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Messages - dewalters

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Transferring / Re: Wisconsin to Michigan
« on: July 11, 2010, 05:07:17 PM »
Thanks for the advice.  I can finish the PhD after Michigan, and, in fact, I can take a few Michigan political science classes to count towards both the JD and the PhD because of the Big Ten Consortium deal.  I believe Michigan does have a loan forgiveness plan (though I need to ask them about this since they don't give many specifics in their brochures), and, of course, so does the federal government when it comes to public service jobs.  That raises another question:  does anybody know if the federal government's loan forgiveness plan under the College Cost Reduction Act includes clerkships and/or teaching jobs at public universities? 

Baby Lawyer:  What do you mean by additional assistance?  I'm not sure I follow.

Also, would it change the calculus greatly if I had a guaranteed spot on law review at Wisconsin but had to take my chances with the transfer write on process at Michigan?

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Transferring / Wisconsin to Michigan
« on: July 10, 2010, 07:00:04 PM »
I am in dire need of some advice here.  I just finished year one at Wisconsin and ended up in the top 15%, and I then reapplied to my dream school--Michigan.  To my great surprise, I got in.  So my question is whether it is worth it to transfer, but the specifics are important.  My goals are to first be a clerk at the federal appellate level and then become a law professor.  At Wisconsin, I'm enrolled in a joint PhD program in political science, and my understanding is that having a PhD might have made up for the lower ranking of the law school in getting a lawprof job.  On the other hand, it seems clear that Michigan produces more clerks and more teachers (much more) than Wisconsin.  But Wisconsin was free (so long as I stayed in the PhD program) since I could be a teaching assistant in political science classes.  Michigan will be about 48k in out of state tuition and fees alone for each year, not to mention the living expenses.  I'll therefore have to take out massive loans to cover all of that--somewhere in excess of 100k.  I should add that I may return to Wisconsin to finish the PhD after law school if I decide to go to Michigan.

So, given my goals, does it make sense to take advantage of this opportunity or stick it out at Wisconsin?  My family is telling me to choose Michigan since I've always dreamed of going there and because of its reputation, but I'm afraid that that is easy to say when you aren't the one about to incur that kind of debt.  Thanks in advance for your help!

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