Penn State Dickinson School of Law 2012 Forum

[SoxyPirate]

I started shivering just reading that...

[mari]

Well, hang on now. The nice lady in the student affairs office sort of hinted that the bus route thing might be undergoing review. After all, the Katz Building has been occupied only since last December. They were so glad to get in there from the temporary buildings . . . .

The car pool thing is also very possible. The folks in the parking office say that the law school has discretion to allocate the student spots in the adjacent lot. The law school says they have chosen to give them to 3L's by lottery. BUT: wouldn't it make more sense to give at least some of the student spots to people who shared cars? Like a carpool lane on a freeway? For example, four or five of us could agree to meet at the commuter lot (or a coffee shop outside town?), and ride over to Katz in one vehicle, if that one vehicle could be parked in the adjacent lot. Anyway, since I am nearby and pushy by temperament, I will see whether I can float that idea.

And in nice weather, it's a nice walk. It doesn't always sleet at UP. Please don't be unduly alarmed, especially if you are young and spry.

[Clever username]

so far:

me
soxy
mari
sharp
jrab
Kevin
LSAT NC
A'nold?
who else???

Boxer
Golden
Basset
Cow dog +1

others?

Me.

[dkelch317]

I'm in: I sent my first deposit today (I received a 2-week extension)! I'm damn excited and honestly can't believe it. Just about a year ago I decided to take the LSAT and started studying, and now law school is a reality.

[bmdubs]

Just a note its PSU not UP.

[LSATfromNC]

Just a note its PSU not UP.

University Park, no?

[mari]

Just a note its PSU not UP.

I hear you. BUT, inside the Penn State system, they have started to refer to the main campus at State College as "University Park" or "UP." (Pronounced as: you pee.) I work at another campus (Altoona) and they say "you pee" all the time to refer to events at the main campus or directives emanating therefrom.

It was very hard for me to get used to this. "UP" traditionally meant "University of Pennsylvania" as opposed to "Penn State."

At Penn State and its "commonwealth campuses," no one says "PSU" or "pee ass you." We only type that in for our e-mail addresses: xxx@psu.edu. For those at University of Pennsylvania, it's xxx@upenn.edu, I think.

The other way of referring to UP (the "University Park" campus, or main campus) is "happy valley." I do not know why. I see it on teeshirts, etc. At first I thought it was a joke, like a good name for a mental hospital.

[starstruck393]

Just a note its PSU not UP.

I hear you. BUT, inside the Penn State system, they have started to refer to the main campus at State College as "University Park" or "UP." (Pronounced as: you pee.) I work at another campus (Altoona) and they say "you pee" all the time to refer to events at the main campus or directives emanating therefrom.

It was very hard for me to get used to this. "UP" traditionally meant "University of Pennsylvania" as opposed to "Penn State."

At Penn State and its "commonwealth campuses," no one says "PSU" or "pee ass you." We only type that in for our e-mail addresses: xxx@psu.edu. For those at University of Pennsylvania, it's xxx@upenn.edu, I think.

The other way of referring to UP (the "University Park" campus, or main campus) is "happy valley." I do not know why. I see it on teeshirts, etc. At first I thought it was a joke, like a good name for a mental hospital.

The real joke comes with the football stadium: Beaver Stadium in Happy Valley. Priceless.

[mari]

Today they posted the class schedules for next fall. I can see them because I am already in the system, as a part-time employee at another campus. Other new admits probably cannot see them yet. We all get registered automatically, anyway. Here is the link to the first-year curriculum: http://www.law.psu.edu/academics/required.cfm

The schedule shows "available seats," which usually indicates the capacity of the classroom assigned. From that info, it looks like there will be two sections at Carlisle of up to 80 people each, and three sections at University Park of up to 73 people each. At University Park, it looks like one of the sections will not have to come to campus on Fridays at all. I could be wrong.

The Writing sections are capped at 35. There are three of those sections in the schedule for Carlisle and six for University Park. All the writing sections are either MW or TTh; no Friday meetings. It looks like all Carlisle students and some UP students will have writing at 8 a.m. on MW.

[SoxyPirate]

Today they posted the class schedules for next fall. I can see them because I am already in the system, as a part-time employee at another campus. Other new admits probably cannot see them yet. We all get registered automatically, anyway. Here is the link to the first-year curriculum: http://www.law.psu.edu/academics/required.cfm

The schedule shows "available seats," which usually indicates the capacity of the classroom assigned. From that info, it looks like there will be two sections at Carlisle of up to 80 people each, and three sections at University Park of up to 73 people each. At University Park, it looks like one of the sections will not have to come to campus on Fridays at all. I could be wrong.

The Writing sections are capped at 35. There are three of those sections in the schedule for Carlisle and six for University Park. All the writing sections are either MW or TTh; no Friday meetings. It looks like all Carlisle students and some UP students will have writing at 8 a.m. on MW.

Damn that's a big incoming class.

Please don't let it be me.

[mari]

Oops, I am not so special as I thought.
Anyone can see the schedule here: --LinkRemoved--

[mari]

About parking at UP: Carpooling looks like a promising option. I just exchanged e-mail with the student who is chair of the orientation committee for the student government. She seems willing to ask the administration to designate a few carpool spaces in the lot near the Katz Building.

University policy allows a group of students to share a single parking hangtag (and the fee) if they apply together as a car pool. So, possibly, if some of us new 1L's can synchronize our schedules, we can put together our own little convenient carpools. This is do-able since you'll have the same schedule as the rest of your section. If the school comes through with the spaces, then this can be arranged at orientation after we know where we will be living.

