Do not listen to what people say about T-3 and T-4 schools on this site

[CJScalia]

I go to a T-25 and when we have visiting professors here they are terrible compared to the quality of education you get from the actual profs. The subject matter may be the same, but that doesn't mean you learn it as well. That's one difference.

I had a visiting professor from Yale that was absolute *&^%, so that's just plain anecdotal evidence that at the very best is worthless.

Not to mention, law is not complicated, you should be perfectly capable of learning what consideration is even if your professor is a homeless guy spending half the class masturbating at his desk.

[Geesh106]

Bigs,  I've read what you've had to say about Tier 4's, and your pride in your own school, GGU, is apparent.  I'm going to assume that you love your school so much that you are/would pay sticker to attend?

[cooleylawstudent]

for the price of a sticker, I'd go to ANY school. Last one cost me a quarter and after I got it wet and rubbed it on, I had a badass tatoo for like a week.....I got on my peddlebike and rode like the badass biker I am!!!!

Bigs,  I've read what you've had to say about Tier 4's, and your pride in your own school, GGU, is apparent.  I'm going to assume that you love your school so much that you are/would pay sticker to attend?

[bigs5068]

I like law school I would rather have gotten into Stanford obviously.  I actually would like a lot of things, but I had 3.1 and 155 LSAT and I want to be a lawyer and I was going to make a horrendous mistake by relying on rankings and going to a tier 3 in Michigan opposed to a tier 4 in San Francisco, where I want to live and my fiance has an awesome job and I get free place to live. Plus 16,000 a year scholarship doesn't hurt either. 

So in that situation it would be MORONIC!!!!!! to have gone to a tier 3 or tier 2 in a far off place and what would the difference be between HOFSTRA or MICHIGAN STATE AND GGU really??? U.S. News IDIOTIC SYSTEM that makes no sense and is not approved by anybody says I should have gone to Michigan State, realistically None of those schools is going to have employers dropping their paints for me and I just want to warn people who are thinking about law school to not get caught up in the rankings like I was when applying particulary if you are debating between Tier 2 and tier 3.  I was going to apply to Gonzaga and there Tier 2 last year had I gone there they went to tier 3 this year what changed? Nothing I am sure. The rankings are bogus and use common sense when applying to law school that is all.

I just want to warn law school applicants to not put that much stake in the rankings that is all. Obviously, use common sense when applying, but just know the rankings should be about 9,204 on your list of things to consider when choosing your law school.

 

[Netopalis]

My take: The only people who are really hurting to find jobs right now are people who are looking for jobs in biglaw.  I'm at Mercer, and I ended up with 4 summer job offers.  I have no qualms whatsoever about my job prospects.  Why?  Because I want to prosecute, and it's not one of those uber-competitive fields (DOJ aside).  The point is, you can get a job with a medium-to-small sized firm from just about anywhere.  You won't be making $160k+, but the benefit of a lesser salary is a more interesting job and more free time.  I think it's a worthwhile tradeoff.

[the white rabbit]

My take: The only people who are really hurting to find jobs right now are people who are looking for jobs in biglaw.  I'm at Mercer, and I ended up with 4 summer job offers. 

I'd be careful about equating summer job offers with full time job offers.  Still, good job on that.

[Trivium]

I go to a T-25 and when we have visiting professors here they are terrible compared to the quality of education you get from the actual profs. The subject matter may be the same, but that doesn't mean you learn it as well. That's one difference.

I had a visiting professor from Yale that was absolute bunnies, so that's just plain anecdotal evidence that at the very best is worthless.

Not to mention, law is not complicated, you should be perfectly capable of learning what consideration is even if your professor is a homeless guy spending half the class masturbating at his desk.

I disagree that it's anecdotal evidence. An anecdote is one story intended to evidence an entire pattern of activity. What I have just described is the entire pattern of activity. Every visiting I have had was terrible and all but one permanent prof. I have had was amazing.

Saying that the law is not complicated is sort of ignorant too. Obviously, I can (and did) figure out what consideration is on my own. However, I have a limited amount of time within which to do my studying and attempting to figure out what most of the securities act means without the guidance of a competent teacher stretches the boundaries of the amount of time I have.

I do think, however, that your experience with a visiting at Yale demonstrates a key difference between the T-14 and lower ranked schools. Profs. from my school probably visit at yours. My school gets visiting profs from T-3s.

[Netopalis]

My take: The only people who are really hurting to find jobs right now are people who are looking for jobs in biglaw.  I'm at Mercer, and I ended up with 4 summer job offers. 

I'd be careful about equating summer job offers with full time job offers.  Still, good job on that.

Yeah, I realize that, but I also know that at least 2 of the offices hire a ton of their 2L interns, so it's not like there's no translation at all.

[the white rabbit]

I disagree that it's anecdotal evidence. An anecdote is one story intended to evidence an entire pattern of activity. What I have just described is the entire pattern of activity. Every visiting I have had was terrible and all but one permanent prof. I have had was amazing.

It's still anecdotal in the sense that it's still just one person's perception (yours).

My take: The only people who are really hurting to find jobs right now are people who are looking for jobs in biglaw.  I'm at Mercer, and I ended up with 4 summer job offers. 

I'd be careful about equating summer job offers with full time job offers.  Still, good job on that.

Yeah, I realize that, but I also know that at least 2 of the offices hire a ton of their 2L interns, so it's not like there's no translation at all.

No, it's not. 

[legalized]

My take: The only people who are really hurting to find jobs right now are people who are looking for jobs in biglaw.  I'm at Mercer, and I ended up with 4 summer job offers. 

I'd be careful about equating summer job offers with full time job offers.  Still, good job on that.

Yeah, I realize that, but I also know that at least 2 of the offices hire a ton of their 2L interns, so it's not like there's no translation at all.

Were your offers Macon firms?  I have heard that Mercer is pretty protected from the overall crash because it has a lock on the Macon firms.

While I grow weary of seeing OP's sentiments browbeaten into everyone in every thread, I do appreciate the sentiment behind this thread, because it is easy even if you are not biased against T3 and T4 schools to end up not even able to analyze them properly because many of us first encountered any organization of the schools in the US News rankings...and they don't even bother to rank the T3 and T4.  So it's easy for a majority of ls hopefuls to see only T1 and T2 schools as options, and end up making all their choices among those.

It is good to research continuously on these schools...while getting into a top 10 school feels good psychologically (and 90% of getting through anything hard is mental), being considered tops of the entering class feels good psychologically too, and so does attending school in an area you would LOVE to live and work for the rest of your life, ESPECIALLY doing it for free! lol

So again, people, don't use up all your analytical skills on practicing for the LSAT...once that's done, really look at every ABA-accredited school (and the non-accredited in California if you like risk and don't want to keep open your options of practicing outside the state)...use the Detailed Search funtion of the ABA guide to search for any combination of criteria that fits your description or what you are looking for.

TLS has a list and reviews (by clicking on the hyperlinked names) of the T3 and T4 schools, with their 25th-75th percentile GPAs and LSATs.  You can start there if the ABA search function is a bit intimidating...then go on the schools' websites!  While I always say it's good to know the good and the bad...the OP's point is that most if not all of what's on the net about these schools are very bad.  So balance it out with a visit to the website of the schools you're interested in...read the Dean's letter, the history, their blurb about their location...click around, there are always interesting facts that may be just right (or all wrong) for you that you won't find out by listening to only one side of the story.  Do NOT ignore the bad news about a school, but have a comprehensive file of info on it.

Do your research and buyer beware.  Know your priorities in a school and choose the schools in that order of priority, not anyone else's.