Top Law Schools

I tried searching for this but found nothing so if someone knows where this has been discussed before, I'll delete this.

I've been wanting to be a lawyer for a really long time now and so my goals of undergrad is just to make this possible. I would love to go to a place like UCLA or USC and live in California. However, I continue to think about something that may make this not as good as it seems. In the southern California area alone, there are so many great schools: Stanford, Boalt, USC, UCLA, Davis, etc., just to name a few. Now wouldn't the job prospects of a place like USC be much worse than a place such as Vanderbilt? Vanderbilt is in a location that, too my knowledge, really has no great schools surrounding it. Therefore, wouldn't law firms in Tennessee consider Vandy grads easily the best of the pool to hire from whereas if you come out USC with a JD, you are competing with at least two of the best schools in the country. Anyone have insight on this?

I'm going to give you a very large hint...

How many law firms are there in L.A.? How many in Tennessee?

Hippononymous wrote:I'm going to give you a very large hint...

How many law firms are there in L.A.? How many in Tennessee?

Math is hard...

PJENNEWE wrote:In the southern California area alone, there are so many great schools: Stanford, Boalt, USC, UCLA, Davis, etc., just to name a few.

You just named 5 schools, 3 of which are not in Southern California. Not to say that Northern California schools don't compete for jobs in LA, but there is a whole job market in SF/SV that may attract people to those schools.

bdubs wrote:

PJENNEWE wrote:In the southern California area alone, there are so many great schools: Stanford, Boalt, USC, UCLA, Davis, etc., just to name a few.

You just named 5 schools, 3 of which are not in Southern California. Not to say that Northern California schools don't compete for jobs in LA, but there is a whole job market in SF/SV that may attract people to those schools.

add the fact that S students compete nationally and B students are starting to extend their range. Take that with what Opie said about markets, and you have your answer.


That said, California's market is still pretty rough and Vandy places in more locations than just locally, so the difference between Vandy and UCLA/USC is basically a product of where you want to work

http://www.law.com/jsp/nlj/PubArticleNL ... slreturn=1

Two conclusions:

(1) Given the size of the population, there really aren't that many big law jobs in Southern CA.

(2) Texas! There are over 5000 big law jobs just in Dallas and Houston, and only one top school in the state. Of course, various other schools place well in to Texas as well (Duke, Vandy, et cetera).

AntipodeanPhil wrote:http://www.law.com/jsp/nlj/PubArticleNL ... slreturn=1

Of course, various other schools place well in to Texas as well (Duke, Vandy, et cetera).

Is this because of region do you think? I know TX is way further West than these schools, but my experience with people from Texas is that they distrust people from the North and from the West coast. Is it regionalism?

Opie wrote:

AntipodeanPhil wrote:http://www.law.com/jsp/nlj/PubArticleNL ... slreturn=1

Of course, various other schools place well in to Texas as well (Duke, Vandy, et cetera).

Is this because of region do you think? I know TX is way further West than these schools, but my experience with people from Texas is that they distrust people from the North and from the West coast. Is it regionalism?

I have to admit to not knowing. It just seems to be the received wisdom on TLS. I've read various threads that say the same thing. For example:

http://www.top-law-schools.com/forums/v ... 4&t=109644

The usual list is Duke, Vandy, and Virginia. I would guess two reasons: (1) people from Texas tend to go to those schools, and people from Texas tend to get jobs in Texas - because they want to, and because they can show strong ties; (2) Texas identifies with the South much more than it does with the West Coast and Northeast.

PJENNEWE wrote:I tried searching for this but found nothing so if someone knows where this has been discussed before, I'll delete this.

I've been wanting to be a lawyer for a really long time now and so my goals of undergrad is just to make this possible. I would love to go to a place like UCLA or USC and live in California. However, I continue to think about something that may make this not as good as it seems. In the southern California area alone, there are so many great schools: Stanford, Boalt, USC, UCLA, Davis, etc., just to name a few. Now wouldn't the job prospects of a place like USC be much worse than a place such as Vanderbilt? Vanderbilt is in a location that, too my knowledge, really has no great schools surrounding it. Therefore, wouldn't law firms in Tennessee consider Vandy grads easily the best of the pool to hire from whereas if you come out USC with a JD, you are competing with at least two of the best schools in the country. Anyone have insight on this?

In general, just go to the best school you get into. But if you know you for sure want SoCal, I would say UCLA/USC give you pretty good chances as long as you get good grades.

If you're not from California, don't automatically assume you'll enjoy living out here. Especially if you're from a medium sized city and are thinking of moving to LA. LA is HUGE (the city area stretches 75-100 miles in all directions) and can be overwhelming.