3.41/Cancel-162-166 Forum

[nematoad]

I'm pretty picky about standard of living so my list is limited to a few cities outside of California as I am a native.
Pretty decent softs, fluent in 3 languages, planning on intl law. Will have 2 years of legal work exp. by the time I start in the Fall of 2011. National Champ in Karate as well (hopefully it makes me stand out a little more). Published a few short stories in literary journals.

So here's my list as of now:
Berkeley (i just have to)
UCLA (far reach, possibly ED?)
USC (reach)
BU (reach)
Gtown PT(reach)
GWU
BC
Emory
Fordham
Hastings (target)
Pepp (I live a few miles away)
Santa Clara
maybe Loyola LA but I don't really like the vibe i get from the place.

Two main questions: What other schools within reason that I havent chosen already have solid intl law programs? and does the fact that I applied last cycle and got rejected from a few of the schools help me at all in a rerun?
Thanks so much for the help!

Toad

[3ThrowAway99]

May want to consider U of Arizona as it is a T1 school that places fairly well into southern Cal.

[nematoad]

May want to consider U of Arizona as it is a T1 school that places fairly well into southern Cal.

u think i have any shot at $?

[JWicker10]

What did you actually get on the LSAT? A range of 162-166 is too big to make accurate determinations. Just post your actual score.

[nematoad]

sorry that was unclear, I cacneled in Sept, got a 162 in december and a 166 in june

[3ThrowAway99]

Also, Berkeley is almost certainly a waste of money, but I know where you are coming from: I applied to some ridiculous reaches just for the heck of it (one being considerably more ridiculous than your applying to Berkeley). Unfortunately, I came to realize that law admissions is pretty much just a numbers game (not that I'm really complaining because a strong focus on the numbers probably is the most fair approach overall). Maybe with your competition-related soft and the fact you are in-state you could get a rare break... Almost definitely not I think, but I know where you are coming from with wanting to go for it anyway.

[3ThrowAway99]

Yes, I do think you have a shot at money with U of Az. I would guess anywhere between $5,000-$25,000 per year in scholarship money (tuition is now approx. $40,000 per year. Of course COL in Tucson is WAY less than CA so you would save that way too).

[nematoad]

Also, Berkeley is almost certainly a waste of money, but I know where you are coming from: I applied to some ridiculous reaches just for the heck of it (one being considerably more ridiculous than your applying to Berkeley). Unfortunately, I came to realize that law admissions is pretty much just a numbers game (not that I'm really complaining because a strong focus on the numbers probably is the most fair approach overall). Maybe with your competition-related soft and the fact you are in-state you could get a rare break... Almost definitely not I think, but I know where you are coming from with wanting to go for it anyway.

haha yeah this past cycle taught me that numbers rule all the hard way. i figure the application to berkeley is 10 beers at a bar that I won't be drinking this next year. it makes it easier to waste my money thinking about it like that.

[JusticeHarlan]

I applied this cycle with a 3.4x/166, of those on your list here's how I did:

BU (reach): WL
Gtown PT(reach): Ding
GWU: WL
BC:WL ---> Accept
Fordham - WL

Good luck.

[nematoad]

I applied this cycle with a 3.4x/166, of those on your list here's how I did:

BU (reach): WL
Gtown PT(reach): Ding
GWU: WL
BC:WL ---> Accept
Fordham - WL

Good luck.

o cool, good to know. thanks

[General Tso]

May want to consider U of Arizona as it is a T1 school that places fairly well into southern Cal.

^^ this is blatantly false ^^
http://californiabar.globl.org/report.p ... 0&g=2&pp=5

in fact, Arizona places so well in Southern Cal that it has all of 53 grads in LA and 59 in San Diego. I hope this illustrates the need for diligence in researching your law school options, and the unreliability of some TLS posters. CU Boulder and ASU are two other schools that get tossed around as supposedly placing well in CA, and each of them have fewer grads in cali than UA.

If you want to work in Cali, either go T14 or go to school in Cali. There are very few exceptions to this rule.

[nematoad]

May want to consider U of Arizona as it is a T1 school that places fairly well into southern Cal.

^^ this is blatantly false ^^
http://californiabar.globl.org/report.p ... 0&g=2&pp=5

in fact, Arizona places so well in Southern Cal that it has all of 53 grads in LA and 59 in San Diego. I hope this illustrates the need for diligence in researching your law school options, and the unreliability of some TLS posters. CU Boulder and ASU are two other schools that get tossed around as supposedly placing well in CA, and each of them have fewer grads in cali than UA.

If you want to work in Cali, either go T14 or go to school in Cali. There are very few exceptions to this rule.

so if this situation comes down to Hastings, BC, Emory and GWU for instance, the difference in ranking wouldnt be worth not going to Hastings (assuming I want to end up in LA)?

[General Tso]

May want to consider U of Arizona as it is a T1 school that places fairly well into southern Cal.

^^ this is blatantly false ^^
http://californiabar.globl.org/report.p ... 0&g=2&pp=5

in fact, Arizona places so well in Southern Cal that it has all of 53 grads in LA and 59 in San Diego. I hope this illustrates the need for diligence in researching your law school options, and the unreliability of some TLS posters. CU Boulder and ASU are two other schools that get tossed around as supposedly placing well in CA, and each of them have fewer grads in cali than UA.

If you want to work in Cali, either go T14 or go to school in Cali. There are very few exceptions to this rule.

so if this situation comes down to Hastings, BC, Emory and GWU for instance, the difference in ranking wouldnt be worth not going to Hastings (assuming I want to end up in LA)?

Emory has almost no presence in CA. BU has almost 2x as many grads in CA as BC. GW is one of the higher placing CA schools, but for me it would come down to $$ between GW and Hastings. Hastings doesn't give much merit aid, so if GW gives you 15k+ per year it might warrant some consideration.

With your stats Hastings looks like a target though, not a safety.

[3ThrowAway99]

..

[3ThrowAway99]

Upon double-checking, U of Az does place less of a percentage of each class in CA than I thought. So in that sense 'tso' is right and I was wrong (though I think he may have overstated his point- looking up the number of grads in the cities of LA and San Diego probably doesn't include placements in the larger metropolitan areas of those cities, nor does it include any of the other substantial met areas in CA).

The link below shows that only 13% of the 2007 class was placed in W. Coast region. Nevertheless, in talking with U of Az admissions and reviewing the most recent placement data (which was broken down by specific law firms and states) it seemed clear to me that after Phoenix and Tucson (where 60-70% of the grads get employment), the next largest percentage of grads go to CA (probably 10% of the 13% listed for W. Coast I believe, though right now I don't have the stats to back it up. Also, this relatively low number may not be reflective of the possibility that more U of Az grads could work in CA if desired, but many choose to stay in AZ as that is the primary market the school feeds into. An admissions dean showed me the most recent stats a couple months ago with a state by state breakdown, but I can't find them online right now).

So saying that U of Az places 'fairly well into southern CA' may be overstated, but I don't think it is so overstated as to be "blatantly false." I would assert that it is definitely within the reasonable realm of possibility to get a job in CA upon graduation from U of Az, though I do suspect you would want to be in a higher percentile portion of the overall class in order to increase the option of doing this.

http://www.schoolaah.com/law/University_of_Arizona.htm

[JWicker10]

I recommend going on LSN and looking up people from last cycle with similar numbers to yours to see: a) where they applied and b) how they fared.

Also, apply early.