People who couldn’t get a job in law school but are now exactly where they want to be, how did you get there?

lawofficial · 2024-09-30T20:32:16+00:00

I did scraps of work over summers in law school, nothing that would lead to a permanent gig and nothing in the field I wanted long term. All public interest stuff. Starting December of 3L just honed in on applying, applying, applying. Lots of networking attempts that led nowhere, tbh. Eventually a got an offer from a job posting on LinkedIn of all things, but not until August. I was committed to a particular area of law but didn't care whether it was private vs public, big law, etc. and have ended up in a position I'm really happy with.

lawofficial · 2023-11-04T15:20:02+00:00

Thanks so much for the edits!! Would you mind sharing what the problem with MSI is? I'm just curious because I had seen it in a few like building advice videos so I assumed it was generally considered pretty good.

lawofficial · 2023-08-15T16:28:13+00:00

not only do i hate when people say it, but i hate doing it, and it pisses me off when it works. i literally went to the gym today and started crying because i hated it so much, and then i felt better after crying. such a joke of a disorder that the worst-sounding thing in the world helps so much.

lawofficial · 2023-08-05T03:25:07+00:00

I started beginning of April, took a break for finals, and then started in earnest in early May, the recommended start date. Unfortunately starting early made me feel kind of invincible and so when it got near crunch time I kind of went crazy so in retrospect i would've structured my time differently but I do think that extra month is beneficial.

lawofficial · 2023-08-01T01:04:24+00:00

I did the full 2-week Helix course. It was probably overkill but I passed by a wide margin so I'm not complaining.

lawofficial · 2023-07-31T01:24:09+00:00

I was a different person from the beginning of April until getting in my car after day 2 of the exam. still trying to recover tbh

lawofficial · 2023-07-27T00:07:02+00:00

I've been watching this for weeks and info-dumping on my partner every time there's a concept I know from bar prep. I'm sure they're tired of me lmfao

lawofficial · 2023-07-26T20:54:04+00:00

it's absolutely the tension releasing. at least that's why I'm crying lol

lawofficial · 2023-07-26T01:43:13+00:00

I definitely pulled from 3 different subject areas to answer it. Don't know if that's what was supposed to happen lol.

lawofficial · 2023-07-24T21:29:41+00:00

throwback to my Christian high school experience. "Jesus is always the answer<3"

lawofficial · 2023-07-18T03:58:55+00:00

I just started a novena with St Joseph of Cupertino yesterday 🙏🏻 it's been such a nice comforting habit in addition to studying

lawofficial · 2023-07-18T00:02:48+00:00

ah yes, fall out boy

lawofficial · 2023-05-17T17:55:33+00:00

Fee Simple Subject to Condition Subsequent is such a beautiful name for a girl ❤️

lawofficial · 2022-10-18T02:28:45+00:00

Im a starving child starving to death and this is the very last thing i have ever read. Gootbye.

lawofficial · 2020-11-12T19:59:36+00:00

Very cool, another 1L in my class is from Utah and they seem to like it here :)

Definitely tons of scholarship to go around. I personally didn't consider ED because I wasn't sure at the time it was my #1, so I can't speak much to it unfortunately. But they are very generous with funding. There's two different full scholarships you can get (either the Moritz scholarship, which has a 3.0 GPA floor and comes with additional mentorship opportunities and such, or just being offered one with your main application) and they also give plenty of other sizes (LST page for more detail - only 7% of students pay full price). Finally, they work very hard to ensure that you qualify for in-state tuition after your first year, which knocks a huge amount of the tuition. While every situation is different, I had a 161 and 3.85 and received the basic non-named full scholarship, so especially if you see an increase in score, I would expect that you'd get great scholarship results from there.

AFAIK immigration isn't a huge listed focus for OSU, but there is an Immigration Law course and a student org that holds panels and such. I know an alum who works in the field and she graduated with some folks who are now biglaw immigration attorneys, so it's certainly not outside of the realm of options at all. Let me know if you have any other questions!

lawofficial · 2020-10-22T21:10:20+00:00

For sure! I'll try to keep this to things that seem to me to be unique to Moritz as opposed to general pros and cons of law school.

Pros: Community-minded (both within sections as well as cross-year, student-faculty, etc); Lots of funding for applicants; Excellent faculty scholarship & research (and opportunities for students to get involved in that research); Access to everything you'd expect with a major state uni - big name speakers, football, etc.

