Question for part time students Forum

[Generic20101L]

Are you viewed differently?

When (or if) you join the FTs after a couple of semesters, were you an outcast?

Do your teachers change?

Can anyone give me any info about the transition from PT to FT?

[lawschoolgiant]

somewhat interested also..thinking about sticking with PT till I grad, so I am more interested to know if you are afforded the same opportunities as the FT students.

[OperaSoprano]

1) I am a part time student. Because I'm not working 40 hours a week, however, I can be on campus on a regular basis, so I know a decent number of day people. I've never been "viewed differently," at least to my face. Not even T14 students will do it. Most disobliging. The "evening students are pariahs" myth can be safely put to rest.

2) At least at my school, the same professor teach both day and evening

3) PT students here have the same career resources, and participate in the same OCI, just a year later if they remain part time.

[lawschoolgiant]

Opera,

I am assuming same deal for law review. Thank you for the answer btw. I am choosing a state school pt over other options, because of my wife's career, but am/was worried about any stigma....also as far as class rank goes who are you ranked against?

[MrSoOoFLy]

1) I am a part time student. Because I'm not working 40 hours a week, however, I can be on campus on a regular basis, so I know a decent number of day people. I've never been "viewed differently," at least to my face. Not even T14 students will do it. Most disobliging. The "evening students are pariahs" myth can be safely put to rest.

2) At least at my school, the same professor teach both day and evening

3) PT students here have the same career resources, and participate in the same OCI, just a year later if they remain part time.

you calm all my fears lol

[Connelly]

I am assuming same deal for law review. Thank you for the answer btw. I am choosing a state school pt over other options, because of my wife's career, but am/was worried about any stigma....also as far as class rank goes who are you ranked against?

Obviously I am not Opera.

I don't know how she is ranked at Fordham, but at Georgia State, we are ranked with the other PT students as well as the FT students that started a year after we did. We are ranked against them based only on our 1L grades. If we have taken additional courses by that time (which is almost certainly the case), they are not figured into our 1L ranking.

We only have 1 chance to join Law Review (the summer after our second year of PT work). One concern is that our Law Review generally requires a 4 semester commitment (and summers don't count). So if you're graduating in 3.5 years, that might be a problem, but there are waivers for a few students in this situation.

We actually have two chances to join Moot Court, however.

To your original question, PT students are not outcasts, but it is very difficult for most of us (who work full-time, have families, etc.) to spend enough time on campus during the day to develop relationships with the FT students. I could see where some students might feel like outcasts, but I do not think that captures the dynamic at all. People in different sections during the day may feel like outcasts from each other for pretty similar reasons.

[Bert]

I know a sh!t storm is coming my way for this, but I do think this is a valid question. Also, I am not intending to insinuate PT students are less intelligent or their accomplishments are less worthy than those of full-time students. That being said....

What about from an employment point of view? At least a couple people with whom I have spoken have indicated that there has traditionally been a certain stigma attached to law students who are/were enrolled in the PT program at their schools (i.e. the question arises in people's minds as to whether such student's success in a PT program can be attributed more to fact that they are in a less rigorous PT program than anything else), and this can make it a little more difficult to obtain competitive jobs. Has this myth been properly dispelled now that law schools are being more open about the competitiveness of their PT programs?

[OperaSoprano]

I know a sh!t storm is coming my way for this, but I do think this is a valid question. Also, I am not intending to insinuate PT students are less intelligent or their accomplishments are less worthy than those of full-time students. That being said....

What about from an employment point of view? At least a couple people with whom I have spoken have indicated that there has traditionally been a certain stigma attached to law students who are/were enrolled in the PT program at their schools (i.e. the question arises in people's minds as to whether such student's success in a PT program can be attributed more to fact that they are in a less rigorous PT program than anything else), and this can make it a little more difficult to obtain competitive jobs. Has this myth been properly dispelled now that law schools are being more open about the competitiveness of their PT programs?

