Top Law Schools

Outside of HYS (where supposedly nearly everyone gets a great job), does it matter where you attend school from the T4-14?

E.g., Will it matter if you attend Columbia versus Northwestern? ....Chicago versus Georgetown? etc.

If it does matter, how much does it really matter?

Since your chances of getting biglaw decrease from like 85% down to around 50%, yeah, it matters.

Also some of the T14 are less nationally portable than others.

Depends largely on your goals and where you want to work

I suspect some strong anti-Georgetown sentiment will be voiced ITT.

rinkrat19 wrote:Since your chances of getting biglaw decrease from like 85% down to around 50%, yeah, it matters.

Also some of the T14 are less nationally portable than others.

I'm an OL, so big disclaimer here. But that doesn't sound right.

Even at Columbia, I don't think 85% of the students got biglaw there. And at Georgetown, I don't think 50% of the students got biglaw there.

.....Or wait. Are you saying that you have to be above the bottom 15% at Columbia and above the bottom 50% at Georgetown to qualify for biglaw? Becsause tehre are two different things - qualifying for and getting biglaw.

Hmmm, so you're saying like Duke and Georgetown - those lower T14's - won't let me go anywhere in the nation? Do youy know what teh cutoff is for mobility?

scifiguy wrote:Do youy know what teh cutoff is for mobility?

National mobility to non-NYC/DC markets to which you don't have ties is basically a huge flame.

scifiguy wrote:

rinkrat19 wrote:Since your chances of getting biglaw decrease from like 85% down to around 50%, yeah, it matters.

Also some of the T14 are less nationally portable than others.

I'm an OL, so big disclaimer here. But that doesn't sound right.

Even at Columbia, I don't think 85% of the students got biglaw there. And at Georgetown, I don't think 50% of the students got biglaw there.

.....Or wait. Are you saying that you have to be above the bottom 15% at Columbia and above the bottom 50% at Georgetown to qualify for biglaw? Becsause tehre are two different things - qualifying for and getting biglaw.

Hmmm, so you're saying like Duke and Georgetown - those lower T14's - won't let me go anywhere in the nation? Do youy know what teh cutoff is for mobility?

The 85% comes from a figure that's been circulating around here for a while-- that 85% of last year's OCI participants got an offer, or something like that. idk about the accuracy of Georgetown's figures, but it's Georgetown so it's probably right / too high

banjo wrote:

scifiguy wrote:

rinkrat19 wrote:Since your chances of getting biglaw decrease from like 85% down to around 50%, yeah, it matters.

Also some of the T14 are less nationally portable than others.

I'm an OL, so big disclaimer here. But that doesn't sound right.

Even at Columbia, I don't think 85% of the students got biglaw there. And at Georgetown, I don't think 50% of the students got biglaw there.

.....Or wait. Are you saying that you have to be above the bottom 15% at Columbia and above the bottom 50% at Georgetown to qualify for biglaw? Becsause tehre are two different things - qualifying for and getting biglaw.

Hmmm, so you're saying like Duke and Georgetown - those lower T14's - won't let me go anywhere in the nation? Do youy know what teh cutoff is for mobility?

The 85% comes from a figure that's been circulating around here for a while-- that 85% of last year's OCI participants got an offer, or something like that. idk about the accuracy of Georgetown's figures, but it's Georgetown so it's probably right

The 85% comes from my ass, because I'm studying for Contracts and I can't be bothered to actually look it up. There is, however, a fairly linear decreasing percentage of grads getting good jobs that slopes from almost 100% at H/Y, down to whatever percentage at the bottom of the T14 and continuing through the rest of the ~T20. (With Northwestern usually being an outlier, placing a bit above its ranking).

Chicago and Georgetown are peers using every valid metric, idk why TLS hates GULC so much

rinkrat19 wrote:The 85% comes from my ass, because I'm studying for Contracts and I can't be bothered to actually look it up. There is, however, a fairly linear decreasing percentage of grads getting good jobs that slopes from almost 100% at H/Y, down to whatever percentage at the bottom of the T14 and continuing through the rest of the ~T20. (With Northwestern usually being an outlier, placing a bit above its ranking).

Okay, I'm not studying for Contracts or even in law school yet, so I found a post that may be helpful: http://www.top-law-schools.com/forums/v ... 4#p5886319

While order doesn't matter, I would strongly recommend attending an NYC, Chicago, or California feeding T14 over the others. Outside HYS, that would be the rest of the Ivy League, Chicago, Northwestern, NYU and Berkeley.

Edit - forgot NYU

Aberzombie1892 wrote:While order doesn't matter, I would strongly recommend attending an NYC, Chicago, or California feeding T14 over the others. Outside HYS, that would be the rest of the Ivy League, Chicago, Northwestern, and Berkeley.

Blatant anti-NYU trolling

At NYU, 80 percent of people who participated at OCI received at least one offer. FWIW.

Within MVPBDCN it matters very little. If I were deciding between any of those schools, I would consider them placement peers and make my choice based on debt load, personal preferences, interest in the "home" market, etc.

law2015 wrote:At NYU, 80 percent of people who participated at OCI received at least one offer. FWIW.

