Thinking about dropping out Forum

[ScaredWorkedBored]

If you don't actually want to practice law, you should drop out. But then again, people in that situation shouldn't have gone to law school in the first place.

Where you planning on making a career of practicing law or not? Career lawyers who are any good at all won't be earning $60K for life.

[---why---]

Have you been to Career Services?

Yes, PM me if you want details. Nothing all that interesting, but I had an hour metting yesterday. Heading over to undergrad OCS today.

[teaadntoast]

Dude, I love your spirit. I really do. In fact, I even loved law school and learning my first month or two. The cases were awesome and the professors were smart, etc. etc. However, to think that you know EXACTLY what you want to do with your life (being a public interest lawyer) or anything else at such a young age is a gamble itself. You will have a family one day with kids you want to send to a nice college, a wife who wants things, etc. Do some people "love" being a lawyer so much to make 60k a year forever? Yes. Is anything wrong with that? No. Are many of those people happy? yes. But don't fool yourself - you will be giving up many things in your life. Is it silly to question that? Lets be honest we aren't "average" people. If you got into a top law school by either scoring a 170+ on your LSAT or doing really well your first year and transfering, you are smart enough to do well in another industry.

I'll say it again - some CLS will be out of jobs this year - why not me? Also, those 100% job rates are not true. As a professor said yesterday, "the school is bothering me to create year long jobs all the time"

OS, you hear that? You're apparently moving to Massachusetts.

And, again, no one said there weren't going to be compromises.

You seem to have already made up your mind and are increasingly peeved that we aren't validating your decision.

You have two options: ride it out, keep trying, make peace with the idea that you may not get the sort of job you wanted (or any during this hiring cycle) and press on, or drop out.

It's also more than a little hilarious that you're thinking of jumping into real estate. In New York. Now. Frying pan ---> Fire.

[---why---]

If you don't actually want to practice law, you should drop out. But then again, people in that situation shouldn't have gone to law school in the first place.

Where you planning on making a career of practicing law or not? Career lawyers who are any good at all won't be earning $60K for life.

This is just wrong. Plenty of Public Interest Lawyers make around this (many less).

Second, the "why did you go to law school if you didn't really want to be a lawyer" people are just so mislead. Not everyone in this world goes into a profession with deep love of the grind. Plus, how many 1ls really want to be a lawyer? We make educated guesses about these sorts of things. We have no idea what being a lawyer really means.

[etwake]

As some of you know, I'm a transfer student at Columbia. I was top 20% at Indiana. I ended up with two callbacks. One rejection so far and the other firm didn't sound too encouraging. Since you all will ask, I consider myself an above average/very good interviewer. I will apply for government jobs, but realize that they are difficult to get and don't pay that well. I can make 40k a year doing other things (besides gov. work) and save a bunch of money. I will probably also attend the undergraduate job fair and see what they have to offer. I am open to doing pretty much anything. For what its worth, I don't feel like I deserve anything. I am a little bit down, but not "giving up." I simply wonder if this is the best decision. I also don't regret transferring. I will answer questions as well.

Given that this is now one day after the deadline for applying to DOJ I've bumped maybe 4 times in the last two weeks, I'm not going to spend a lot of time trying to convince you the world isn't over. When you are ready to take the big-law blinders off. Feel free to PM me.

thats good, douche, because he was asking you specifically...

Is the D-word making a comeback? Perhaps you don't really know me, but I'm being serious. When OP is ready to think about government, I'm in the know and can help. He hasn't asked me specifically, but I'm letting him know he can ask me.

If you want to be an internet tough guy, take it somewhere else.

+1. Read some of USAIRS posts, and s/he has been extremely helpful; definitely one of the most helpful posters I've encountered on TLS. Throwing out the D-Bag was uncalled for. That internet garbage that detracts from the quality of TLS and the wealth of information its users bring to the table.

[ToTransferOrNot]

As far as dropping out goes, I actually gave it serious thought as well. I'm in a very similar situation to you; was at Wisconsin, transferred to Chicago, essentially struck out at OCI. On a secondary journal here, was top 1% at my old school, etc--I figured I would end up with *something.* I've decided not to drop out for the following reasons:


The "utilitarian":

1.) I really do believe that I want to be a lawyer, at least based on what I've seen of the profession thus far. It is intellectually challenging, intense work (the long hours are a plus to me)

2.) My backup plans aren't particularlly good. I have a degree in music education. Surviving on my performing chops isn't plausible anymore, the job prospects for the kind of music teacher I am (I'm not qualified to do elementary music, I can only do middle/high school) are rather low, and I don't think the profession is where my heart is. I suppose I could go teach English in China or something.

