Pre-Law. Go for prestige or not?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:To expand on OP’s question - for law school admissions purposes, is it better to do very well (summa/awards) at a school like BC/Miami/Northeastern/Tulane/Wake with substantial merit, or say 3.7 at a T20 with limited accolades/merit, assuming major(s), LSAT, ECs and LoRs essentially are the same?

Better to have the highest possible GPA at a reasonably good school than a lower GPA at a top school. No question.

-Someone who works in T10 Law School Admissions

Agreed. That guy is really splitting hairs.

[Anonymous]

DF's kid went to University of South Carolina OOS because they gave him a full ride. Graduated #1 in the class and was accepted to Stanford Law. Carolina isn't even in the top 100.

[Anonymous]

OP here. I really appreciate all the thoughtful and detailed insights.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No go for highest GPA possible! I went to an ivy law school and the majority of our class came from middle of the road colleges where they had absolutely excelled.

I don't think that's true. Yale Law School was 70% from top 20 schools.

It may have felt that way to you based on who you knew, but I would expect that actually 50%+ came from top schools...which still leaves a sizeable minority.

But those schools also have a much higher percentage of students who can score high on the LSAT and get high grades.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No go for highest GPA possible! I went to an ivy law school and the majority of our class came from middle of the road colleges where they had absolutely excelled.

I don't think that's true. Yale Law School was 70% from top 20 schools.

It may have felt that way to you based on who you knew, but I would expect that actually 50%+ came from top schools...which still leaves a sizeable minority.

But those schools also have a much higher percentage of students who can score high on the LSAT and get high grades.

Right. Not to mention that we are talking about yet another poster who can’t read. It has been made clear from the outset that Yale is the outlier. The undergraduate schools represented at the other Ivy League schools, even Harvard, are much broader.

[Anonymous]

If you are not independently wealthy and there's a chance your child might not pursue law school, I suggest choosing a reasonably priced college where your child will be happy and that will help propel them toward a non-legal career. You can gain admission to Harvard Law from nearly any college in the U.S., and it might actually be easier from a lesser-known school.

The South Carolina approach mentioned above is a reasonable strategy to save money for law school expenses. There are many paths to top law schools, and no college will lock your child out of admission to a top-tier program. Focus on helping your child find affordable schools where they will be happy and excel. If you are wealthy, you can remove "affordable" from the previous sentence.

[Anonymous]

OP. From what I've gathered, unless we're talking about top Ivies or Stanford, going to a T10 school has its perks but can be offset by a strong GPA, LSAT score, work experience, LoRs, etc. Not assuming DC will land a top law school spot or downplaying the effort it takes, but spending ~$400K on undergrad doesn’t seem wise. The real challenge will be tuning out the prestige talk from parents and their kids around us.
And yes, choosing a school that they'll enjoy will be a big factor.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think parents should pay for law school. If the kid has the chops they should be able to get a good scholarship and also make their own decisions about which school to go to, balancing the cost against their career ambitions.

With what's happening with AI, now way in hell I would tell my kid today that we would pay for law school...nor that they should even be thinking about it as an option until things sort out.

A rising senior has 4-7 years until law school starts.

[Anonymous]

Chances of attending t10 law school, if going to T30 undergrad that grades on a curve...was this a mistake?

Plan on working for 2 years before law school and considering harvard early admission program. Thoughts or feedback?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wouldn't it be extremely competitive to get into a top law school from a T10? It's like attending a very rigorous IB/Magnet program in HS. It's a fantastic program, but when the admissions cycle arrives, a pool of 50+ almost equally talented students from the same school are applying to the same colleges. There is no way any school is going to accept more than a couple from that program.
Leaving Harvard, Yale, and Stanford out of the discussion, since they have a large number of undergraduates feeding into the top law schools.

Yale used to provide a detailed listing of the number of kids by undergrad attending Yale law school (I think they stopped this in 2022).

Yes, Yale undergrad was literally like 25% of Yale law school (so like 150 kids)...but I remember seeing that UPenn had like 20 kids attending...Williams like 8.

At 600 total students, I think Yale is on the small side?

Why does Yale have such a heavy preference for their undergrads?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wouldn't it be extremely competitive to get into a top law school from a T10? It's like attending a very rigorous IB/Magnet program in HS. It's a fantastic program, but when the admissions cycle arrives, a pool of 50+ almost equally talented students from the same school are applying to the same colleges. There is no way any school is going to accept more than a couple from that program.
Leaving Harvard, Yale, and Stanford out of the discussion, since they have a large number of undergraduates feeding into the top law schools.

