Top Law Schools

great. yes, thank you for this post. very useful info here. surprising.

2016 Non T-14 Skadden Fellows: 6/28 (21.4%)
DePaul, U Conn, Northeastern, American, WUSTL, UCLA

2015 Non T-14 Skadden Fellows: 8/28 (28.6%)
Chicago-Kent, Michigan St., UC Irvine, Villanova, Loyola LA, American, Vanderbilt, Suffolk

2014 Non T-14 Skadden Fellows: 8/28 (28.6%)
Tulane, Denver, Wash & Lee, John Marshall, Vanderbilt, Northeastern, UCLA (2)

2013 Non T-14 Skadden Fellows: 8/28 (28.6%)
U Washington, Vanderbilt, Michigan St., Boston U, UC Irvine, U Illinois, UCLA

2012 Non T-14 Skadden Fellows: 6/28 (21.4%)
DePaul, U Maryland, U Miami, Rutgers, CUNY, UCLA

2011 Non T-14 Skadden Fellows: 10/28 (35.7%)
Howard, Northeastern, BC, Widener, U Arkansas, CUNY, Texas, American, Wayne St., Fordham

EJW Fellowships since 2000

40 Arizona: 1
40 Colorado: 1
40 Illinois: 9
40 Wake Forest: 0
40 Washington & Lee: 1
45 George Mason: 0
45 SMU: 2
48 U Florida: 19
48 U Maryland: 10
50 Florida State: 6

To put the T-14 EJW Fellowships (page 1) from 2009 to the present in perspective, Illinois ranked #40 had 7; Florida ranked #48 had 5; and Maryland ranked #48 had 5, more than 5 of the T-14 schools. IMO, If we want to have a true discussion of the schools to choose for public interest, we need to broaden the scope of the schools beyond the T-14 to give the uninformed a true picture of the PI/government numbers.

FamilyLawEsq wrote:To put the T-14 EJW Fellowships (page 1) from 2009 to the present in perspective, Illinois ranked #40 had 7; Florida ranked #48 had 5; and Maryland ranked #48 had 5, more than 5 of the T-14 schools. IMO, If we want to have a true discussion of the schools to choose for public interest, we need to broaden the scope of the schools beyond the T-14 to give the uninformed a true picture of the PI/government numbers.

I'm not doing that. This thread is limited to the T14 because the type of PI/govt from Illinois is materially different than the type of PI/govt from UChicago. Additionally, T14 employment prospects are not generally bound by geographic barriers, but they are outside of the T14. Good luck landing a sought after PI job in Chicago if you're not from there and attend the University of Alabama law school

Nebby wrote:

FamilyLawEsq wrote:To put the T-14 EJW Fellowships (page 1) from 2009 to the present in perspective, Illinois ranked #40 had 7; Florida ranked #48 had 5; and Maryland ranked #48 had 5, more than 5 of the T-14 schools. IMO, If we want to have a true discussion of the schools to choose for public interest, we need to broaden the scope of the schools beyond the T-14 to give the uninformed a true picture of the PI/government numbers.

I'm not doing that. This thread is limited to the T14 because the type of PI/govt from Illinois is materially different than the type of PI/govt from UChicago. Additionally, T14 employment prospects are not generally bound by geographic barriers, but they are outside of the T14. Good luck landing a sought after PI job in Chicago if you're not from there and attend the University of Alabama law school

Is an EJW Fellowship from Illinois or Alabama materially different from an EJW Fellowship from UChicago?

stego wrote:

Nebby wrote:

FamilyLawEsq wrote:To put the T-14 EJW Fellowships (page 1) from 2009 to the present in perspective, Illinois ranked #40 had 7; Florida ranked #48 had 5; and Maryland ranked #48 had 5, more than 5 of the T-14 schools. IMO, If we want to have a true discussion of the schools to choose for public interest, we need to broaden the scope of the schools beyond the T-14 to give the uninformed a true picture of the PI/government numbers.

I'm not doing that. This thread is limited to the T14 because the type of PI/govt from Illinois is materially different than the type of PI/govt from UChicago. Additionally, T14 employment prospects are not generally bound by geographic barriers, but they are outside of the T14. Good luck landing a sought after PI job in Chicago if you're not from there and attend the University of Alabama law school

Is an EJW Fellowship from Illinois or Alabama materially different from an EJW Fellowship from UChicago?

In terms of getting the money? No.

In terms of where you're able to work with that fellowship? Absolutely.