3.) Our best chance to salvage anything from this nightmare is to land a decent clerking gig to buy us a year, and the chances of that happening are greatly increased being at Columbia/Chicago over Indiana/Wisconsin.

The "non-utilitarian":

1.) I worked too goddamned hard to transfer to my dream school to give it up.

Take that for what you will--feel free to PM me if you want to chat in more detail.

P.S.--the set of people who transferred in to Columbia from Indiana is probably very small. I wouldn't admit to doing the online poker thing to help pay for school, even though it isn't really enforced...

[---why---]

Dude, I love your spirit. I really do. In fact, I even loved law school and learning my first month or two. The cases were awesome and the professors were smart, etc. etc. However, to think that you know EXACTLY what you want to do with your life (being a public interest lawyer) or anything else at such a young age is a gamble itself. You will have a family one day with kids you want to send to a nice college, a wife who wants things, etc. Do some people "love" being a lawyer so much to make 60k a year forever? Yes. Is anything wrong with that? No. Are many of those people happy? yes. But don't fool yourself - you will be giving up many things in your life. Is it silly to question that? Lets be honest we aren't "average" people. If you got into a top law school by either scoring a 170+ on your LSAT or doing really well your first year and transfering, you are smart enough to do well in another industry.

I'll say it again - some CLS will be out of jobs this year - why not me? Also, those 100% job rates are not true. As a professor said yesterday, "the school is bothering me to create year long jobs all the time"

OS, you hear that? You're apparently moving to Massachusetts.

And, again, no one said there weren't going to be compromises.

You seem to have already made up your mind and are increasingly peeved that we aren't validating your decision.

You have two options: ride it out, keep trying, make peace with the idea that you may not get the sort of job you wanted (or any during this hiring cycle) and press on, or drop out.

It's also more than a little hilarious that you're thinking of jumping into real estate. In New York. Now. Frying pan ---> Fire.

I'm not sure what this whole post really means. If I have to make compromises, I will. If OS wants to work for the gov., that is fine. I don't share this view at this point.

Also, I'm not going to talk about other people's backgrounds, but I have paid for everything in my life. I know how hard it is to make money, and I know about making sacrafices.

[GATORTIM]

Do some people "love" being a lawyer so much to make 60k a year forever? Yes. Is anything wrong with that? No. Are many of those people happy? yes. But don't fool yourself - you will be giving up many things in your life. Is it silly to question that? Lets be honest we aren't "average" people. If you got into a top law school by either scoring a 170+ on your LSAT or doing really well your first year and transfering, you are smart enough to do well in another industry.

I'll say it again - some CLS will be out of jobs this year - why not me? Also, those 100% job rates are not true. As a professor said yesterday, "the school is bothering me to create year long jobs all the time"

Bro, just f'n drop out. I have learned things about you from your posts: 1. You went to LS for the wrong reasons (dreams of the big-bucs in "biglaw", whatever the hell that is) and 2. You have a completely distorted perception on what it is like in the real world.

I have 6-7 years of work experience and can assure you that your view of salaries is dead wrong. Sure, there are many pullin' in the six-figure salaries, but the overwhelming majority of professionals and workforce in general is in that 60-70k rut you speak of. If you quit law school what f'n gurantee do you have that you would be successful with your bachelor's degree and a year of LS under your belt? Maybe it would be good for you to quit and get a dose of reality and then perhaps you could achieve some focus and perhaps go back to LS with the knowledge that you should have quit you bitching, stuck it out and enjoyed your 3 years there in the first place. I can assure you that more than half of any person's success in life is not the institutions named stamped on his/her JD, but their enthusiasm, motivation and desire to be the best in whatever field they study. With your "I'll just quit" attitude, you likely would have struck out in a variety of interviews, regardless of field.

[rayiner]

If you don't actually want to practice law, you should drop out. But then again, people in that situation shouldn't have gone to law school in the first place.

Where you planning on making a career of practicing law or not? Career lawyers who are any good at all won't be earning $60K for life.

This is just wrong. Plenty of public interest lawyers make around this (many less).

Second, the "why did you go to law school if you didn't really want to be a lawyer" people are just so mislead. Not everyone in this world goes into a profession with deep love of the grind. Plus, how many 1ls really want to be a lawyer? We make educated guesses about these sorts of things. We have no idea what being a lawyer really means.

