US News Best Law Schools, 2012
So Michigan is the 7th best law school (tied with U Penn) according to the US News.Northwestern is the only Big Ten School that made this list as well.
Having known a few ND law students during my time there, I am especially delighted to see us owning them here (ND down at #23 - a bad loss, and they might drop out of the top 25 :p ).
March 16th, 2011 at 10:24 AM ^
Well at ND Law we do have a ton of HOT CHICKS! Actually, no, no we don't. They are tremendously unattractive. But it at least has a seriously sweet alumni network, really helped me get a job.
That is a damn good point and you've shown me an entirely new way of looking at most rivalries Mr Lahey. I always saw Michigan vs OSU and Michigan vs MSU as different cultures, which fueled the rivalry, and that was how I defined what a rival was to me. I learned something tonight...thank you.
My wife graduates from Duke Law in May. They dropped to #11 from #10 last year, that Kyrie Irving injury is hurting the Law School ranking too lol. She was a Michigan undergrad :)
Why is the instate/out of state discrepancy so small for law school when for undergrad or other grad/professional schools it is 2-3 times higher? Just curious.
March 16th, 2011 at 11:12 AM ^
It was actually the same for my Masters in Accounting that I got back in 2007. I think I saved all of 3k ( or slightly more) being in state. Needless to say I am still paying that off.
March 16th, 2011 at 11:24 AM ^
UM Law and undergrad grad here, both out-of-state. My understanding when in law school (class of '07) was that the reason for the similar tuition is that the law school receives even less money from the state than the undergrad school does. I think the law school gets something like less than 1% of its money from the state. That, and, well, frankly, the market will bear it.
So... hurray?
/See George Michael above.
Tuition has gotten outrageous.
Gotta give mom and dad a huge thanks for footing the bill during my three years in Ann Arbor for law school. I can't imagine busting my ass, getting to April of 3L with a brain that resembles oatmeal only to finish with a mountain of debt. I is lucky.
"I can't imagine busting my ass, getting to April of 3L with a brain that resembles oatmeal only to finish with a mountain of debt."
March 16th, 2011 at 10:27 AM ^
March 16th, 2011 at 11:13 AM ^
I intended no offense, though re-reading my original comments I can see how it came off the way it did. Don't get me wrong, I am fully aware of how crazy lucky I am.
March 16th, 2011 at 11:26 AM ^
It sucks. I think I still have 75K-80K in debt, about 30 of which is variable rate private loans. Thank god interest rates have been so low over these years, might be able to get rid of those before interest rates rise significantly.
But at least I graduated before the bottom fell out of the market. And I'd probably already have all the private loans paid off and then some if I weren't married and didn't spend a bunch of money on sending my wife to grad school. I feel kinda bad for the people who graduated in '09, '10 and paid even more than I did for school while having job prospects that were significantly worse than mine through no fault of their own, the job market was fantastic when they started school.
March 16th, 2011 at 11:38 AM ^
Yeah, I'm in a similar boat, paying around $1600/month in law school loans. . . and will be until I'm in my late-40's. The debt burden makes it impossible for it to have been a good financial decision for me unless making $100k/year, minimum, which is obviously very, very doable with an M Law degree, but it also sort of handcuffs your options. I definitely knew that the post-graduate debt burden would be a pain in the ass, but, well, living the reality of it vs. conceptualizing it at "some point in the future, after graduation" is obviously different.
March 16th, 2011 at 11:36 AM ^
Does anyone here have a JD but didn't do the typical big law/clerkship route afterwards? Does anyone have any insight as what someone with a JD can do as far as hedge funds/private equity goes?
March 16th, 2011 at 11:40 AM ^
It can absolutely be done. If you go to a top 10 or top 15 law school, the best way to get there might be to work for a big firm for a couple years in their private equity department and then transfer over to a hedge fund. I also know that, at least back when I was doing it, if you put your mind to it, you could land an interview with a large investment bank- the kind they give to the MBA students. It can definitely be done.
March 16th, 2011 at 11:42 AM ^
would be the one that kills its students and feeds them to feral pigs.
March 16th, 2011 at 12:05 PM ^
Law schools need to do a better job of providing their students insight into opportunities outside of the practice of law. The world doesn't need any more lawyers. They could cap it right now and we'd all be better off. The world does need the thinkers and problem solvers that a great law school like Michigan Law produces.
For the kind of money they ask, the law schools should be illuminating long term options in all fields that the students can build towards. Just producing more litigators is actually way beneath the greatness of U of M.
I was a lawyer. For every 100 lawyers I met, I met less then 5 that should have actually been lawyers. The rest were in it for the money but weren't cut out for tougher disciplines like engineering. I was a sad member of that group.
I can't speak to U of M at all. I sure hope they are producing great minds who have clear goals beyond arguing and racking up billable hours on pointless cases for rich people. I'll assume that since it is Michigan, they are out front leading the way on being better.