I’ve narrowed down my potential schools to three options

[Administrator]

Below is a conversation between prospective law student Sofie and PowerScore CEO Dave Killoran, regarding Sofie's law school choice.

Sofie: "Hi Dave,

I’ve narrowed down my potential schools to three options: UCLA ($100,000+), ASU (full), Northwestern (~$90,000)

Eventually, I want to end up somewhere in the western states, but I feel comfortable moving to any of those cities for school. I’m interested in entertainment law, but it isn’t a dealbreaker for me. Pretty sure I am not interested in Public Interest but open to all other areas. I am debt averse, but willing to take out some loans if I’m reasonably confident they will pay off.

Any advice is appreciated!"

Dave Killoran: "Hi Sofie,

Thanks for the message. I’m going to assume those those are your scholarship offers, but those alone don’t tell me enough to really help here. What we need is cost of attendance (COA), and because some schools have in-state residency discounts and I don’t know where you are living currently, I need you to come back and post the COA figures for you personally, if you don’t mind
Thanks so much!"

Sofie: "Thanks for your response! Yes those are my scholarship offers, and I am currently living in Utah. These are the COA figures for each school:

UCLA offered me a resident tuition waiver, so this is calculated with their in-state tuition: $38,964

Northwestern: $110,418

ASU: $0, full tuition and fees are covered through O’Connor Honors Program (extended deadline April 15)

Also would like to add that I have not negotiated my offer with Northwestern yet."

Dave: "Hi Sofie,

Thanks for the info! You can see how much of a difference that makes here

So your schools compare as follows, using https://www.lstreports.com/compare/nort ... /ucla/asu/ as a reference. I’m going to focus on biglaw related employment opportunities based on what you said:

Northwestern, ranked #9: $110,418. Power employment percentage (all clerkships + firm employment at firms of 250 or more) = 9.1% + 65.9% = 75%

UCLA, ranked #15: $38,964. Power employment percentage = 5.7% + 38.5% = 44.2%

ASU, ranked #24: $0. Power employment percentage = 9.8% + 6.5% = 16.3%

You can see the rankings relate very directly to higher chances of power outcomes, which makes sense given the nature of the legal hiring world. Speaking bluntly, ASU does not fare well here (and there’s been controversy there recently over their handling of grades during the COVID crisis–read up on that if you haven’t already). The number itself is low and only 1 in 6 grads are going into what are the higher prestige/eventually high paying jobs. For $39K you can almost triple your outcomes at UCLA, and to me that increase is worth the $39K as you are now closer to a 1 in 2 chance.

That leaves UCLA and Northwestern. Overall $110K isn’t the worst law school debt out there, and you again almost double your outcomes and now you’d be at 3 out of 4 chances to land something that would lead you to where you want to go. Or, alternatively, you go from 44% to 75% and it costs you the difference of ~$71.5K. Not a bad deal!

So, what I’d do is use the UCLA offer to see if you can leverage Northwestern down a bit. They might not budge here because they won’t see UCLA in the same strata as they are (and they’re right) so you might not get a whole lot. however, you won’t know unless you try and things are so up in the air that you might get really lucky! I don’t see a wrong decision here between UCLA and Northwestern, and if NW came down they would be awfully hard to pass up

Last, congratulations on the great set of offers! you’ve had quite a good cycle

Thanks and please let me know if this helps!"

Sofie: "Wow, thank you very much for your insight, this is great! I agree that Northwestern is very difficult to turn down.

Is there a benefit to UCLA over Northwestern if I am hoping to practice somewhere in the West?"

Dave: "A little bit in LA but keep in mind that Northwestern has a higher national name recognition, and that extends West too. UCLA will always do fine out west because of course everyone knows it (and I’m a personal fan of the school having lived nearby and taught there), so the placement of UCLA grads will always be solid. But overall Northwestern has a bigger name and a more powerful draw.

Or, put another way, if you walk into an LA firm that interviews 100 UCLA grads a year and only a few NW grads, who do you think stands out?

Thanks!"