the Cost of Law School

A legal education is vocational; it teaches one the skills and knowledge required to be an attorney, and covers legal theory to the extent that would be required to understand the more day-to-day processes of legal work. Theory classes exist, but most employment tracks don't require them.

The "full cost" of attending this law school (per year) is slightly more than $66,000. That includes two semesters' tuition, books, health insurance, and about $20,000 to live on

Surprisingly, most of the horror stories regarding law school seem to actually be inaccurate. At least at this school, students were generally helpful, offering the previous class' notes if you miss a session for some reason, etc. (You often hear that it is so competitive that people will sabotage other people, checking out books so that others won't be able to study with them, etc.)

It does appear that to handle costs, the school has somewhat exceeded its ideal capacity; 1Ls (first year law students) have to share lockers, classes aren't usually the stereotypical 100s per professor, but many are close to 50. A more purely academic graduate school class averages to about 10 students per class, 5 not unusual and more than 15 very unusual.

1) Prepare for the LSAT. Work harder on it than you think you'll need to. Take a class (often $1000+) if you can afford it (I couldn't, really), and at very least take a full practice test (in other words, a full LSAT exam that was previously used in the actual test; you can buy books of them on Amazon) every weekend for several months leading up to the test.

2) Go to the best school that is located in the city/state in which you want to eventually practice (unless you get in to a top 14, maybe top 25 school). Harvard is worth it, even if you want to settle in San Diego, but attend Hastings in San Francisco over Northwestern near Chicago if you plan to settle in the Bay Area. Note: I have not attended any of the three schools I just mentioned. It's just that the alumni network, your professors' connections in government and the courts, all will prove invaluable to you, and so it's worth compromising on notional rankings to accrue those benefits _IF_ you are certain you want to live in one specific city.

3) Controlling for #2, attend the best school possible. The "feel" of the school, the specifics on whether you "like" it or not really aren't significant. Most schools' experience are the same, and you can never compensate for the effects of lost ranking.