I graduated from Penn and have been working in government (not fedgov, fwiw) since I passed the bar. Feel free to PM me with questions or whatever.

cavalier1138 wrote:

stego wrote:

Nebby wrote:

FamilyLawEsq wrote:To put the T-14 EJW Fellowships (page 1) from 2009 to the present in perspective, Illinois ranked #40 had 7; Florida ranked #48 had 5; and Maryland ranked #48 had 5, more than 5 of the T-14 schools. IMO, If we want to have a true discussion of the schools to choose for public interest, we need to broaden the scope of the schools beyond the T-14 to give the uninformed a true picture of the PI/government numbers.

I'm not doing that. This thread is limited to the T14 because the type of PI/govt from Illinois is materially different than the type of PI/govt from UChicago. Additionally, T14 employment prospects are not generally bound by geographic barriers, but they are outside of the T14. Good luck landing a sought after PI job in Chicago if you're not from there and attend the University of Alabama law school

Is an EJW Fellowship from Illinois or Alabama materially different from an EJW Fellowship from UChicago?

In terms of getting the money? No.

In terms of where you're able to work with that fellowship? Absolutely.

Eh, I think if someone gets one of those things they probably have decent options about where to work with it. At that point you're probably looking at extremely qualified individuals (independent of where they go to school - like, the recent SCOTUS clerk from Hawaii didn't get the gig because she went to Hawaii).

This is not at all saying that someone should go to, say, Illinois banking on getting one of these. I get the emphasis on T14 when you're talking about PI options generally. But I don't think the Illinois/Alabama etc fellows are somehow on a different tier in their work - all those schools have smart people and can produce the occasional great outcome.

Why not at least add CUNY? It's a niche public interest school and seeing how it compares to the T-14 and T1's in terms of NYC PI is pretty important for those considering NYC PI.

SportsFan wrote:I graduated from Penn and have been working in government (not fedgov, fwiw) since I passed the bar. Feel free to PM me with questions or whatever.

If you feel like writing a testimonial about your experiences as a PI student, feel free to pm it to me and I'll post it in OP

Ferrisjso wrote:Why not at least add CUNY? It's a niche public interest school and seeing how it compares to the T-14 and T1's in terms of NYC PI is pretty important for those considering NYC PI.

I'm keeping it at the T14 because most prospective students here are concerned with the T14 and because the PI jobs out of CUNY are likely not of the same caliber as the PI jobs out of the T14.

Nebby wrote:

Ferrisjso wrote:Why not at least add CUNY? It's a niche public interest school and seeing how it compares to the T-14 and T1's in terms of NYC PI is pretty important for those considering NYC PI.

I'm keeping it at the T14 because most prospective students here are concerned with the T14 and because the PI jobs out of CUNY are likely not of the same caliber as the PI jobs out of the T14.

Saying that "most" prospective students here are concerned with only 14 particular schools seems a touch elitist to me when most 1L's will not end up enrolling at one of them. Regardless that info would still be helpful to an applicant(who is 100% sure they want PI) who'd have to pay sticker at T-14 but could go to CUNY for free or close to free. Even if most of the jobs aren't in the same league ,that's not the point of comparing CUNY and the T-14, (obviously T-14 wins), it's rather the "how much better", question which for someone about to pay sticker(200k plus in loans most likely) or close to sticker to a T-14 school seems like it would be pretty relevant. I'm considering PI but am unlikely to go to CUNY because I do not want to limit myself to one practice area right now when I'm interested in many. For people on the other hand who are pretty sure they want PI(who I guess would be the main target of this thread) I just find it silly to not have CUNY's data as part of the comparison in a "Public Interest Megathread" as it provides a much cheaper alternative to the T-14 for those who didn't get sizable scholly's to attend(and access to the NYC market).

Ferrisjso wrote:

Nebby wrote:

Ferrisjso wrote:Why not at least add CUNY? It's a niche public interest school and seeing how it compares to the T-14 and T1's in terms of NYC PI is pretty important for those considering NYC PI.

I'm keeping it at the T14 because most prospective students here are concerned with the T14 and because the PI jobs out of CUNY are likely not of the same caliber as the PI jobs out of the T14.

Saying that "most" prospective students here are concerned with only 14 particular schools seems a touch elitist to me when most 1L's will not end up enrolling at one of them. Regardless that info would still be helpful to an applicant(who is 100% sure they want PI) who'd have to pay sticker at T-14 but could go to CUNY for free or close to free. Even if most of the jobs aren't in the same league ,that's not the point of comparing CUNY and the T-14, (obviously T-14 wins), it's rather the "how much better", question which for someone about to pay sticker(200k plus in loans most likely) or close to sticker to a T-14 school seems like it would be pretty relevant. I'm considering PI but am unlikely to go to CUNY because I do not want to limit myself to one practice area right now when I'm interested in many. For people on the other hand who are pretty sure they want PI(who I guess would be the main target of this thread) I just find it silly to not have CUNY's data as part of the comparison in a "Public Interest Megathread" as it provides a much cheaper alternative to the T-14 for those who didn't get sizable scholly's to attend(and access to the NYC market).

