GLZ19 wrote:
My offer from the T-20 school is very good, so in the event i get little to no money from the T-13, I'm wondering what people's thoughts are on the relative merits of accepting a T-20 w/ little to no debt compared to a T-13 with substantial debt compared to reapplying in September.
On your broader question, I wouldn't be stressed. Offers will come through.
On this specific question, it depends on where the school is and where you want to end up. For example, if your offer is from Texas and you would be fine working in Texas (big law or otherwise) after school, it's a great option. Same for, say, UCLA and California. I'm at a CCN and I see from the big law office I'm going to (out-of-state) quite a few students from local state schools.
Taking on more debt to go to a higher-ranked school is either 1) an insurance policy, or 2) helps you reach your preferred market.
Regarding the insurance policy, waiting out an offer from a T14 means plenty of interviews with big law firms regardless of your grades, and you should end up at a big firm paying you big dollars. Compare that to a lower-ranked school, where placing high on your first-year grades will matter a lot. What if you get sick during finals? What if you have your appendix removed? Get pregnant? Breakup with your SO? Your margin of error will be lower...is that worth six figures of debt to you?
As far as your preferred market, it's going to be harder to get to NY or LA or the Bay Area right out of Texas Law (but nowhere near impossible). Compare that to going to a T3 school where any office from any firm would not hesitate to take you (assuming you're a relatively normal person who didn't bomb their first year).
To summarize, the more you know about what you want to do and where you want to do it, the better decision you can make. If you know you want to practice in LA, UCLA would be a great option. If you're not sure, a higher-ranked school will keep more doors open to you, and be safer in case you have unexpected issues that affect your grades. (This is all just looking at your first job out of law school...I do not have a good feel for how two Latham associates looking for a new job would differ if one went to Stanford and one went to Texas but they had showed the same level of competence while at the firm.)
Finally, the debt's not THAT big of a deal (compared to other ways you can go six figures into debt), but it would be REALLY nice if I were able to graduate without debt. You'll have no trouble paying it off (assuming big law), but it could tie you to big law for a few years (which would suck if you end up not liking it) and obviously delays buying a house, etc. You just have to weigh what matters to you. Going to Texas debt-free, working for a top ten firm in their Houston office, and buying a 6000 sqft house right out of law school would be pretty awesome.
and I did my undergrad at a school that isn't regarded nationally - but my softs are good: 20 months of work experience in management consulting (was 17 at the time of my application), tons of volunteer work, trilingual, and a respectable post-grad academic achievement. 
