Well I'm a conservative libertarian, and everywhere I've been that's been a minority. Even conservatives and libertarians have been a rarity, in high school and college, so I've never known what its like to be surrounded by people with similar ideas. Even when I went to College Republican meetings I was the odd ball that liked Ron Paul. But I've found it to be healthy, and its forced me to defend my ideas a lot, and I do it so often that I stump most liberals and convince most moderates. Though I do think I'm smarter than the average bear, I wouldn't say that I discuss politics more persuasively than others because I'm more intelligent than them - a lot of liberals I discuss politics with are smarter than me, but I've had to defend my ideas over and over again because I'm never in a crowd where even half initially agree with me. And having my ideas challenged not only makese better at defending them, I refine them. I use to really be against gay marriage, but now that I'm closely familiar with the arguments (and sincere wishes) of both sides, I've found that the best view is neither, because neither is reconcilable with the other and ensures protection of all groups involved, so I've come to that very popular libertarian stance a long time ago. I essentially support marriage equality, I just don't support current marriage laws.
You shouldn't think that way. I had very good grades in undergrad (which was a huge change from high school, when all my attention was focused on football), but my chances of getting into a top school hinge just as much on the LSAT as yours do. Law schools place a lot of weight on the LSAT. It is more important to admission than almost any other standardized test. So you would probably need to do better on the LSAT than me to get into comparable schools, but the difference wouldn't be that great. I would probably need to get at least a 165 to have a good chance to get into a top 15 school. While you would probably need at least a 170. Don't get me wrong, that is incredibly difficult and would require a lot of work, but you said you test very well. If that is the case, and you got say a 173, maybe you wouldn't get into Harvard or Yale, but you would have a legitimate chance of getting into many other top level law schools.
Aside from applying for post-graduate programmes, you cannot completely shut the door to job hunting. Many undergraduates intending to go to graduate school often graduate without securing employment after failing to get into any of graduate programmes they applied for and you cannot assume that you will be accepted by some graduate school unless you're a straight-A student. It's a bad life choice to put all eggs in one basket and it's better to have a back-up plan or Plan B just in case.
Well its not something I'm stating out of ignorance. I know the 75th, 25th, and median percentile GPA and lsat scores of where I want to go, and my GPA is closest to the median for a lot of schools. I haven't taken the last yet, but I do verubwell in standardized tests, and w/o studying was in the top 5% of my state for writing and reading on the SATs, as well as the top 10% for math, and was in the 94th percentile on the asvab. And I'll actually be studying on my own for this, and so I do anticipate a good score that will be above UMaine's median (probably well above their 75th percentile), and its not hard to figure out where I'll get in. Veteran status is an added variable bonus on such applications, and having in state status, unless I bomb the rest of my undergrad and take the lsat drunk, I can reasonably to expect to get in at UMaine. I'm being realistic about this. UMaine is actually something of a safety choice, but worst case scenario, I can get certified to teach (paid for by my last year of my gi bill) and get assisted placement with the troops to teachers program. But its unlikely it'll come to that. I know where I generally sit with the incoming classes at law schools, but I'd like similar figures for grad schools, and that's why I started this thread.
The lsat percentile scoring is a little odd. It changes a bit year to year, but generally 151 is the middle, 159 is the top quarter, and 173 is the top 1%. Its a very write scoring system, and I'm sure I'll do well, but realistically I don't expect a superb score. On most standardized tests I was around the top 5% in high school, and between those who didn't go to college and those who aren't going to law school, a lot of the chaff has been separated, so my edge in testing is likely dulled, but that dull edge taken with a boost load of studying should get me well above the median. I'd realistically expect to be within five points one way or the other from 162, even with hard studying. But I'm still in my second year of undergrad, and each semester my GPA has improved, so I'll probably be applying with a GPA of 3.1-3.2, and an last of 157-167. Still not a stellar candidate, but good enough to be a shoe in at a lot of schools. Maybe I'm worrying too much and over thinking it, but I really don't want to be relegated to the scenario that third term talked about. The "snob" bit was just a humorous jest, but I realistically don't think I'll get into any ivy leagues, or Vanderbilt or Tulane or other Ivy-ish schools, though I may apply to both of those.