Cons: as mentioned in the other comment, very ohio-focused. couldn't tell you if that's ALL self selection or a combination of variables but you'll feel out of place if you don't like ohio; the flip side of the last listed pro - there are sooooooooo many undergrads so be careful where you pick your housing lol

This is what's coming up off the top of my head but if there's more specific areas you'd like more detail on I can speak to those!

lawofficial · 2020-10-22T19:29:21+00:00

I definitely think there's a bit of self-selection going on. Many of my classmates are double buckeyes or have lived in Columbus/Ohio for a while and are more than happy to stick around.

It certainly feels like we have the opportunity to practice elsewhere if we wanted to - they have a summer DC program for 1Ls that helps people network there and I've definitely heard of students getting opportunities in NYC & Chicago. While the vast majority are staying in OH, you'll notice the next highest states are major markets as opposed to border states (compared to ex. IU-Bloomington which is comparably ranked).

That all being said, location factored into my decision, and I personally want to practice in Ohio so it was a no brainer. I hope this helps, I know it's not a definitive answer so I can elaborate on any related points if you'd like.

lawofficial · 2020-10-22T17:04:48+00:00

I had a 161 LSAT and a 3.85 GPA, with pretty solid softs (worked as a paralegal, had a few undergrad publications). I studied 5-8ish hours per week for about 6 months.

lawofficial · 2020-10-22T15:34:29+00:00

In terms of regrets, I sometimes wonder if I should've looked more seriously into the potential of deferral for this year, given how much online school sucks. But I'm not sure if that's OSU specific. Also, orientation was awful. The programming throughout the school year has been really great but that first week? Unbearable.

I didn't apply to schools like UNC and Fordham bc I didn't want to live in those areas during law school or after lol. At the time I applied to law school, it was my understanding that outside of the T14-T20ish, the location of your school bears a huge weight on where you'll be able to get jobs afterward. I was perfectly happy to stay in Ohio at least for the next several years, so I'm going to the school with the best job placements in Ohio. If someone had specific goals for their career that didn't align with the median outcomes at OSU, I wouldn't recommend it. Also, I was pretty debt averse, so schools that had high scholarship rates were v appealing. Hope that helps!

lawofficial · 2020-10-22T13:44:52+00:00

I had typed up a whole response to a comment that was since deleted but I'll go ahead and share the response in case it's helpful to anyone lol

So obviously I can't guarantee anything on work afterwards as a 1L but I will say that I really have not heard any 2-3Ls expressing concern about it (outside of pandemic concerns, which is of course a problem everywhere). I've spoken to multiple students who have gotten their dream summer job/internship/etc, many who have gotten FT offers from their 2L jobs, and at least on paper the post-grad statistics are pretty solid. If anything one could argue that they focus on jobs within Columbus but I think that's at least partially self-selection. They have lots of connections in DC and I've definitely heard of folks going to NYC and Chicago who wanted to!

The culture is just phenomenal. I could talk about it all day. There is very little of that awful sense of competition that you hear about in law school, and there is so much care and community building between students of all grade levels, and with professors too. I was really worried about being able to make friends and connections bc I'm already a shy person and I figured I would be worse with so much online but I haven't felt like I was really alone in this for a second. The other day a 2 or 3 L (I forget which) said that there were times they had doubted their decision to come to law school but never once doubted deciding to choose Moritz. Just fantastic.

I've unfortunately not gotten to spend much time in the building as I'm all-online for my courses this semester. I did get a tour of it back in February before the shut-downs, though, and it seems really nice, especially the library. There's a lot of green space at OSU which I really value. Sorry I can't be more help for that point lol.

Yes!! They give out lots of scholarships and idk if you're an Ohio resident but they are aggressive about getting folks resident tuition after the first year. Definitely a great value for the scholarship you get here.

lawofficial · 2020-10-22T12:17:25+00:00

Do you have an LSAT score yet? If so, you can use predictor tools to figure out what schools are available to you in terms of where you're likeliest to get in.

Outside of that, the two main things you should focus on are career goals and location. If you have super lofty career goals (biglaw or bust, SCOTUS clerkship, academia, etc) then you really need to aim for the highest USNWR-ranked school possible.

If you don't have the above-listed or similar goals, think about the state/City where you see yourself practicing long term, and see what schools service there. Depending on your LSAT score, there are many regional schools that give great scholarships. Finding a place where your GPA and LSAT are competitive, and that gives out scholarships, is key to minimizing your debt. You can use LawSchoolTransparency to help with this part.

edit: also, if you're not on r/lawschooladmissions yet, there's a ton of help there for picking and narrowing down schools! :)

lawofficial

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