[Clever username]

Oops, I am not so special as I thought.
Anyone can see the schedule here: --LinkRemoved--

It's nice to be able to see that and get some idea, but it doesn't do us a whole lot of good if we don't know what section we're in.

[Tsmith448]

Thanks for posting the link with the class schedule for the fall. I will be commuting from Harrisburg to the Carlisle campus, to save some $ at least for my first year.

Anyone else leaving a job to enroll in law school? If so just curious how much time you are giving yourself between your end date and first day of Orientation. I feel like I should take a month off because I know once school starts I want to focus all of my efforts to doing as well as I can.

I have lived in PA my entire life and will never call State College or Main Campus, university park or "up". They can try as hard as they want it just won't happen for me.

Also wanted to give a little love to all those that decided for Carlisle campus.

[AMo4Sho]

Penn State jumps to 65 in rankings! How sick is that?

[Jones, Dow]

Penn State is a rising star that will crack the top 50 in the next 5 years if not sooner given its large jump this year. It has excellent name recognition, a strong college alumni base resulting in great contributions, and a lack of any strong competition outside of Penn, which will always be a top 10 law school.

Holla!!

[dkelch317]

Penn State jumps to 65 in rankings! How sick is that?

This is so friggin sweet. I'm so happy I chose PSU

[aguyingeorgia]

Congrats to all. Just curious if any of you are headed into the part-time program?

[Jones, Dow]

The adcom told me that they aren't admitting any more PT students (this year included). She said that there wasn't enough demand, which makes sense for a college town. Anyone else confirm this?

Edited

[swc5018]

hey all, new to the forum... going to UP (or "Main Campus" as i remember it being called) in the fall. went to PSU for undergrad so i can def help answer any ?s. anyone else looking for a place to live w/ a dog?? i need to find a roomie to cut the rent in half and the school website sucks for finding people.

[Jones, Dow]

Damn that's a big incoming class.

yeah, this might hurt us next year in the rankings. THey hired a bunch of professors which got the student teacher ratio to 10.? : 1 and it probably contributed quite a bit to the rankings jump. When all of us scrubs get there it might water that number down and it will hurt the ranking.

[Jones, Dow]

hey all, new to the forum... going to UP (or "Main Campus" as i remember it being called) in the fall. went to PSU for undergrad so i can def help answer any ?s. anyone else looking for a place to live w/ a dog?? i need to find a roomie to cut the rent in half and the school website sucks for finding people.

Are you in the facebook group? THat's a good place to start looking for a roomie.

[Clever username]

Damn that's a big incoming class.

yeah, this might hurt us next year in the rankings. THey hired a bunch of professors which got the student teacher ratio to 10.? : 1 and it probably contributed quite a bit to the rankings jump. When all of us scrubs get there it might water that number down and it will hurt the ranking.

I was told by Elena DeLuca at the scholarship dinner that they expected the class to still be in the range of 200-250, as it has been for at least the past few years. She said they have the capacity to expand if they want to or get an unexpectedly high number of attendees, for lack of a better word, but she said she still sees the class as being in that range. It could just be that the sections could accomodate that many people, not necessarily that they will.

[Jones, Dow]

Damn that's a big incoming class.

yeah, this might hurt us next year in the rankings. THey hired a bunch of professors which got the student teacher ratio to 10.? : 1 and it probably contributed quite a bit to the rankings jump. When all of us scrubs get there it might water that number down and it will hurt the ranking.

I was told by Elena DeLuca at the scholarship dinner that they expected the class to still be in the range of 200-250, as it has been for at least the past few years. She said they have the capacity to expand if they want to or get an unexpectedly high number of attendees, for lack of a better word, but she said she still sees the class as being in that range. It could just be that the sections could accomodate that many people, not necessarily that they will.

My only problem with what she is saying is that I think it's in the school's best interest to have as few sections as possible (it costs additional money to have more, etc.). So by the way I'm looking at this, which i really don't want to explain right now, the absolute minimum they would enroll at UP would be ~151 and obviously the max was something like 75*3 sections (225). So a pretty conservative expectation would be 188 for UP. I think we're looking at a total class size closer to 300-320.

[aguyingeorgia]

They make money by expanding the class size if they can fill it.

Any of you all hear about some of the crap they pulled last year with the p-t kids that started in the summer, and how they gave them all this jazz about how they would be able to grade into the full time program, then were told that only 1-2 of them were going to be able to based on a special curve they were instituting. Shady.

Damn that's a big incoming class.

yeah, this might hurt us next year in the rankings. THey hired a bunch of professors which got the student teacher ratio to 10.? : 1 and it probably contributed quite a bit to the rankings jump. When all of us scrubs get there it might water that number down and it will hurt the ranking.

I was told by Elena DeLuca at the scholarship dinner that they expected the class to still be in the range of 200-250, as it has been for at least the past few years. She said they have the capacity to expand if they want to or get an unexpectedly high number of attendees, for lack of a better word, but she said she still sees the class as being in that range. It could just be that the sections could accomodate that many people, not necessarily that they will.

My only problem with what she is saying is that I think it's in the school's best interest to have as few sections as possible (it costs additional money to have more, etc.). So by the way I'm looking at this, which i really don't want to explain right now, the absolute minimum they would enroll at UP would be ~151 and obviously the max was something like 75*3 sections (225). So a pretty conservative expectation would be 188 for UP. I think we're looking at a total class size closer to 300-320.