their regional law schools are facing. Yes, LLS probably could have done more, but that's life. You got to go out and find the jobs yourself sometimes. As for the Pepperdine thing, I'm not worried at all. I'm curious why their ranked one spot higher than us, but at the numbers I've looked at, it's probably something with how USNWR calculates its ratings rather than anything substantial at all.

[thisguy123]

RANKINGS
Pepperdine jumped bec of their new dean - Ken Starr. The only numbers that went up on their score was how well known their faculty is. Its been joked about that we should pick Eliot Spitzer as our next dean and one-up Pepperdine. You be the judge.

If you want to be upset about anything regarding higher ranked schools, look into UCI opening up next year which supposedly will be ranked in the 30s just because its a UC and they stole some great profs from other schools. Loyola continuously refuses to "trade" the dean's vote on the USNWR with other schools to boost our ranking, and is constantly fighting off other schools trying to steal our amazing faculty. The rankings SUCK, are inescapable, so get over it.

NEIGHBORHOOD
Unless your planning to live in the new apt building opening up across the street, do you really care that much about the neighborhood around you that you can't even see because of the big fences and trees around the campus? We walked to and from Staples Center multiple times this year (yes, back from Staples at 10pm), drove home at 1 in the morning, and even had basketball games on campus at midnight a few times while studying for finals. Newsflash: none of us got shot.

[eeandtee]

FOR ALL EVENING STUDENTS: FYI

I got an email from the Dean of Admissions and I quote:

For clarification purposes, the tentative schedule for Orientation for entering evening students is Tuesday, August 12, 5:45-9:15 p.m.; Wednesday, August 13, 5:00-9:30 p.m.; and Thursday, 5:00-8:40 p.m. We do not have activities planned for Friday. (As you know, Orientation is mandatory for all students.)

Hope this eases some of the Evening Students orientation nervousness...

see you there

ef

[Herbellis]

NEIGHBORHOOD
Unless your planning to live in the new apt building opening up across the street, do you really care that much about the neighborhood around you that you can't even see because of the big fences and trees around the campus? We walked to and from Staples Center multiple times this year (yes, back from Staples at 10pm), drove home at 1 in the morning, and even had basketball games on campus at midnight a few times while studying for finals. Newsflash: none of us got shot.

Thanks for the firsthand account. I'm just being cautious. This calms my nerves.

[snowboarder2713]

Good news everyone:

1) The LLS apartment/roommate classified systems is up and running for us. For a link, go to my first post or click here.

2) Apple is having a summer deal for us with it's education discount. If you buy a new mac (i.e. macbook, macbook pro, macbook air, imac...), you can get a free iPod Nano or iPod Touch. It's a rebate, but still that's a free $300 product right there. Details are here (LinkRemoved) and the promotion starts today and ends mid-September.

[gm907]

I'm not worried about either. The L2L person IMO is just stating what many students that aren't excelling in their regional law schools are facing. Yes, LLS probably could have done more, but that's life. You got to go out and find the jobs yourself sometimes. As for the Pepperdine thing, I'm not worried at all. I'm curious why their ranked one spot higher than us, but at the numbers I've looked at, it's probably something with how USNWR calculates its ratings rather than anything substantial at all.

This is all true generally, but the problem is that Loyola lags other similarly ranked schools like Brooklyn or Cardozo. I'm sure you've seen these links before.

--LinkRemoved--
--LinkRemoved--

If you're top 15%-20% ish at those schools you'll get a large firm job. At Loyola you need to be top 5% to 10%. On the other hand, those schools in a very expensive cold weather state so it might balance out.

[gm907]

Speaking of Ken Starr, isn't Loyola getting a new Dean soon?

[LBCLawGirl]

out of curiosity..is anyone doing anything in terms of reading/preparing before school starts? i've read a couple "How to Survive Law School" books but i dont know if i should start borrowing text books from people and skimming through them as i dont want to be counterproductive if its not the same books we'll have...just wondering if anyone was in the same boat?

[PugPug]

RANKINGS
Pepperdine jumped bec of their new dean - Ken Starr. The only numbers that went up on their score was how well known their faculty is. Its been joked about that we should pick Eliot Spitzer as our next dean and one-up Pepperdine. You be the judge.

If you want to be upset about anything regarding higher ranked schools, look into UCI opening up next year which supposedly will be ranked in the 30s just because its a UC and they stole some great profs from other schools. Loyola continuously refuses to "trade" the dean's vote on the USNWR with other schools to boost our ranking, and is constantly fighting off other schools trying to steal our amazing faculty. The rankings SUCK, are inescapable, so get over it.

NEIGHBORHOOD
Unless your planning to live in the new apt building opening up across the street, do you really care that much about the neighborhood around you that you can't even see because of the big fences and trees around the campus? We walked to and from Staples Center multiple times this year (yes, back from Staples at 10pm), drove home at 1 in the morning, and even had basketball games on campus at midnight a few times while studying for finals. Newsflash: none of us got shot.

Hey sorry- I didn't mean to make anyone mad or upset. I was just curious of other's opinions.

Too bad I don't need a new mac or ipod... Well actually nvm it's a good thing i don't need a new one b/c I'm already broke...

[senorsombrero]

I just withdrawaled after putting down the first deposit. Hopefully my 28k a year scholarship gets redistributed to you guys . Good luck class of 11!
Also, I am hardly from the ghetto (so i'm not immune to shitty neighborhoods ala the tenderloin), but if you're just going to Loyola during the day/early evening you have absolutely nothing to worry about as far as the neighborhood goes.

[gm907]

out of curiosity..is anyone doing anything in terms of reading/preparing before school starts? i've read a couple "how to survive law school" books but i dont know if i should start borrowing text books from people and skimming through them as i dont want to be counterproductive if its not the same books we'll have...just wondering if anyone was in the same boat?

I was told not to read anything from other profs. Supposedly the profs at Loyola are very subjective when grading. So you want your mind filled with what they say, not what Gilberts or Chemerinsky or whatever says.

But as soon as I find out who my profs are, I am going to download their outlines from outlinedepot.com

[snowboarder2713]

I agree with what gm907 said. The only books I'm reading are Law School Confidential and Getting to Maybe (which every law school student I've asked and has read the book told me they wish they read it earlier). I probably won't pick up commercial outlines, but really I may only buy E & E just to get a better idea of how to answer hypos.

[Herbellis]

I've read: "The law School Breakthrough", and "Acing your first year of Law School". I also have, "How to Ace Civil Procedure", but I think it's a bit over my head right now. I have an E&E coming soon. Property I think?

[snowboarder2713]

In all seriousness property could be a fun class. That's the class I sat in on at LLS and the class talked about ownership of a wild fox that was shot by one guy and found by another. Really interesting...

[Herbellis]

In all seriousness property could be a fun class. That's the class I sat in on at LLS and the class talked about ownership of a wild fox that was shot by one guy and found by another. Really interesting...

Really? I've been reading the boards about current law students, and property seemed universally hated by all?! I like the go get em attitude though.

[snowboarder2713]

Yea, I'll probably end up hating it to, but at least I won't exactly hate it going into it! What classes is everyone else looking forward to?