Number was in the 70s for Chicago according to one of the threads on OCI

Until we see lower t14 data that's comparable I'm willing to keep buying into the T6 distinction

ChampagnePapi wrote:

law2015 wrote:At NYU, 80 percent of people who participated at OCI received at least one offer. FWIW.

Number was in the 70s for Chicago according to one of the threads on OCI

Until we see lower t14 data that's comparable I'm willing to keep buying into the T6 distinction

Unless I'm mistaken, Penn consistently rivals Columbia with NLJ/fed placement.

So to recap, the real value of the T14 are as such:

TOP: Harvard/Stanford/Yale
MIDDLE: Columbia/Chicago/NYU
BOTTOM: Penn/Michigan/Virginia/Northwestern/Berkeley/Duke/Cornell/Georgetown

Is that about right? There's a distinct advantage to attending a school in the tier above yours (if there is one), but no advantage to attending a different school in the same bracket?

ETA: I'd love to see more evidence of the value of the middle bracket of CCN over the bottom one PMVNBDCG.

Aberzombie1892 wrote:

ChampagnePapi wrote:

law2015 wrote:At NYU, 80 percent of people who participated at OCI received at least one offer. FWIW.

Number was in the 70s for Chicago according to one of the threads on OCI

Until we see lower t14 data that's comparable I'm willing to keep buying into the T6 distinction

Unless I'm mistaken, Penn consistently rivals Columbia with NLJ/fed placement.

I agree but it'd be nice to get data for penns oci last year

scifiguy wrote:So to recap, the real value of the T14 are as such:

TOP: Harvard/Stanford/Yale
MIDDLE: Columbia/Chicago/NYU
BOTTOM: Penn/Michigan/Virginia/Northwestern/Berkeley/Duke/Cornell/Georgetown

Is that about right? There's a distinct advantage to attending a school in the tier above yours (if there is one), but no advantage to attending a different school in the same bracket?

ETA: I'd love to see more evidence of the value of the middle bracket of CCN over the bottom one PMVNBDCG.

If you want biglaw, I'd put Penn in the mid tier and NU would be right on the edge of bottom/mid tier.

If you want CA, Berk moves up to mid tier.


I don't really know how wanting PI factors into it. HYS would remain the same but I have a hard time analyzing the LST statistics for the rest. UVA/NYU/Berk seem to be very strong on those fronts but that's a very superficial take on the numbers.

From the looks of it, PI at NYU seems like a legitimate goal for many people and not a fallback option. Nobody can tell whether there is greater self selection into PI at NYU but I personally think that it is very likely to be the case.

scifiguy wrote:So to recap, the real value of the T14 are as such:

TOP: Harvard/Stanford/Yale
MIDDLE: Columbia/Chicago/NYU/Penn (for sure)/Northwestern (maybe)
BOTTOM: Michigan/Virginia/Berkeley/Duke/Cornell/Georgetown

Slightly more accurate. I'm at a loss for the bottom tier, as it's still not right. Unfortunately, I don't know how to fix that.

Aberzombie1892 wrote:

scifiguy wrote:So to recap, the real value of the T14 are as such:

TOP: Harvard/Stanford/Yale
MIDDLE: Columbia/Chicago/NYU/Penn (for sure)/Northwestern (maybe)
BOTTOM: Michigan/Virginia/Berkeley/Duke/Cornell/Georgetown

Slightly more accurate. I'm at a loss for the bottom tier, as it's still not right. Unfortunately, I don't know how to fix that.

Looking at last years numbers Berkeley and Duke are clearly at the top of that bottom tier, no? Then again it's probably useless to make distinctions from year to year.

You all know that you're debating generally just a few percentage points, right? I don't know if we should be putting so much weight on pretty inconsequential differences. Also, when you compare to the numbers for people who attended OCI, you're not making an apples to apples comparison...

God I wish we had a resident stats PhD.

2014 wrote:Chicago and Georgetown are peers using every valid metric, idk why TLS hates GULC so much

Inaccurate, perhaps joking, but certainly inaccurate

Definitely matters. Slight differences in overall placement all the way down the line.. Each school has slants that it tends to do better.

If you want Cali, Stanford>Berkeley>the rest

For Biglaw in general, Penn could be considered second to none. At the same time, keep in mind that there may be a factor of self selection for various schools, or that some schools are just more geared towards certain things. If you want a prestigious clerkship, Chicago places more into that than almost any other school. Georgetown may have a large amount of people opting to pursue a job on Capital Hill rather than BigLaw. Cornell does well in NYC but won't carry as well out west as Columbia. Northwestern places very well, but this may be due to the fact that non-trads fare better than KJDs in general, so a KJD at NU may in fact be no better off than a KJD at Georgetown. Some schools have a solid lock on a market, whereas some like D, V, and M might struggle to place grads because they aren't near a large market.

So no, ordering may not matter per se, but no two schools are interchangeable imho.