Here is my experience to date, for what it is worth.. I have a 3.9+ gpa from undergrad, a dual science major. The one college course that really helped with the LSAT was one in philosophy, concerned with logic. The Kaplan LSAT is a must! They guarantee to raise your score from pre to post test, and they do. Its really an endurance test! Think as hard as you can, how long can you keep it up? Now, I got in to one of the top six schools, so that all worked out for me. I see that people are stepping into jobs starting at 160K, from this school. Even so, some 3L still dont have anything lined up! I think it can hardly be overemphasized how much law school is not for everyone, including most of the people who go. Its just a disaster. For sure go to the best one you can get into, for sure get the best possible grades! I would personally advise that if you cannot get into one of the top schools, dont even think about it. But that is your decision. Do tho by all means research very thoroughly, more than you ever imagined for any term paper. Make sure you know what you would be getting into! Dont be like the girl they were interviewing on NPR who was suing her school. (imagine suing a school full of lawyers...) because she cant get a job and felt they misoverrepresented (as gwb might say) her chances of getting a job. I looked up the school, it was ranked # 146. What did she think was going to happen? Utter failure to do her due diligence right there shows she's not made of the right stuff. Dont let it happen to you!
That is absolutely ridiculous and bad advice. He said he was interested in real estate law, not becoming managing partner at an international law firm or working on Wall Street. How many hours a week are your friends starting off at $160K working and how many minimum billable hours are they having to generate each and every week for the next 5 years of their life? Real estate law largely just means he would need to hire a good staff, network with the brokers and realtors, provide quality service and make a lot of money on volume. He could easily make hundreds of thousands of dollars a year in a few years take home, have a staff that does most of the work for him so he has a lighter schedule, and be living a good life when your friends are still putting in 80 hours a week in a cubicle somewhere all by going to even a third tier law school.
It is pretty common advice. I am also considering law school and I have read a lot, and spoken to any lawyer who will spare some time for me. That is generally the advice they give. They say that if you want to work locally, going to a second or third tier school is fine. However, if you want to be competitive and have the opportunity to work where you want, getting into a top tier school is very important. Maybe they overstate the case, but if you look at the employment statistics for schools outside the top 10, they indicate that the benefit may not justify the large cost. http://www.theatlantic.com/business...ols-is-much-much-worse-than-you-think/274795/ University of Maine, which is Troianii's home state school, has an underemployment rate of 44.8%. With a cost of 134,579 dollars for residents. That is a lot of money, and potentially a lot of debt, to get a degree that is going to leave you underemployed 44.8% of the time. Compare that with top 10 schools, which have underemployment rates below 10%. I was considering NYU and Columbia, whose underemployment rates are 2.7 and 1.9 percent respectively. That represents a lot of debt, but very little risk that you won't find a job which will make you capable of paying that debt off.
You will or you won't be underemployed. They are not winning lottery tickets. If you go to Harvard and go back to practice in your hometown of Turtle Elbow, North Dakota, your Harvard degree isn't going to do you any better than going to Turtle Elbow University. If one goes to their in-state school, they can dramatically reduce their costs to be within the government subsidized loan limits which will put them into the income-based repayment plan window which will take the pressure off them. One is better off going to the best school they can get into in their state so that they can learn their state's law as they can if they want to private practice in their state. Maine is a pretty rural state even Down East. He would be better off IMO staying in state, getting to know the other lawyers and maybe some judges in his state as he goes along, perhaps find a lawyer or firm that will let him work in summers or while in school, and have a network of connections to use if he wants to remain in the state of Maine.
Lottery tickets are an incredibly low risk proposition. I never understood the point of them. It seems to me it is essentially people deciding that the government doesn't have enough money and they want to regularly donate more to them for no reason, but that is a complete aside. Law school on the other hand is not only an investment of at minimum 100,000 dollars, but is also an investment of an enormous amount of time. If I am going to invest at least 100,000 dollars, plus eschew 3 years of potential work, I want to have some level of assurance that the investment is worth the risk. Therefore, it only makes sense to go to a school, which is going to see me employed following graduation. Also, I conceded the point about local schools. If a person wants to work in Nebraska, going to the University of Nebraska makes some level of sense, for exactly the reasons you are mentioning. I don't deny that. However, the statistics I referenced are still valid. About 60% of University of Maine graduates get jobs in Maine. They still have an incredibly high underemployment rate. That means there is a limited pool of jobs and a high number of graduates competing for those same jobs. So if you go to the University of Maine, and you expect to graduate in the top 10% of your class, then it makes sense. Otherwise, the pay-off is too low to justify the costs.
