Top Law Schools

Hey all,

Let's say I wanted to torture myself and go to law school, what's the fastest way I can do that.

I'm 30, married, have kids, make about 100k+ right now, wife is going to law school in 2022 so I will continue to work at least through that. I never got a degree (I'm an immigrant) so would need to do that, unless there are schools that will allow you to matriculate without an undergrad?

So aside from the "you'll fail" "you're crazy" "It's too expensive" responses. What is the best and quickest way I can set myself up to get into law school for say 3-5 years from now, at the tender age of 33-35!

Thanks,

EDIT - Money is my love language, I am highly motivated by money (I work in tech sales), definitely not the smartest kid on the block, but worked my way into a pretty good salary right now, just would like to diversify my skill set (e.g work in big law, become a partner - yeah yeah, not very likely)

Do you actually want to be a lawyer? Law school is very expensive and takes you out of the workforce for 3 years. Given that you’ll also be foregoing your salary, you’ll effectively be spending over half a million dollars on law school.

And depending where you go, biglaw is super not guaranteed. And even if you get it, it’s not a very sustainable lifestyle for most people.

All to say, going to law school for the money may not be a good idea.

Fastest way? Study now, take the test in June, apply to an accelerated two year program as soon as applications become available. I believe Pepperdine has one.

better advice. Don't go to law school. You are married with children and have a six figure income. You've already hit the jackpot. Just because your wife makes law school look like fun doesn't mean you should do it too.

Do not go to law school if your only goal is to make money.

You already make money. So if you don't want to be a lawyer, law school is a dumb investment.

Thanks Everyone.

Just to clear things up, I actually *do* want to become a lawyer.

The plan would be big law for a few years then pivot to something more "meaningful" like Public Interest.

Thanks for the tip about pepperdine.

If biglaw is the goal then you should be very mindful of employment stats. You're basically only safe for biglaw in the top 14. After that it's a pretty precipitous drop, and really outside the top 20 or so it's basically only the very top students who get biglaw.

Because of the all or nothing nature of 1L grades, if you're not at a top school your ability to get biglaw depends on how like 8 tests are opaquely graded on a curve against all of the other students. If you have a bad test, get sick, or the professor just doesn't like your test, you're done. No biglaw.

As such, you should plan on getting the median outcome at whatever school you choose. If you really want biglaw then you should be aiming for T14. If you're not as set on biglaw then you should look at options where the median outcome is cool for you.

tim131 wrote: ↑

Sun Feb 21, 2021 3:40 pm

I never got a degree (I'm an immigrant) so would need to do that, unless there are schools that will allow you to matriculate without an undergrad?

I feel like the other posters are missing this. OP needs to first get some kind of UG degree (ideally with the highest possible GPA he can manage). Thus, the fastest way to a law degree for OP -- to answer the call of the question -- is probably one of the 3 + 3 programs like those offered by Iowa, Cincinnati, Syracuse, among others.