Final Transfer Decision (again)

[Columbia or Old school]

Columbia or Old school

Columbia

 13 (52%)

old t50

 12 (48%)

Total Members Voted: 25

[win45]

Perhaps I should take the final out of the thread....
Wanted to get the LSD opinions...

DC t50(duh)- 3.94, Law Rev, no money but they are going to give me some

VS.

Columbia

Waiting on H and Y, but have a low LSAT.

Kicker: I want DC big law.

Kicker part 2: Family/friends/hobbies in DC

[big - fat - box]

DC is a very grade snobby/school snobby market. Go to Columbia unless you get into H or Y.

[win45]

7 to 4 say stay at my old school?  Really?

[big - fat - box]

Yes. Unless American or GMU (I'm assuming you're at one of these?) wants to cough up a full ride for 2L and 3L and reimburse you for 1L tuition, I wouldn't stay.

Like I said, DC is a very elitist job market...not just in biglaw either. A Columbia degree will carry infinitely more weight than a American/GMU degree both now and in the long term.

7 to 4 say stay at my old school?  Really?

[Matthies]

I have to agree with BFB here. Unless your top 10 (people not percent) and getting a free ride I think you should go to Columbia. Usually I recommend staying in the city you want to work, but DC is not like a typical legal market. It’s not like Columbia is that far either and there will be plenty of DC firms OCIing there. If it was say Berkley and meant moving all the way across the US to other coast I would tend to say no. But in this case, if it was me I would transfer. Oh, and don’t make your mind up based on the advice of anonymous internet posters. Did you apply to GULC? That would see like a no brainer if you got in there staying local plus top school.

[big - fat - box]

I'd actually recommend Columbia over GULC any day, even if we're talking about DC. DC firms are going to be noticeably more selective when choosing among GULC students compared to Columbia. Like I said, DC is a very elitist place. Students at the top five schools are going to have better OCI results even over GULC.

[tiesto82]

Please do your research before spouting off.

http://lawfirmaddict.blogspot.com/2006/08/washington-dc.html

You will retort will self selection for the disparity but that is nothing but pure speculation. 

Look at the firms websites and look at how many associates and partners are at the firms you want.  There is no guarantee that you will be able to self select your market at any OCI as a transfer student this year because with OCI hurting transfer students are going to suffer the most out of students at t-14's.  Career Counselors at these schools will tell you this.  You may want to think about contacting the Career offices at your school and the schools you are considering rather than asking anonymous people on a transfer board who consistently make bald assertions without any empirical evidence.  There are tons of factors to evaluate and US News Rankings are not the way to do that since their reliance pre-law school student data is paramount to actual career placement.

You should use Brian Leiter's analysis, Vault, and primary source data from the career offices and firms themselves rather than the advice of people you are unlikely to ever meet and who have their own agendas for advice.

Whatever decision you make, ensure that it is properly educated and know that this is not the place to get that education.

Good Luck

I'd actually recommend Columbia over GULC any day, even if we're talking about DC. DC firms are going to be noticeably more selective when choosing among GULC students compared to Columbia. Like I said, DC is a very elitist place. Students at the top five schools are going to have better OCI results even over GULC.

[big - fat - box]

I transferred to a t14. If you are going to contact career offices, my advice would be to try to get info on hiring of transfers from 2000-2001 fall OCI b/c that is the closest thing we have right now to the employment situation for big firms. The problem is that some schools do not track transfers in OCI. I know my school does not.

Absolute worse case scenario, as a transfer you are going to be treated like a student who go whatever grades/rank you got at your old school, period. Transfers are not going to be treated exactly like a student at the new school who started there. I already said this. However, you will be treated better than a student with the same rank/gpa at your old school who chose to stay behind and not transfer. This is because firms value prestige (i.e. they are elitist) and it means a lot to them that they get to list a Columbia grad vs. a t50 grad on their website.

They are going to adjust your gpa/rank based on what they perceive to be equal to students who started at the old school. At my school, the word from many transfers was that they were treated like top 25% to top 50% students depending on what school they transferred from. Coming to a top 50 school, worst case scenario is that they are going to equate you with a top half student. I highly doubt they are going to treat you like a bottom half student, even in this economy. Historically, many transfers have done well at 2L OCI, even a lot of students who went from a tier 2/3 to a T14.

Spouting off numbers of what people went to what schools at firms in what cities doesn't give the whole picture because you don't know what the selectivity scale for a particular firm is or what grades those people got in order to get those summer offers. GULC is right behind Harvard, but 58 students really isn't that many compared to GULC's class size. Over 650 JDs graduate from GULC each year. I would not be surprised if many of those 58 students had quite high grades due to the grades/school snobbiness of the DC market in general.

Add to the mix that many students this summer and next summer are going to be no offered and it complicates things further. I wouldn't be surprised if many of those no offerred are from lower ranked schools.

Another thing to keep in mind is that DC is a much smaller market and has smaller summer classes even in a good year. Also, those numbers tiesto posted are from 2006, which was a much better year for legal hiring than this upcoming OCI.

Bottom line is that a Columbia degree will be worth more now, and in the future, even if you graduate in the middle of the class there. Like I said, unless your t50 wants to cough up the serious money you really have no reason to stay.

[big - fat - box]

One more piece of advice to the OP:

Many schools have student organizations for transfers. Like "X school transfers" or whatever. I would see if the schools you are considering can put you in touch with the officers of those orgs. That's where you are going to get the best info from, even over the career office. Usually the officers or presidents of the transfer student orgs know everyone who came in as a transfer and where they ended up...they can also put you in touch with students who went through OCI last year as transfers and those students can give you a good picture of what is going on. Based on what I know, I will say that 2008 OCI was a tougher year than 2007 OCI. So the info you get from transfers who went through 2008 OCI isn't going to be totally off but things will rougher for 2009 OCI.

[Matthies]

I'd actually recommend Columbia over GULC any day, even if we're talking about DC. DC firms are going to be noticeably more selective when choosing among GULC students compared to Columbia. Like I said, DC is a very elitist place. Students at the top five schools are going to have better OCI results even over GULC.

True but GULC is not limited to OCI, becuase your local. Right now putting all your eggs in the OCI basket is risky. Being DC at GULC would allow your to internt/clerk 3L where you want to work and network. I don't think that can be over looked espically with the way OCI is shaping up for next year.