Posts from — October 2008

After a period of personal growth (AKA professional floundering) I have determined that in this economy, I’m better served going back to school. So: I choose the law. I took the LSAT on October 4th and scored well enough that I won’t be re-taking it.

One of the most consistent things I’ve heard from all the current and former law students I know is that going to law school just to be going to school isn’t a good idea. You need to be going in order to do something. In short, law school is a means to an end.

So, what’s my end? Well, I don’t know exactly (yet). Generally speaking, I’ve always been interested in politics and political philosophy - in particular, I’m interested in international relations and diplomacy. This seems like enough of a focus to go on with (feel free to disagree in the comments if you like).

Basically I’m looking at schools that are good overall and really good in international law. I’d also like to be relatively close to Charlottesville for personal reasons. My LSAT score has netted some fee waivers from schools I didn’t plan to apply to, but will now since it’s free. So far, I’m looking at these schools (in alphabetical order, with fee waivers in italics):

• American University (Washington, DC)
• College of William and Mary
• Columbia University (New York, NY)
• Duke University (Durham, NC)
• Fordham University (New York)
• George Washington University (Washington, DC)
• Georgetown University (Washington, DC)
• New York University (New York, NY)
• Northwestern University (Chicago, IL)
• Temple University (Philadelphia, PA)
• University of California - Los Angeles (Los Angeles, CA)
• University of Michigan - Ann Arbor (Ann Arbor, MI)
• University of Southern California (Los Angeles, CA)
• University of Virginia (Charlottesville, VA)
• University of Washington (Seattle, WA)
• University of Washington - St. Louis (St Louis, MO)

In the coming months, I’ll be working on gathering letters of recommendation, essays, and all that jazz. I’ll use this space to distill my thoughts and hopefully elicit a reaction from any readers who happen by.

Onward and upward!