Do you want us to validate your making a $200k decision without knowing what you were getting yourself into?

[rayiner]

It's interesting that the ones who are most positive about the OP's situation seem to be first years who didn't go through this year's OCI. A lot of really qualified people won't get jobs this year. Platitudes about "being happy at your school" and just waiting for the economy to sort itself out show a denial of reality and are useless to the OP. What the economy is like in 2011 is irrelevant. We 2Ls are getting our jobs now, in this economy.

Yes, because all the available employment info is only given out at 2L OCI to students who are barred from posting that info on ATL, naldirectory, TLS, etc. Further, non-2Ls are barred from talking with lawyers, looking at job openings, etc.

What the 2Ls really have is a sense of panic and despair from being the sheep in the slaughter pen. That is making them miss some very basic facts like: $60k/year small-law firms aren't on the biglaw recruiting schedule. Most people at schools outside the T14 never got 2L SAs through OCI. They got their small-firm jobs at graduation/after taking the bar. This will continue to be the case when OP graduates.

Also, this stuff about making "$60k forever" is amusing. Yeah, boo-hoo, your timing was bad and you're in the lost class and your life sucks. That doesn't mean you get to abandon all rationality and the pretense of trying to make a reasoned decision. Lawyers get raises like everyone else. They have upwards career mobility. Some of the shit in this thread is truly ridiculous. OP would've made more money not going to college and working at McDonalds? Really? Do you realize how much an *average* person makes, much less someone working in food service?

I'm a money-grubbing bastard, but the sense of entitlement is shocking even to me. All you need to get into a top law school is a somewhat decent GPA (and not even that) and a good performance on a 4-hour exam. That doesn't make you a f--king badass. If you want to take your chances in a non-legal career, be my guest. I'm sure you'll rise rapidly through the ranks at your $40k/year job and be making baller money before the rest of us graduate law school.

Well, rayiner, you should keep in mind that to the extent OP would feel entitled (it doesn't seem he does,) it isn't based only on UGPA and LSAT. It's based on that and kicking the hell out of 1L year, giving up LR at his original school, and probably taking a significant increase in loans.

I'm not talking about his decision to transfer. I'm talking about his general attitude. His performance 1L year is just another GPA. More learning how to do something. OP has yet to actually do anything. His sense of entitlement is completely out of proportion with his position.

OP came to this thread to ask for advice regarding dropping out. He has received advice regarding dropping out. Now, he's just whining about how shitty his job prospects are.

[---why---]

Do some people "love" being a lawyer so much to make 60k a year forever? Yes. Is anything wrong with that? No. Are many of those people happy? yes. But don't fool yourself - you will be giving up many things in your life. Is it silly to question that? Lets be honest we aren't "average" people. If you got into a top law school by either scoring a 170+ on your LSAT or doing really well your first year and transfering, you are smart enough to do well in another industry.

I'll say it again - some CLS will be out of jobs this year - why not me? Also, those 100% job rates are not true. As a professor said yesterday, "the school is bothering me to create year long jobs all the time"

Bro, just f'n drop out. I have learned things about you from your posts: 1. You went to LS for the wrong reasons (dreams of the big-bucs in "biglaw", whatever the hell that is) and 2. You have a completely distorted perception on what it is like in the real world.

I have 6-7 years of work experience and can assure you that your view of salaries is dead wrong. Sure, there are many pullin' in the six-figure salaries, but the overwhelming majority of professionals and workforce in general is in that 60-70k rut you speak of. If you quit law school what f'n gurantee do you have that you would be successful with your bachelor's degree and a year of LS under your belt? Maybe it would be good for you to quit and get a dose of reality and then perhaps you could achieve some focus and perhaps go back to LS with the knowledge that you should have quit you bitching, stuck it out and enjoyed your 3 years there in the first place. I can assure you that more than half of any person's success in life is not the institutions named stamped on his/her JD, but their enthusiasm, motivation and desire to be the best in whatever field they study. With your "I'll just quit" attitude, you likely would have struck out in a variety of interviews, regardless of field.

I hve mad over $100,000 a year for the last 5 years. Thanks for asking.

