Thursday, March 31, 2011

Scholarship!

I'm not sure if my strategy of holding out while waiting for a scholarship worked, but today I went to put down my seat deposit.  The woman at admissions asked if I would meet her back in her office.  You know what immediately went through my head.  Unfortunately, porno movies aren't accurate to real life, so my hopes were dashed.  However, she said that the scholarship committee reconvened and awarded two additional scholarships, and mine was one of them.

So, after getting scholarship offers to half a dozen law schools, only one of which it was practically feasible for me to drive to, I finally got a $10,000 scholarship to the school I want to go to.  So, roughly half-tuition.  I'm really happy with that.  If I end up taking out student loans, this is the difference between paying off an Accord versus an Escalade if I had gone to school at sticker price.

The requirement for renewal is a 3.3 gpa, which I have been warned isn't that easy.  Other students on various discussion boards equate it to being in the top third of the class, give or take. 

I'm pretty pumped at this point.  Due to geography, there are only three feasible schools that are within an hour's drive.  U of M and Cooley are in Ann Arbor.  It'd be a haul, but not out of the question.  Unfortunately, that's pretty much like saying, "you can go to either the best or the worst school in the country".  (Yes, I know that U of M is, arguably, not the best law school in the country and Cooley is not, arguably, the worst.  However, for the purpose of this discussion, they may as well be.)

Toledo is my only realistic option.  At half price, it's a good deal.  If my biz picks up, I should be able to afford to pay tuition rather easily.  If biz stays bad, it's easier to borrow $10,000 than it is to borrow $20,000.

I'm getting sort of excited to be a Rocket.  The campus is beautiful and I've heard a lot of good things about the law school.  Sounds like the smaller class sizes and collegial atmosphere make a big difference in people's experience, there.  All the profs are from the top schools, like pretty much all the profs, everywhere.  So, I have every reason to believe the quality of instruction will be just fine. 

I have seven more chapters to do in the Torts book.  I figure I'll do one more tonight, and then knock out the next six over the course of Friday and the weekend.  Should be ready for my Civ Pro book next week.  This Torts book has really, really taught me a lot, though.  Did it do more for me than I would have done by simply taking the class without doing the E&E first?  Don't know, but I do know there are things to learn in the E&E and that's that many fewer things to learn during the first semester.  Or, if I re-learn them, they should be all the more firmly ingrained.

No comments:

Post a Comment