Yale used to provide a detailed listing of the number of kids by undergrad attending Yale law school (I think they stopped this in 2022).

Yes, Yale undergrad was literally like 25% of Yale law school (so like 150 kids)...but I remember seeing that UPenn had like 20 kids attending...Williams like 8.

At 600 total students, I think Yale is on the small side?

Why does Yale have such a heavy preference for their undergrads?

It's not just Yale law. I went to HLS and I think around 200 (out of 500 students) went to Harvard or Yale for college.

[Anonymous]

I went to Georgetown and there were students from all sorts of schools.

But I know from talking to admissions that the you need a higher GPA if you are coming from a less prestigious undergrad.

I think it also helps a bit to have a prestigious undergrad when applying for jobs, though that's mostly about GPA, journal, etc.

But overall, yes, she can still go to a strong law school but she will need to have a higher undergrad and LSAT if coming from a lower ranked undergrad.

I am not sure why you think she can get a full ride to a top fifty undergrad. Those are hard to come by. It's more typical to get 10-30k in merit aid.

(Yale Law, the student body has tons of top 5 SLACS and ivies. But chances are, your kid is not getting into Yale Law regardless.)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think parents should pay for law school. If the kid has the chops they should be able to get a good scholarship and also make their own decisions about which school to go to, balancing the cost against their career ambitions.

With what's happening with AI, now way in hell I would tell my kid today that we would pay for law school...nor that they should even be thinking about it as an option until things sort out.

As of today, the ABA continues to insist that only humans can practice law and represent others' interests.

They don't care if BigLaw uses AI to do discovery, write drafts of transaction and other legal documents, etc.

I assume they require actual lawyers to file things and attest that they are accurate, but they don't care how the sausage is made.

Most lawyers aren't trial lawyers...agree that's not going anywhere...but even those lawyers will use AI to create the documents that are filed.

This is a boon to experienced attorneys, but may dramatically reduce the number of entry-level attorneys...and the entry-level attorneys better be AI experts if they want the jobs.

However, maybe in 4 years from now the world hasn't changed much or there is a need for more lawyers...who knows.

You don't have to be a "trial lawyer" to make a court appearance. AI can't appear in court because a person must do so currently. AI could theoretically make some tasks shorter if it improves. However, while the assumption is that it will improve over time, I listened to a discussion recently where it was stated that it is getting worse instead of better.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think parents should pay for law school. If the kid has the chops they should be able to get a good scholarship and also make their own decisions about which school to go to, balancing the cost against their career ambitions.

With what's happening with AI, now way in hell I would tell my kid today that we would pay for law school...nor that they should even be thinking about it as an option until things sort out.

You could remove “law school” and insert almost any other grad school or profession. How quickly AI will disrupt is not at all clear. I’m a 25 year lawyer, 15 year law firm partner. Yes, we are implementing AI in our service delivery innovation, but good associates are still in strong demand. I need about 3.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wouldn't it be extremely competitive to get into a top law school from a T10? It's like attending a very rigorous IB/Magnet program in HS. It's a fantastic program, but when the admissions cycle arrives, a pool of 50+ almost equally talented students from the same school are applying to the same colleges. There is no way any school is going to accept more than a couple from that program.
Leaving Harvard, Yale, and Stanford out of the discussion, since they have a large number of undergraduates feeding into the top law schools.

Yale used to provide a detailed listing of the number of kids by undergrad attending Yale law school (I think they stopped this in 2022).

Yes, Yale undergrad was literally like 25% of Yale law school (so like 150 kids)...but I remember seeing that UPenn had like 20 kids attending...Williams like 8.

At 600 total students, I think Yale is on the small side?

Why does Yale have such a heavy preference for their undergrads?

It's not just Yale law. I went to HLS and I think around 200 (out of 500 students) went to Harvard or Yale for college.

You’re either exaggerating or misremembering or old AF because this has never been true so far as I know, and it’s certainly not true today. The current 1L class at Harvard has graduates of 146 undergraduate schools. It’s not 40 percent from Harvard or Yale and 60
percent from 144 other schools. We can be pretty sure of that.