What to look for in a law school?

[BvBPL]

Hi,

I know there's at least a couple lawyers who regularly post here. A few general questions on law school.

What should one look for in a law school? What qualities indiciate a good school?

How important is the ABA accreditation for a school? There's a new state school in the area, but it doesn't have accreditation yet, although I know it is seeking it.

How soon does one need to choose a specialization. Second year? First year?

Thanks.

 

[shortguy]

I'm not a lawyer, but I just went through the law school application process. I get the impression our experiences won't be quite similar, but I may have a little received wisdom to share with you.

First, a warning. The legal market is not very good, and, while it may well be better 3-4 years down the road, there are a lot of people graduating with law degrees, a lot of debt, and no job. I won't outright tell you not to go to law school, just know what you're getting into.

Now for the advice. If you're not going to a highly competitive school, you should choose your school based primarily on two factors:

1) Where do you want to practice? Very few schools can place candidates across the nation. Everyone else will have much more success looking for jobs in legal markets in the school's state or thereabouts. So if you really want to live in San Francisco, don't go to school in New York.
2) How can you minimize you debt? As I said, the legal market is tough. Further, the distribution in salary for entering lawyers is heavily bimodal, so even many people who do end up getting attorney positions aren't getting paid a ton. Any scholarships you can get you should really consider hard. I understand a lot of scholarships have significant strings attached, so be careful of that, too.

I'm not sure what to tell you about the ABA thing. I'd be inclined to suggest that you avoid non-ABA schools, though the fact that it's a new school and a state school makes me think a little differently about it. Google around, there are tons of resources for prospective law students and I bet you can find some good discussion about this issue, perhaps even about this very school.

Good luck!

 

[BvBPL]

Thanks. Those are all good points. Thankfully the region I live in, which is also where I am looking for law schools, is loaded with some good schools that have close ties with local employers.

 

[illram]

ABA accreditation is crucial, I would not recommend going to a school without it and you may face difficulties even sitting for bar exams without it. In CA where ABA accreditation is not necessary to sit for the bar exam, you will still face an uphill battle competing against grads from accredited schools, even low ranked accredited school grads. ABA accreditation is also a potential litmus test for bar passage rates, usually non-accredited schools have very low bar passage rates and they get a bad rap as essentially being diploma mills. For a young job seeker the legal market is especially fickle and prone to elitism so that's just the way it is.

Everything shortguy said is spot on. There are loads of rankings and law school review resources out there, figure out where you want to live and work and then look at the schools in the area, look at bar passage rates and look at tuition and potential scholarships.

Feel free to PM me if you want. I followed the "scholarship at a low ranked" school career path in SF, graduated in 08, so if you're in California and especially Northern CA I can talk about that experience.