That is fine. Future students who read this thread will be able to get your different opinion on the subject matter and will do with it what they will.

Ferrisjso wrote:

Nebby wrote:

Ferrisjso wrote:Why not at least add CUNY? It's a niche public interest school and seeing how it compares to the T-14 and T1's in terms of NYC PI is pretty important for those considering NYC PI.

I'm keeping it at the T14 because most prospective students here are concerned with the T14 and because the PI jobs out of CUNY are likely not of the same caliber as the PI jobs out of the T14.

Saying that "most" prospective students here are concerned with only 14 particular schools seems a touch elitist to me when most 1L's will not end up enrolling at one of them. Regardless that info would still be helpful to an applicant(who is 100% sure they want PI) who'd have to pay sticker at T-14 but could go to CUNY for free or close to free. Even if most of the jobs aren't in the same league ,that's not the point of comparing CUNY and the T-14, (obviously T-14 wins), it's rather the "how much better", question which for someone about to pay sticker(200k plus in loans most likely) or close to sticker to a T-14 school seems like it would be pretty relevant. I'm considering PI but am unlikely to go to CUNY because I do not want to limit myself to one practice area right now when I'm interested in many. For people on the other hand who are pretty sure they want PI(who I guess would be the main target of this thread) I just find it silly to not have CUNY's data as part of the comparison in a "Public Interest Megathread" as it provides a much cheaper alternative to the T-14 for those who didn't get sizable scholly's to attend(and access to the NYC market).

For starters, the name of the form is "Top Law Schools", so I'm not sure why you're surprised that most people are focusing on... top law schools.

But the exact point is that the jobs aren't in the same league. You can work for local PI organizations from anywhere, and while CUNY is somewhat unique in that it's exclusively a PI-focused school, that doesn't mean that it would be valuable to compare job stats with T14 schools. Access to the NYC market doesn't mean all that much if you're not able to target the same organizations as someone coming from NYU or Columbia.

cavalier1138 wrote:

Ferrisjso wrote:

Nebby wrote:

Ferrisjso wrote:Why not at least add CUNY? It's a niche public interest school and seeing how it compares to the T-14 and T1's in terms of NYC PI is pretty important for those considering NYC PI.

I'm keeping it at the T14 because most prospective students here are concerned with the T14 and because the PI jobs out of CUNY are likely not of the same caliber as the PI jobs out of the T14.

Saying that "most" prospective students here are concerned with only 14 particular schools seems a touch elitist to me when most 1L's will not end up enrolling at one of them. Regardless that info would still be helpful to an applicant(who is 100% sure they want PI) who'd have to pay sticker at T-14 but could go to CUNY for free or close to free. Even if most of the jobs aren't in the same league ,that's not the point of comparing CUNY and the T-14, (obviously T-14 wins), it's rather the "how much better", question which for someone about to pay sticker(200k plus in loans most likely) or close to sticker to a T-14 school seems like it would be pretty relevant. I'm considering PI but am unlikely to go to CUNY because I do not want to limit myself to one practice area right now when I'm interested in many. For people on the other hand who are pretty sure they want PI(who I guess would be the main target of this thread) I just find it silly to not have CUNY's data as part of the comparison in a "Public Interest Megathread" as it provides a much cheaper alternative to the T-14 for those who didn't get sizable scholly's to attend(and access to the NYC market).

For starters, the name of the form is "Top Law Schools", so I'm not sure why you're surprised that most people are focusing on... top law schools.

But the exact point is that the jobs aren't in the same league. You can work for local PI organizations from anywhere, and while CUNY is somewhat unique in that it's exclusively a PI-focused school, that doesn't mean that it would be valuable to compare job stats with T14 schools. Access to the NYC market doesn't mean all that much if you're not able to target the same organizations as someone coming from NYU or Columbia.

While that's the name,there really are no other forum's that serve the same purpose(and if they are next to no one visits them, I'm thinking of one in particular and the name escapes me right now) so yeah, Top Law Schools is for everyone not just T14 applicants(I applied to a T-14 myself although I probably won't get in) and saying otherwise based on the name of the site just makes you sound like a jerk whether it be intentionally or unintentionally. Also "Top Law Schools" doesn't mean, "T-14", what qualifies as "Top" or not is pretty ambiguous. Some of the worst elitists on here would say only top 3 or top 6 counts, others would say top 20 or T1. US News even considers all ranked schools "top tier". Seeing as the site used to have profiles for the top 100 schools, it's clear that TLS doesn't see the definition of "top" as T-14 though otherwise 86 of those school profiles would have never been on the site.

