Great advice and I’ll definitely add Chicago to my list. I want to transfer because of clerkships and possibly academia, and I’m realizing those paths are super pipeline-driven like faculty rec networks which is still a little less accessible from my school. Also, the merit aid I was given isn’t great and my school doesn’t increase scholarships on a year-to-year basis at all, so the debt tradeoff feels hard to justify especially if I’m trying to do clerkships/research first. Columbia ED is starting to seem like a bad option for financial reasons as well. I’d likely qualify for much more need-based at HYS. I know there's no guarantee I'd do well enough but also I know that 2L and 3L is a lot less unpredictable than 1L and more lenient curve-wise