Top Law Schools

I'm a junior at a top 15 school in the Midwest - and I want to return to California for law school - eventually working in Los Angeles or the Bay Area. My LSAT score is 174, and I have a 3.99 GPA. My softs are fine (alot of school organizations, some internships, quite a bit of service work, etc.) but not eye-popping by any means.

My dad is encouraging me to apply to T14 schools - but I'm unsure whether I'll get in, or obtain decent scholarship money - but most importantly, I don't want to end up in the East or Midwest long-term. I'm worried about going down the rabbit hole of graduating from a non-California law school, getting that attractive first job offer in the East . . . and never returning to California. Any advice on an approach that will increase my chances of landing in California - without necessarily attending Stanford (super reach), Berkeley (reach) or UCLA?

With your numbers you're in a great spot for scholarship money at UCLA/Berkeley.

If you're from California, getting back from a T14 won't be too hard.

In your shoes I'd apply to most of the T14 (can skip a couple) plus UCLA and UC Irvine. Maybe one or two more CA schools with good reputations (Pepperdine, UC Hastings, etc.).

You should apply to basically the whole T14, and probably add UCLA / USC. Your stats are great, and you'll get into a bunch of them, probably with good scholarship offers. Then you can use scholarship offers from schools you're less interested in to get better offers from schools you are interested in (i.e., Berkeley might be willing to give you more money if it's competing with a big scholarship offer from Michigan).

Ultimately, if your best offer is from a non-CA school, that might be the best choice. It can be fun to go somewhere new for 3 years, and any T14 can give you a good shot at getting a CA job.

I had worse stats than you, and I got into Stanford, fwiw (although I think work experience helped).

Lol, can't believe I forgot USC. The above advice is great.

I think you should be able to get scholarships at Berkeley, UCLA, and USC. I had a slightly worse LSAT and slightly better GPA than you and got 80% tuition at UCLA and Berkeley, and a full ride + cost of living at USC.

Apply to the University of Chicago law school in hope of being offered a Ruby scholarship which covers almost the entire COA. Then let the Chicago weather dictate your first career move.

And I agree that you should apply to any T-14 law school that is of interest to you as well as UC-Berkeley, UCLA, & USC.

HamlinMcgill wrote: ↑

Mon Jan 25, 2021 2:22 pm

You should apply to basically the whole T14, and probably add UCLA / USC. Your stats are great, and you'll get into a bunch of them, probably with good scholarship offers. Then you can use scholarship offers from schools you're less interested in to get better offers from schools you are interested in (i.e., Berkeley might be willing to give you more money if it's competing with a big scholarship offer from Michigan).

Ultimately, if your best offer is from a non-CA school, that might be the best choice. It can be fun to go somewhere new for 3 years, and any T14 can give you a good shot at getting a CA job.

I had worse stats than you, and I got into Stanford, fwiw (although I think work experience helped).

Definitely apply to all T14s to play the scholarship game. Agree that you’ll have no problem landing in CA if you set your mind to it from any T14, but it’ll be the path of least resistance if you land at Berkeley or Stanford.

I also had worse stats than you and frankly unexceptional softs and I am an SLS grad so you never know. Hope you have a great cycle!