[OperaSoprano]

Dude, I love your spirit. I really do. In fact, I even loved law school and learning my first month or two. The cases were awesome and the professors were smart, etc. etc. However, to think that you know EXACTLY what you want to do with your life (being a public interest lawyer) or anything else at such a young age is a gamble itself. You will have a family one day with kids you want to send to a nice college, a wife who wants things, etc. Do some people "love" being a lawyer so much to make 60k a year forever? Yes. Is anything wrong with that? No. Are many of those people happy? yes. But don't fool yourself - you will be giving up many things in your life. Is it silly to question that? Lets be honest we aren't "average" people. If you got into a top law school by either scoring a 170+ on your LSAT or doing really well your first year and transfering, you are smart enough to do well in another industry.

I'll say it again - some CLS will be out of jobs this year - why not me? Also, those 100% job rates are not true. As a professor said yesterday, "the school is bothering me to create year long jobs all the time"

OS, you hear that? You're apparently moving to Massachusetts.

And, again, no one said there weren't going to be compromises.

You seem to have already made up your mind and are increasingly peeved that we aren't validating your decision.

You have two options: ride it out, keep trying, make peace with the idea that you may not get the sort of job you wanted (or any during this hiring cycle) and press on, or drop out.

It's also more than a little hilarious that you're thinking of jumping into real estate. In New York. Now. Frying pan ---> Fire.

Apparently so. If I was a lesbian, perhaps fewer "well meaning" people would pester me to marry my way out of my student loans. If I wanted to be a trophy wife, why the hell would I be in law school? Sorry, mini rant over.

I do want kids some day, and I'm aware that PI work is not well compensated. I'll have to make choices and sacrifices, and hopefully whomever I marry will have some income, even if he won't be a hedge fund manager. It seems that dual income families are the norm these days, and have been for at least a generation.

Next up: I'm pretty much straight up average. No 170 for me. It's probably my own fault for having failed to study in a manner that was even minimally productive, but that's water under the bridge now. I don't have the luxury of glamorous expectations.

Still, my aim is not to criticize you, OP. You worked hard to transfer to CLS, and I respect that. I don't think you should excoriate yourself for your perceived flaws, whatever they may be. You do have to decide whether you enjoy the law, though. You're right: few of us know for sure when we come to law school whether we'll even like this profession. If you legitimately don't (and I hated my first field), you have every right to go find something that will make you happy. If you want a CLS JD, though, you still have options, and better options than most law students are facing right now.

[---why---]

If you don't actually want to practice law, you should drop out. But then again, people in that situation shouldn't have gone to law school in the first place.

Where you planning on making a career of practicing law or not? Career lawyers who are any good at all won't be earning $60K for life.

This is just wrong. Plenty of public interest lawyers make around this (many less).

Second, the "why did you go to law school if you didn't really want to be a lawyer" people are just so mislead. Not everyone in this world goes into a profession with deep love of the grind. Plus, how many 1ls really want to be a lawyer? We make educated guesses about these sorts of things. We have no idea what being a lawyer really means.

Do you want us to validate your making a $200k decision without knowing what you were getting yourself into?

SIgh - I'm not sure that this is worth replying to. I made a $200k decision knowing the risks involved. If you invest in a stock based on solid info it can still go down. Do you just keep it? Or think about alternatives?

[GATORTIM]

I hve mad over $100,000 a year for the last 5 years. Thanks for asking.

Ha! I didn't, but thanks for sharing...Teddy KGB.

[---why---]

Dude, I love your spirit. I really do. In fact, I even loved law school and learning my first month or two. The cases were awesome and the professors were smart, etc. etc. However, to think that you know EXACTLY what you want to do with your life (being a public interest lawyer) or anything else at such a young age is a gamble itself. You will have a family one day with kids you want to send to a nice college, a wife who wants things, etc. Do some people "love" being a lawyer so much to make 60k a year forever? Yes. Is anything wrong with that? No. Are many of those people happy? yes. But don't fool yourself - you will be giving up many things in your life. Is it silly to question that? Lets be honest we aren't "average" people. If you got into a top law school by either scoring a 170+ on your LSAT or doing really well your first year and transfering, you are smart enough to do well in another industry.

I'll say it again - some CLS will be out of jobs this year - why not me? Also, those 100% job rates are not true. As a professor said yesterday, "the school is bothering me to create year long jobs all the time"

OS, you hear that? You're apparently moving to Massachusetts.

And, again, no one said there weren't going to be compromises.

You seem to have already made up your mind and are increasingly peeved that we aren't validating your decision.

You have two options: ride it out, keep trying, make peace with the idea that you may not get the sort of job you wanted (or any during this hiring cycle) and press on, or drop out.

