Law School Decisions. Advice?

[XxGodJrxX]

Ok, so I have it basically narrowed down to two schools. Ohio State University and the University of Florida. George Washington and Boston College have not gotten back to me, but deposit deadlines are at the end of the week, so I feel I have to decide between these two right now, and see what happens if one of the better schools accept me.

This is how it breaks down. Ohio State is 31st in the rankings, and UF is 47th. Ohio State offered about $15,000 in grants/scholarships, while UF offered about $4000. Since I live in Florida, UF will be much MUCH cheaper than Ohio (tuition will be about $5000 the first year, while Ohio will be about $20K; without taking into account living expenses and such) On the other hand, Ohio seems to have a better school, and a good dispute resolution program, which I am pretty interested in.

I am interested in hearing the opinions of everybody, but especially those in law school that should have a better idea of what I am getting into than I am. Thoughts?

[Mens Rea]

Generally, I tell anyone who asks me this question the following:

If you are deciding between two schools.....

... that are comparable in quality but vastly different in price (Ohio State and Florida), pick the cheap one.

... that are vastly different in price and quality (Harvard and Widener), pick the quality one.

... that are significantly different in quality and price, but are both good schools, pick the one that will provide the best access to what you believe is your preferred practice area.

At all times, you should be taking into account your expected debt to future earnings ratio. I always find it puzzling when someone decides to pick up $150-$200k in debt to go to Penn or Stanford when they want to practice public interest law. It's an easier burden to justify when someone wants to do M&A or securities work at a big city firm. Never underestimate the freedom that comes with minimal debt.

[recipro]

Where do you want to work after graduation?

[XXXNoahXXX]

[ QUOTE ]
I always find it puzzling when someone decides to pick up $150-$200k in debt to go to Penn or Stanford when they want to practice public interest law. It's an easier burden to justify when someone wants to do M&A or securities work at a big city firm. Never underestimate the freedom that comes with minimal debt.

[/ QUOTE ]

Except that some of the top schools have awesome loan forgiveness programs for people that do PI work...and it always leaves the door open for big money firm work.


I agree with the rest of your advice, except also, I would def. take into consideration WHERE you want to work. If you want to come back to FL, no sense in going to OSU.

[TheBronzer]

Florida and it should not even be close unless you want to work in Ohio or anywhere near there...even though it's ranked a little higher, I just don't see it being a national school (Frankly, I am surprised it's ranking is that high).

[Dave D]

As everyone else said, it's about where you want to be when you graduate. Rankings really don't matter that much, as long as they're in the same "tier", so there's a difference between Harvard and my school, but 31 and 47th, meh.

[XxGodJrxX]

I definitely don't envision myself in EITHER Ohio or Florida. I am not sure where I will end up, but I do know that I am tired of living in Miami, and I don't see any reason to live in the Midwest. I really wish American had offered SOMETHING in the way of grants or scholarships like these two other schools have, because DC is pretty much my dream city.

[recondite7]

I'm going to the University of Texas next fall so I've been looking into this stuff a lot recently. Florida is the easy choice if you aren't already a millionaire. Up until this year the schools were much closer in the rankings and although the difference in ranking might seem large they are actually very close in quality to each other. Florida recently became much larger and it's numbers and rankings will suffer as a result BUT it is still the big dog in the state of florida.

If I were you I would only give up on florida if I got into a top 20 program elsewhere, otherwise it should be the easy choice.

PS Florida owns Ohio State in everything now.

[Misfire]

[ QUOTE ]
If I were you I would only give up on florida if I got into a top 20 program elsewhere, otherwise it should be the easy choice.

[/ QUOTE ]

[Dave D]

Go to UF, it's the default choice since you dont know where you want to be, so you might as well spend the least amount of money doing it. The rankings are stupid, and honestly for whatever reason there seems to be more influence from UF in the north than OSU.