It basically works this way at Fordham: in the past (IE, before this year), many people switched to FT after 1L year. For these students, grades are paramount. I have personally known people who started in the evening program and made it to V5 jobs. Obviously, this necessitates sky high grades, but my point is that it happens. Those students who stay PT tend to be the ones who either 1) could not quit their jobs, due to family obligations, or 2) had sufficiently prestigious or well paying jobs that it made no sense to quit. Many people had both. These mitigating factors gave PT students a point of differentiation to bring to employers, and they had stronger resumes, on average, than their peers in the day program. Employers who come to Fordham know that our PT program is the best such program in the country outside of DC (ranked #3 behind GULC and GW.)

[Connelly]

I know a sh!t storm is coming my way for this, but I do think this is a valid question. Also, I am not intending to insinuate PT students are less intelligent or their accomplishments are less worthy than those of full-time students. That being said....

What about from an employment point of view? At least a couple people with whom I have spoken have indicated that there has traditionally been a certain stigma attached to law students who are/were enrolled in the PT program at their schools (i.e. the question arises in people's minds as to whether such student's success in a PT program can be attributed more to fact that they are in a less rigorous PT program than anything else), and this can make it a little more difficult to obtain competitive jobs. Has this myth been properly dispelled now that law schools are being more open about the competitiveness of their PT programs?

I am not a legal employer, so I don't know; I can only speak from my experiences. I think viewing PT students (as a population) at some schools as a different category of student would be fair. When there are extreme differences in acceptance criteria, you are likely dealing with different populations. However, at my school, the PT students seem to have more varied backgrounds and credentials, and I would imagine this would be true at many PT schools. So while as a group PT students may have lower admissions criteria, there could be a bigger difference between the groups at the top and the bottom (less of a bell curve) than in the FT admissions criteria distributions.

OS's comments:

Those students who stay PT tend to be the ones who either 1) could not quit their jobs, due to family obligations, or 2) had sufficiently prestigious or well paying jobs that it made no sense to quit. Many people had both.

are credited and explain why you could have students who would be relatively over-qualified relative to the full-time students at a school in the PT program. These would definitely be the exception. Adding to the variance would be the IP folk. It is much more common for them (and makes much more sense in some cases) to go PT despite having credentials to get scholarships in the day programs.

PT numbers may also not be indicative of ability in some cases. I know that if I had wanted to attend FT somewhere, I would have taken more time to practice for the LSAT. As it is, I scored above the 75th percentile at schools ranked much higher than the school I go to, and I felt not practicing a few more weeks left several points on the table. But at the time, it did not matter, because I knew I wouldn't be getting money at the school I wanted to go to; I just needed to get in. This would be balanced (or dragged down, since PT numbers are lower than FT numbers) by students who went the PT route because they were less competitive relative to the FT admissions standards.

I think PT students that work full-time do miss out on a lot of great opportunities in law school, and I think this hurts them more than anything. As OS mentioned, just about anyone who can switch to FT does, and I am trying to figure out how much I could get for a kidney to do the same thing. I would strongly suggest that most people go FT if at all possible, even considering the debt load in this economy.

[RUQRU]

Before anyone quits their job read this:

This article appeared nationally on April 27th.
You can read it here:
http://abovethelaw.com/2010/04/the-next ... the+Law%29

"It’s one thing when I write about how crushing law school debt has impacted the value proposition of going to law school. I’m just repeating what every jobless 4L already knows. And prospective law students, 0Ls, have already proven that are too full of themselves to take out a calculator before they commit to three years of debt financing...Despite the proliferation of blogs by recent graduates trying to educate others about the danger of going to law school, new students keep signing up in record numbers. Law schools are not under any pressure to control tuition hikes when the demand for legal education is higher than ever." Elie Mystal is an editor of Above the Law.

Also, see what the crushing burden of $100K or more in debt does to you:

--LinkRemoved--

If you have a good paying steady job you MUST consider the opportunity cost of lost wages in addition to your LS tuition costs. In essence, if you quit to go full time and take on debt you are really adding three years worth of salary lost to that cost.

[kittyfur]

I know it definitely varies per school and person, but I am choosing to go part-time. Not because i couldn't get in full time, I know I could, but I can't give up my very high paying job. if that means I don't get the full law school experience, that's well worth the trade off for not being in dept, and still making bank. I also think it will help my resume in 4 years. I already have a career.

[lawschoolgiant]

Im going PT, because well it is a state school and with my wife and I working I will graduate with less than 50k of debt after my 4 years, and possibly less.