It's also more than a little hilarious that you're thinking of jumping into real estate. In New York. Now. Frying pan ---> Fire.

Apparently so. If I was a lesbian, perhaps fewer "well meaning" people would pester me to marry my way out of my student loans. If I wanted to be a trophy wife, why the hell would I be in law school? Sorry, mini rant over.

I do want kids some day, and I'm aware that PI work is not well compensated. I'll have to make choices and sacrifices, and hopefully whomever I marry will have some income, even if he won't be a hedge fund manager. It seems that dual income families are the norm these days, and have been for at least a generation.

Next up: I'm pretty much straight up average. No 170 for me. It's probably my own fault for having failed to study in a manner that was even minimally productive, but that's water under the bridge now. I don't have the luxury of glamorous expectations.

Still, my aim is not to criticize you, OP. You worked hard to transfer to CLS, and I respect that. I don't think you should excoriate yourself for your perceived flaws, whatever they may be. You do have to decide whether you enjoy the law, though. You're right: few of us know for sure when we come to law school whether we'll even like this profession. If you legitimately don't (and I hated my first field), you have every right to go find something that will make you happy. If you want a CLS JD, though, you still have options, and better options than most law students are facing right now.

Sorry, didn't mean to call you a man. You are a plenty respectful poster.

However, the whole "you still have options" opinon is just not going to be true for many people.

[teaadntoast]

I'm not sure what this whole post really means. If I have to make compromises, I will. If OS wants to work for the gov., that is fine. I don't share this view at this point.

Lord.

My point is this: You have been told several times over the course of this thread that your situation, while certainly dire in the moment, is not completely hopeless, and that your prospects are potentially bright in the long run. You have also been given at least a few pieces of advice about how you might enhance your job search. None of this appears to have made you feel any better, and you continue to return to the theme of, "There's nothing there and I don't want to keep going if I can't be certain there's a paycheck of $X at the end." That's fine. It's your life and you know what's best for you - which may mean dropping out.

My comment about OS had to do with you referencing a wife and children. If OS were to marry a woman, she's have to move to Mass.

Also, I'm not going to talk about other people's backgrounds, but I have paid for everything in my life. I know how hard it is to make money, and I know about making sacrafices.

I'm not at all sure why this is relevant. No one ever implied that you don't understand the value of a dollar or haven't done an honest day's work. Pointing out that your expectations may be unrealistic is not the same thing.

And whether we think they are doesn't matter. Again, it's your life and you know what you want and need to be happy. For someone on a different path things may appear substantially less gloomy, and maybe hearing his or her perspective or outlook will give you ideas or perk you up or what have you. If it doesn't, that's fine. No harm, no foul. But it does seem as though you're a bit testy with us for not arriving at the same conclusions you have.

[rayiner]

I hve mad over $100,000 a year for the last 5 years. Thanks for asking.

I can make 40k a year doing other things (besides gov. work) and save a bunch of money.

Am I missing something?

[rayiner]

SIgh - I'm not sure that this is worth replying to. I made a $200k decision knowing the risks involved. If you invest in a stock based on solid info it can still go down. Do you just keep it? Or think about alternatives?

Buying a stock involves a lot less of a personal investment. It's more like agreeing to join a startup company with a guy you don't know in a market you're not sure you want to be in.

Either way, I'm not chastising you for considering your alternatives. I'm chastising you for being unrealistic about your alternatives. Though if you're making $100k/year outside the law, my advice changes completely. The question you asked was "CLS degree versus 40k/year job", not "CLS degree versus 100k/year job"!

[etwake]

Is it impossible to pay off debt without a six figure salary? No.

Almost. Let's say you make 50k before taxes. For simplicities sake, we'll be conservative and say you take home 36k. If you have 160k in debt at 7% interest, if you paid 1k a month, you'd never touch the principle, but only be covering the interest. 1/3 of your post-tax income just to not fall deeper in the hole.

Even paying off 160k when you make 90 is not exactly fun.

Umm. OK, well post tax that 60K is about $40K, and 8.5% interest on $170K (let's assume OP paid $30K for his first year and there was no interest accrual across the three years for simplicity sake) is $14.5K a year. So you would need to pay more then $14.5K a year just to pay down your loans. So OP paid $20K each year and lived off the remaining $20K, then all that would be paid off is about $5K off the principle of $170K. So do that for another 8 billion year and live like a homeless person (or actually be homeless), then yes, his loans may eventually get paid off.

