Top Law Schools

Need educated opinions on the following: I am a 1L with 3.0 GPA, 53rd out of 135, which puts me only in the “top” 37%-40% or so. I like my school, it is quite inexpensive, in one of the Midwest states, low living expenses, great outdoors, but not too close to the geographic areas where I want to end up working. That means I can not obtain good connections, summer internships etc., even though I have previous paralegal experience.

Here are my preferences:

Wash DC (certain foreign language skill is my advantage, but town seems too humid)
Chicago (Large market, interesting city, too competitive and too cold?)
Denver (I just like the climate and outdoors there, in CO)
Phily (Never been there but also large market, closer to DC)
Pittsburgh (Never been there, just climate/area considerations, and not too expensive compare to DC or Phily, smaller market?)
Seattle, SF, LA maybe (I lived in CA, hate LA with all my heart).
As you can see, those are large markets, some on the cooler side.

I am curious if I have a chance to transfer to not too expensive T2 in any those cities,
and weather any T3s will make sense and give me what I need - get a job eventually. What would be my best bets in those towns?

Thanks a bunch

http://www.top-law-schools.com/forums/v ... e+transfer

To transfer into the T1 you need:
-top 10-20% at a T2
-top 5-10% at T3
-top 5% at T4

.

You definitely know best, but it sounds to me like you're pretty happy with where you're at.

Big Tuna wrote:Wash DC - Catholic
Chicago - Loyola, Depaul, Chicago-Kent, IU Indianapolis, Marquette
Denver - U Denver
Phily - Nova, PSU, Temple
Pittsburgh - Pitt, Case Western, WVU?
Seattle, SF, LA - Lewis and Clark, USF, Seattle U, Gonzaga, Pacific

I think some of those are aiming pretty high. I know Temple specifically states they won't consider anyone below 20%.

True, I am relativelly happy at this school, but I am more job-oriented at this point. It is not my first degree and I find happiness in things that are not related to education or work.

Out of the schools above, which 2-4 seem to be more out of my reach than others? I might consider part-time as well, and not necessarily in the city itself, but with better prospects of employment in those cities.

OK, so Temple might be out of my reach, Seattle, Loyola, DePaul look too pricey, for example.

Any other thoughts?

Suny? Howard? Akron?

Without in-state tuition, any school is going to be more expensive than it's worth in terms of what you'd net in job prospects. Scholarships to transfer students are rare, and your grades probably wouldn't get you one anyway.

My advice would be to think about going part-time somewhere and working during the day as a law clerk/para or trying to make it into a school where you can get in-state tuition.

Another option would be to stay put, and apply as a visiting student next year so you can spend your third year at a different law school. For this, you'll have to look closely at your current school's visiting student policies. Some schools do not like it when their students leave for the third year because they lose tuition revenue, so they have very restrictive policies re: visiting.

Also, if you want to work in those cities, you're going to have to look at schools in those actual cities. It's not going to help you to go to a school four hours away or in the next state over when you are talking about a t2/3/4 school.

Why did you go to that school in the first place? You could probably transfer to a school like Golden Gate or California Western. You might be able to transfer to USF, but I think that's probably less than 50/50.