Well I guess the difference between you and me I think the efforts of the person involved means more than the school name on the piece of paper on the wall. It is a tough time for lawyers because of the recession. People flock to law schools during wars and economic hard times as a refuge and we have had a decade of both. If someone goes to law school wanting to do something other than practice law, they would be "underemployed" even if that had been their plan all along. I think you rely too much on generic statistics without knowing the details and do not allow enough room for the career plans of people that are different than yours. Someone wanting to go into politics or public interest advocacy would logically benefit from law school and never formally practice, and be deemed "underemployed". Likewise someone might would rather work 32 hours a week for $50K a year instead of 60 hours a week for $90K a year because they are not defined by their job and the time is more of value to them than the money. As for the investment, a lawyer from a third tier law school with no particular aptitude whatsoever could conceivably recover the entire cost of their university with a single wrongful death case or a dozen small personal injury cases. The money is the easy part to deal with if one is willing to do a little hustling, hand-shaking and build their name from the ground up even if it will take them a couple lean years to do it.
Yeah, I remember hearing about that - that's just idiotic, trying to sue a school because you haven't found a job. Unless they guarantee job placement, which I've heard a few schools do, but I sincerely doubt #146 does. I think the lower tiered law schools are given too much crap. I'm not talking about the ones ranked well over #100, but the nothing-but-Ivy attitude doesn't seem to measure up to the facts that I've seen. Now if you're going into law just to make cash cash cash, yeah, then the nothing-but-Ivy attitude holds a a little more truth, but not entirely. The problem with this nothing-but-Ivy view is that it treats all law schools the same without qualification. Now if I told you, "I have a 4.0GPA and a 180LSAT," and asked where I should go, you'd probably say Harvard or Yale. But what if I told you, "I have a 4.0GPA and a 180LSAT and want to do maritime", and asked you where I should go, all of a sudden Harvard and Yale are out of the picture. From what I've read, Miami and Tulane suddenly run the top of that gammut, with Maine getting an honorable mention in the top 10 for maritime. And, under the same circumstances, what if I told you that I want to do real estate law? Again, it's about the same. And I don't mean to beat a dead horse, but the case becomes even more eye-popping if I were (with a perfect GPA and LSAT score) to say that I want to go into environmental law. Suddenly Vermont, ranked #119 overall by US News, becomes the #1 choice. It has the best law program, followed by Lewis and Clark, which is ranked #80 overall. Now I disagree with your assessment, but I do appreciate your advice, especially the Kaplan advice. http://education-portal.com/articles/Best_Marine_Law_Schools_List_of_Top_Degree_Programs.html http://law-school.findthebest.com/d/c/Real-Estate-or-Property-Law Ooofta, that is bad. I knew it had lower employment figures, but I didn't know it was that low. But at least I won't be dealing with that kind of debt, worst case scenario. And less than worst case scenario is working for the government, which I'd have a distinct edge in as a veteran. Yeah, from my understanding the local-edge makes a big difference, especially if you get an internship locally. I don't think it's as big as you make it out to be, but I certainly think it's bigger than taikoo makes it out to be.
Sorry, I meant to include this link as well, and had the webpage pulled up to do so, and then forgot to do so. http://www.lawschooltransparency.com/ There is a lot of good information on that site.
It is a pretty big foot in the door in my area, even though I do not live in Maine. Government jobs are about the only legal jobs one will see advertised for in my area. I have even seen law firms "Of Counsel" young lawyers in transition they already knew to give them a place to hang their shingle until they could get whatever was going on with their career direction sorted out. That usually is just a status for old lawyers who might be able to make some rain for you.
Doesn't U.S. News & World Report have an annual "Best of" Undergraduate / Graduate schools broken down by fields of study? http://www.usnews.com/education/bes...-releases-2014-best-graduate-schools-rankings I attended UMSL (University of Missouri @ St. Louis) for a graduate degree in Business. I strongly advise a State school in your area to avoid out-of-state fees tacked on to an already expensive proposition in the pursuit of a graduate degree. Question for you sir, have you taken the GRE yet? Many graduate schools in the United States require GRE results as part of the admissions process. I strongly advise taking a GRE preparatory course prior to sitting for it. It's more comprehensive than the LSAT.
Thanks for that. I'll look around that site in the near future. No I haven't taken the GRE yet, I actually don't anticipate graduating until 2016, but I will likely end up taking it Spring 2015.
Also, I don't think they have what I'm looking for. They have med school and law school information (which is technically graduate school, but not what people usually mean when they say grad school), and they have engineering, business, and education. But basically a continuation of every undergraduate major is left out - though I might consider a master's in education. I'd consider it, but I don't think I'd go that route. I was going to get a degree in social studies education, but decided to can that idea two weeks into my second course. I was doing great in those courses, but they were just so bulls***! If you try to think of the classes that make people think undergrad is just a waste of time, these were the epitome of that.
