Top Law Schools

I go to a Top 30 school and I have a 3.97 GPA at a school with a B/B+ median. Ranks won't be out before apps are due, but I expect this is top 2-3%. Aside from grades, I am not particularly noteworthy, though I do have some work experience and helped author a paper with one of my professors when I was an undergraduate.

Would I have a shot?

Yes.

Longtimecoming19 wrote:Yes.

This.

What are your goals? BigLaw? I would throw apps to Columbia if so. They place more than anyone else, and you're a lock with those grades.

I agree w above:

YHS - All in play
Columbia - good safety for biglaw

Well I live in a southwestern state with a relatively small legal community. I expect I will practice here. Biglaw is probably at least my immediate goal, though I think in the long term I'd like to be a federal judge. My main reason for transferring is that I do not want to have as many options and possibilities open to me as I can, and I don't want to be unable to advance my career beyond a certain point. While my school is a good one, even being in the top 5% here is not a lock on a biglaw job.

Do you think that a JD from Columbia et. al. has clout with local biglaw firms assuming I want to move back here after graduation?

So since your long term goal is being a federal judge (a bit of a pipe dream unless you're friends with a senator, but still), you probably want to clerk. Are you on good terms with any influential profs at your current school that can get you interviews with feeders or circuit judges in general? If you are, then you should stay. If not, perhaps transferring isn't a bad idea, but I don't think I'd leave for CCN. I'd probably only go for HYS.

Anonymous User wrote:Well I live in a southwestern state with a relatively small legal community. I expect I will practice here. Biglaw is probably at least my immediate goal, though I think in the long term I'd like to be a federal judge. My main reason for transferring is that I do not want to have as many options and possibilities open to me as I can, and I don't want to be unable to advance my career beyond a certain point. While my school is a good one, even being in the top 5% here is not a lock on a biglaw job.

Do you think that a JD from Columbia et. al. has clout with local biglaw firms assuming I want to move back here after graduation?

Two questions: Is your school in the market in which you'd like to practice? And do you have scholarship money? If the answer to both is yes transferring won't make much sense. If you're somewhere like ASU transferring can make more sense given the lack of certainty for biglaw from anywhere in the class, but transferring is not going to improve your chances of getting a job in the local market. If you leave you'll need to be ready to bid larger markets. So decide whether you'd prefer to work biglaw elsewhere or would instead take a local small firm or government position if you were to strike out this fall.

If your school places well in the legal community you want to work in, then transferring doesn't make much sense.

Now, if you are a single dude/dudette and have no obligations, then you could transfer to HYSC and do things that you never could from your old school. Food for thought. You're in a position where you can radically alter your life course forever.

Check out the large firm resumes in Phoenix, Tucson & any other major cities in your region where you would like to live & work after completing law school. You might be surprised at how many graduated Georgetown law & other T-14 law schools.
Of course, you should apply to any & all T-14 law schools which interest you.

ndirish2010 wrote:So since your long term goal is being a federal judge (a bit of a pipe dream unless you're friends with a senator, but still), you probably want to clerk. Are you on good terms with any influential profs at your current school that can get you interviews with feeders or circuit judges in general? If you are, then you should stay. If not, perhaps transferring isn't a bad idea, but I don't think I'd leave for CCN. I'd probably only go for HYS.

chicago actually placed a higher percentage of its class into federal clerkships last year than harvard. so by that reasoning, if we're talking about realistic clerkship chances, its really only YS; although honestly, I think it would be easier find the support as a very top student at the current school for local federal judges.

jbagelboy wrote:

ndirish2010 wrote:So since your long term goal is being a federal judge (a bit of a pipe dream unless you're friends with a senator, but still), you probably want to clerk. Are you on good terms with any influential profs at your current school that can get you interviews with feeders or circuit judges in general? If you are, then you should stay. If not, perhaps transferring isn't a bad idea, but I don't think I'd leave for CCN. I'd probably only go for HYS.

chicago actually placed a higher percentage of its class into federal clerkships last year than harvard. so by that reasoning, if we're talking about realistic clerkship chances, its really only YS; although honestly, I think it would be easier find the support as a very top student at the current school for local federal judges.

I definitely think it would be easier at current school, assuming it's a school that occasionally gets CoA clerkships. If the school does, you should be one of the people the faculty pushes hard.