Anyway back to the topic at hand, the reason that CUNY should be included is due to it's really low cost, so people can see if the already agreed upon supremacy of the T-14 opportunities(or other elite schools not included in the T-14) is worth x amount of more dollars to applicants if they are sure they will do PI(if they aren't, yeah the T-14 wins in any scenario, even sticker, I'm not denying that).

Ferrisjso wrote: Anyway back to the topic at hand, the reason that CUNY should be included is due to it's really low cost, so people can see if the already agreed upon supremacy of the T-14 opportunities(or other elite schools not included in the T-14) is worth x amount of more dollars to applicants if they are sure they will do PI(if they aren't, yeah the T-14 wins in any scenario, even sticker, I'm not denying that).

Ignoring the weird little rant: this is simply not a choice people will be making.

If you want to do top-level PI work, then you will not realistically look at potentially going to a T14 school (with all the LRAP programs that come with them) versus abandoning your ambitions before you've even started and going for a local-impact NYC organization. There's nothing wrong with either career track, but you're conflating all PI ambitions into one giant "I like to help others" bubble, which is not how it works. If I want to help others by working at the ACLU, I need to go to a different school than someone who wants to help others by setting up an immigration law practice. Even if there are occasional posters on these forums really considering the latter (it's rare), it would be impossible to accurately rank schools for that kind of work, because there just isn't enough information out there. CUNY isn't really a special case just because it's in NY or just because it's low-tuition. Putting it on the list next to these schools would be entirely pointless, because the numbers wouldn't mean anything.

For fun, I just looked at the first 22 ACLU lawyers to pop up on linked in to determine their schools:

Case Western
Fordham
Harvard 2
Stanford 3
NYU 5
Northeastern
Emory
Iowa
Drexel
Duke
Yale
WUSTL
Drake
Villanova
Michigan

While T-14 graduates account for the majority (13/22) of the ACLU attorneys in this small sample, it demonstrates that ignoring the Top 50/Tier 1 schools this PI thread is without merit IMO.

FamilyLawEsq wrote:For fun, I just looked at the first 22 ACLU lawyers to pop up on linked in to determine their schools:

Case Western
Fordham
Harvard 2
Stanford 3
NYU 5
Northeastern
Emory
Iowa
Drexel
Duke
Yale
WUSTL
Drake
Villanova
Michigan

While T-14 graduates account for the majority (13/22) of the ACLU attorneys in this small sample, it demonstrates that ignoring the Top 50/Tier 1 schools this PI thread is without merit IMO.

Well, if you can't trust a random sampling of lawyers from Linkedin, what can you trust?

The whole point (which is just beating a dead horse now) is that you cannot compare Drexel's PI numbers to NYU (for example) simply because one graduate from who-knows-when with who-knows-what-class-rank got one position in a high-level PI organization (which may just be a local office, because your sampling wasn't specific enough). When you look at NYU's gov't/PI numbers, I guarantee that almost all of those students are not going to the same organizations that Drexel students are going to. And that's not because the NYU students are going to NY and the Drexel students are staying in PA. It's because Drexel students can pretty much only work in PA, and they can pretty much only work for local agencies. The NYU students can go anywhere they want.

Again, there's nothing wrong with working for your local PD or municipal government agency. That's good work if you can get it. But comparing the numbers from schools sending their students to those jobs with schools sending their students to the ACLU, SPLC, DOJ honors, etc. is absolutely pointless. It does not give you anything resembling a fair or helpful comparison.

How are the campus resources for PI at Harvard compared to other T14's?

How did I miss the first 4 pages of this strange thread

FamilyLawEsq wrote:For fun, I just looked at the first 22 ACLU lawyers to pop up on linked in to determine their schools:

Case Western
Fordham
Harvard 2
Stanford 3
NYU 5
Northeastern
Emory
Iowa
Drexel
Duke
Yale
WUSTL
Drake
Villanova
Michigan

While T-14 graduates account for the majority (13/22) of the ACLU attorneys in this small sample, it demonstrates that ignoring the Top 50/Tier 1 schools this PI thread is without merit IMO.

y don't u just make a t14-t50 thread then

.

Alexandros wrote:

Colonel_funkadunk wrote:

FamilyLawEsq wrote:For fun, I just looked at the first 22 ACLU lawyers to pop up on linked in to determine their schools:

Case Western
Fordham
Harvard 2
Stanford 3
NYU 5
Northeastern
Emory
Iowa
Drexel
Duke
Yale
WUSTL
Drake
Villanova
Michigan

While T-14 graduates account for the majority (13/22) of the ACLU attorneys in this small sample, it demonstrates that ignoring the Top 50/Tier 1 schools this PI thread is without merit IMO.

y don't u just make a t14-t50 thread then

http://www.t14-t50-law-schools.com

this is the kind of initiative im looking for

Nebby, this is a super helpful compilation. Thanks so much for sharing the info!