Money money money is not really the point, for me. I dont actually need the money, Im lucky that way. Im pretty hyper and very competitive, so I need something to aim it at. I was going into a masters program in a "life science' but changed my mind after an injury and some time off from school. Im glad i did, this feels so right. One of the top schools will open doors that will simply be closed to you if you apply from say, U of Nebraska, let alone #100, Maine. You limit yourself so unnecessarily by not doing that; the calibre of the professors and the other students is another consideration. I suppose it may be like if you want to be a surgeon at Mayo or Joplin general tho. If you set your sights lower you will probably hit lower. As for real estate law, if you want to go into your own business, it probably doesnt matter. People usually dont know what they want to do, what interests them when they start. Well, some know they want to do transactional, but that seems so boring to me. Im curious what you found in what I said, to disagree with! Please say. This? I think it can hardly be overemphasized how much law school is not for everyone, including most of the people who go. Its just a disaster. For sure go to the best one you can get into, for sure get the best possible grades! Another poster got on my case so, that he seems a bit unhinged, saying "That is absolutely ridiculous" to everything i had posted, so Im going to ignore it other than to mention his odd statement..when your friends are still putting in 80 hours a week in a cubicle somewhere all by going to even a third tier law school. First off, my friends are not going to 3rd tier, they are at one of the top six, which Im not going to name. Second, the cubicle and the deep stack of papers is exactly the fate one seeks to avoid, by going to the best schools. I said go to the best one you can get into, and i think that is as good advice as you are going to get from anyone. The 160K starting that I mentioned is, like law school itself, not for everyone, ie they cant do it. The ones getting that sure are not stuck in a cubicle, any firm treated them that way would find their associates being picked off by headhunters. Anyhow, good luck, post your LSAT if you like, when you get it.
Depending of what area of law you intend to practice, a M.A. in Early American History would be invaluable if you intended to practice or take an academic path in constitutional law. I know that the average GRE scores for the Lyon G. Tyler Department of History at William & Mary are in the upper 160s for verbal and around 150 for quantitative. This isn't broad, but it is an indicator. Your letter's of reference are important for some schools, so I would take the time and cultivate at least four highly respected references.
You asked what you said that I could disagree with: "I would personally advise that if you cannot get into one of the top schools, dont even think about it." And, though it wasn't disagreeing so much as showing, the bit about the girl on NPR from school #146. I think I did a fair job of showing how and why someone would choose to not go to an Ivy League school, even if they had that chance. As I already showed, if you break schools down by specialty and look at which are the best for maritime, real estate, and environmental law (and there are other choices, but these are the ones I've considered most), then Harvard and Yale don't top the list. In fact, in one case, a school that isn't even the top #100 overall comes at the very top of the list.
Wow, seriously? Maybe you mentioned that elsewhere, but I didn't understand that!! You have more than enough time to boost your GPA quite significantly. I am going to sound arrogant now, but what I am saying is true, getting A's in undergrad is really easy!! I went to a very similar level of school for undergrad, the University of Illinois, and struggled a little in my first semester, but after that point got 1 B the rest of undergrad (in my very last semester). I didn't try insanely hard either. Don't get me wrong, I tried hard enough and always did every assignment well and on time, but I was just not some one who studied all the time. It is just that history, while being incredibly interesting and enlightening, is not the most difficult subject in the world. As I said, you are going to a similar school and doing the same major, getting A's the rest of your time in school, now that most of your gen eds are out of the way, shouldn't be that difficult. Push yourself hard enough that you can accomplish that, then you can not only raise your overall GPA, but a lot of schools focus more intently on second 60 GPA anyways. If you can then point to a very high GPA in that time period, you can very realistically get into a top 20 school if you want to with a strong LSAT.
I guess we are still saying essentially the same thing, in different ways. "Best by specialty" and "top ten". How about best school you can get into, and you decide what 'best' means. Anything else you'd disagree with?
It's a little bit of a weird case, but I had some credits transferred in but basically decided that I didn't want to rush through undergrad, partly because of grades, but also because I actually want to take some time to breathe, if you will. Right now I'm studying stuff that I enjoy, mostly just because I enjoy it, and I don't want to rush out of that as soon as possible. But yes, I think that I can realistically get my GPA up a good deal. If I have an A- average for the rest of my time here, I'll probably have around a 3.5GPA. With a good LSAT score that'd put me in the 75th percentile for Vanderbilt or Boston College. That's pretty encouraging, and it'd be even more realistic if I can get better than a 3.6 for the rest of my time here. Now I just need to stress out about grades, haha! But really, thanks for the encouragement. Your description of yourself actually sounds a lot like a fair description of me.