Fail fail fail fail fail fail fail fail fail.

First, major caveat: under the new federal IBR program, the burden becomes even easier.

Second, let's Do some Math: You just graduated from Columbia and are dead last in the class. Bummer! But you score a 60K job anyway. Inflation and raises mysteriously grind to a halt.

Assumption: $180,000 in accumulated debt, 8% interest rate (since some will be lower rate stafford loans)

Let's assume throw CoL to the wind and live in New York City, shall we?

Salary Paycheck Calculator (--LinkRemoved-- )

Weekly Gross Pay $1,153.85 = 60K/year
Net Pay after all federal, NYS, and NYC taxes: $771.07 = $40K/year, 3,341/month.

Now let's toss 180K at 8% into a loan calculator and try to pay this bad boy down in 30 years. Monthly payment? 1320.78

Subtract it from our net pay above and we get after taxes and loans actual, spendable income of *drum roll* 2020.22 per month for living, eating, and shopping

ZOMG YOU'RE LOANZ WILL NEVAR BE PAID OFF AND U WILL STARTVE

NOBODY IN AMERICA NOW OR EVER HAS EVER SURVIVED ON SUCH A PALTRY SUM!11!11!! LOANZ WILL NEVER EVER BE PAID OFF.

Look, I understand you might not like math... but try it sometimes before you make yourself look /too/ stupid on the internet.

[OS, do I get a gold star?]

This is the dumbest post I have ever read. WHO THE FUCK PLANS ON PAYING OFF STUDENT LOANS FOR 30 YEARS?!!?!??!?!? I mean seriously, forget about getting a house, having kids and everything else because you take home a pitiful $2K a month to live off prior to paying additional loans on your home mortgage and other things you need to buy in life. I guess if you plan on being homeless and living out of a cardboard box, like reasonable_man probably does, then it is all good, but otherwise hell no this isn't a good deal.

???? This is the most reasonable post I've seen so far. Most people I know that spend $150k on a house take out a 30 year mortgage, so what's the problem with taking out $180k in students loans and paying it off over 30 years? If you're only making $60k/yr to start out, then you're options are limited. $2,200 is not a whole lot of money, but its not impossible to live off of for a few years, until you can work your way up the pay scale (Which, believe it or not, your starting pay could possibly increase over time)

[rayiner]

No one ever implied that you don't understand the value of a dollar or haven't done an honest day's work. Pointing out that your expectations may be unrealistic is not the same thing.

To be fair, I was certainly implying that. Because:

Wait, people are smarter than me? Or better interviewers? Or have work experience? Thanks.

[teaadntoast]

To be fair, I was certainly implying that. Because:

Wait, people are smarter than me? Or better interviewers? Or have work experience? Thanks.

Ah, I missed that exchange.

Apologies for confusion.

[OperaSoprano]

Sorry, didn't mean to call you a man. You are a plenty respectful poster.

However, the whole "you still have options" opinon is just not going to be true for many people.

LOL, no harm done. What happens to me is beside the point, though. You have an important decision to make. If being a lawyer means taking a pay cut for you, only you can decide whether that's worthwhile. If you don't enjoy actual practice, maybe it isn't. There's no judgment involved here. I got plenty of grief for leaving fashion, but it was the right choice for me, and I'm not sorry I did it.

[dresden doll]

Am I missing something here? OP has stated he had 2 callbacks, no? So he didn't exactly strike out at the OCI - he just didn't get as many options out of it as he might have liked. Presumably, callbacks typically turn into offers, so why not do those callbacks and see if either results in an offer?

This whole thread seems predicated on the notion that OP got nothing out of the OCI. With 2 callbacks, that doesn't seem quite accurate.

[KingJones]

Drop out you coward. If something like this makes you give up and cry, then by all means drop out. If you can't handle this, you will never be able to handle it when you're thrown into the tank of sharks called the "real world."

Don't let the door hit you on the way out.

[Anonymous User]

Am I missing something here? OP has stated he had 2 callbacks, no? So he didn't exactly strike out at the OCI - he just didn't get as many options out of it as he might have liked. Presumably, callbacks typically turn into offers, so why not do those callbacks and see if either results in an offer?

This whole thread seems predicated on the notion that OP got nothing out of the OCI. With 2 callbacks, that doesn't seem quite accurate.

In prior years, the standard notion was that a callback gave you 50/50 on an offer. I know that the two firms I've done callbacks with (I'm not the OP) are obviously doing far more callbacks than they have slots for offers.