What should I look for when deciding on a law school?

That’s probably the wrong way to consider law school. You need to find out the academic and LSAT requirements, the application pool and yield and whether you might even be admitted.

I would not like to hire a lawyer who did not know what he was doing, even when he was young. The research isn’t hard. Google Harvard Law School Admissions. Reading that site should keep you busy.

I would guess that asking successful lawyers in your particular area of legal interest might be a good start.

1. Do you have a pre-law advisor? They are usually good sources of information

2. Have you taken your LSAT? LSAT and gpa will tell you what level of schools you should be aiming at.

3. What kind of opportunities does the school offer to advance yourself? What are their placement rates? What percentage passs the bar on their first try?

4. Particularly if you want to go into a competitive field, you need to balance out cost and prestige, because prestige matters more in law schools than many other fields.

5. Most schools cater to teaching for that state’s bar exam so you have to consider location

6. While the first year is ususally pretty inflexible, aftter that there may be electives, so if you know you want to go into one area you should be mindful of the school’s focus

Reputation.

If you can get into any of the Top 25 law schools in America, go to one of those. If you can’t, go to a school with a strong program in something that interests you. Reputation is largely irrelevant once you’re not in the top tier, until you get to bottom of the barrel, barely accredited schools.

(Bonus points: no one agrees what the top tier is: Top 14, Top 25, Top 40?)

Also, I would advise you to pick schools in the four major metropolitan areas, NYC, DC, LA, and Chicago over schools elsewhere, because they have such strong legal industries. Or at least they will once the economy improves. Also, schools in those areas are more likely to have connections to the legal industry.

The real question here is: what do you want to do with a law degree?

…I don’t know what I’m doing

You’ll be perfect for Pro Bono work

It depends a little bit on what kind of lawyer you want to be. If you want to be a public defense attorney, it might not matter much, as long as it’s a ABA accredited law school.

If you want to work in Big Law, you have to go to a top 25 school, and you probably need to finish in the top 10%-20% of your class. To get into those schools, you need a solid GPA and a pretty damn good LSAT score. Keep in mind that the LSAT is one of the hardest graduate-admissions tests.

Another thing to think about is where you want to practice law. It’s almost always a good idea to go to a law school in the area where you want to work. It’ll give you a head start in learning the laws of that particular area and the local rep of the school will help you land a job.

And, as I’ve been told on several law school forums, if you’re doing it for the money, choose a different career.