Which law school should I attend?

[neuroman]

Ignore the OOTiots and pay attention to the people (or those who have friends) with legal experience.

Among schools with very high (and comparable) academic quality, I would focus on, in order of importance:

1) location: what city do you want to spend 3 years in? (and possible a whole lot more if you get hired there.) What city is closer to your family and friends?

2) financial costs: is one school going to be a lot cheaper than the other?

3) intangibles: class sizes, competitiveness, proximity to a B&M casino... whatever.

At the end of the day, go with your gut and you won't regret it.

[El Diablo]

jeff,

Harvard will also make it easier to get an in-house GC position at certain firms, bus dev/corp dev/M&A, venture capital, and a variety of other business roles that people w/ law backgrounds end up doing.

I agree that going to any top-tier school is probably fine for most things, but there's no question that the Harvard name provides a number of advantages over the other schools mentioned, including Columbia.

Most of the attorneys I've known didn't end up practicing law for all that long, so these considerations are worth taking into account.

[Mens Rea]

Without reading any of the responses -

Depends on your goals and what you think you want to do.

If you want to get paid, there is no choice but Harvard. As long as you pass, you'll make $125k minimum in corporate law.

[Mens Rea]

OK - now that I've actually read the thread...

If you want to do litigation, and you're good at it, and you plan to get the grades, pick your school based on quality of life.

I've found that you can go to any tier 1 school and basically pick your job with top 10% grades. A good rule of thumb is this - as the perceived quality of your law school decreases, the importance of grades increases. This seems obvious, but nowhere is this relationship more true than in law school.

Good luck, and congrats.

[Redmen62]

[ QUOTE ]
So umm... how about a 2.6 that will be a 3.0 by the time I graduate... I will be over 175 on the LSAT fo sho... that part Im not worried about.

[/ QUOTE ]

I've seen variations on this statement a dozen times on LSD and elsewhere, invariably followed by the post a couple of months later asking about handsscoring and brutal scales when their 163 shows up. First rule of LSAT is never ever assume or claim you will get a certain score, it's all smoke and mirrors until you have a score in hand.

[HDPM]

Agree with this. The OP is saying he wants to be a big firm litigation attorney. Which to me seems like the worst way to live with a Harvard degree. A lot of people rethink what they want to do during or after law school. harvard gives you the most options IMO.

[CMS79]

[ QUOTE ]
This isn't really a choice. To get into Harvard law and not go would be insane.

[/ QUOTE ]

[fslexcduck]

i've heard harvard sucks and people are miserable. but it does get you good jobs/get you laid.

me, i'll probably end up at an nyu or columbia just because it is in the city, not in new haven/cambridge(where everything closes by 2am!)/ithaca/insert other crappy city that is not new york.

[eviljeff]

[ QUOTE ]
Ignore the OOTiots and pay attention to the people (or those who have friends) with legal experience.

Among schools with very high (and comparable) academic quality, I would focus on, in order of importance:

1) location: what city do you want to spend 3 years in? (and possible a whole lot more if you get hired there.) What city is closer to your family and friends?

2) financial costs: is one school going to be a lot cheaper than the other?

3) intangibles: class sizes, competitiveness, proximity to a B&M casino... whatever.

At the end of the day, go with your gut and you won't regret it.

[/ QUOTE ]

I agree with all of this.

[Skittles]

not close. harvard