I hope there is someone who can give me some good advise or just thoughts about the two mentioned programs. I have been admitted to both and have a very hard time in choosing one.

Thanks everyone for time and effort while considering the stated above issue. Any ideas are much help.

Leaving money aside,

If you want prestige then go for Oxford. Plus I would love to stay in a college, just feels more authentic. I also like quiet old city with lots of great old buildings.

But if you are really really looking forward to an intense year to dive deep into the ocean of Public International Law, and your profile is already a prestige (enough) in itself, then go for NYU. NYU has just snatched a PIL professor from Columbia and another from Harvard. Its Hauser Global Faculty is usually made up of the world's leading scholars.

At Oxford you can do 4 papers (ie courses), at NYU you can go for more courses, about 8 I guess.

Hope this helps and good luck!

hey,
thanks for the given answer. it does help much.

in a way I just need to get along with my intuition now in order to get the right answer.

Oxford is far better than NYU and only Harvard and Yale in the USA can compare with Oxford in term of law.

Oxford for sure! There is nothing to discuss!

are you kidding!
you can not compare Oxford to anything other than Yale.

In my opinion this is utter bullshit.

I am very sceptical about any comparison of top with top, and I think that the only reason to definitely go for Oxford, is the name.

All top 10 US law schools can compete with all top UK (Oxbridge, London three) law schools in my opinion. The education you get from the postgraduate is totally different. Whereas Oxbridge is incredibely academic, London is a bit more pragmatic and US is the whole opposite. US LLMs are a lot more practical, and may thus be better suited for all practitioners.

But the bullshit about only being able to compare Oxbridge with HLS/YLS I can't accept. It all depends on what you want.

Masha, I would go to Oxford (for the prestige of an old name/program selectivity and its academic focus) and later try to get to YLS/HLS/SLS depending on your interests. NYU is a great program, however it's not the best you can get in the US, and being admitted to Oxford demonstrates that you can aim high.

Thanks everyone for the thoughts.

I do think NYU is a great place to study, I do like it much more than CLS. It is also a place for great opportunites.

Oxford on the other hand is also ok, but it might be too academic for me. I understand that it is OXFORD, but still NYU has amazing professors and as a city with its spirit is much closer to me.

Barista, thanks for your idea. I think the academic year 2009-2010 will be the last for me to study. I like to use everything on practise, so I will not be able to hadle another couple of academic years away from my country:)

I have studied law at Oxford and Harvard. I am sure that Oxford is as good as Harvard. In any way, SLS is not as good as Oxford. But I admit that the UK LLM is less practical than the US LLM.

Santa is naive and silly.

Thanks!

People have been quick to suggest Oxon over NYU for international legal studies. If we leave prestige aside for a while and concentrate on the composition of the respective faculty, it seems to me that NYU has the most accomplished faculty with the widest range of subjects and interests.

Some Oxford names that pop up are impressive, indeed, Vaughan Lowe, Adam Roberts, Dan Sarooshi, Franklin Berman, Stefan Talmon, plus a number of scholars that I must have missed. But with names like Tom Franck, Simon Chesterman, José Alvarez, Ryan Goodman, Philip Alston, Benedict Kingsbury, Andreas Lowenfeld, Joseph Weiler, Mattias Kumm, Rob Howse, Theodor Meron (yes, he might not be teaching a lot these days), Dick Stewart and Jeremy Waldron (plus a most impressive Hauser Global Faculty), can anyone honestly dispute the slam-dunk for NYU in this regard?

Surely, Oxford admissions is more competitive than NYU but I still think that a lot of highly qualified PIL-oriented LLM students will gravitate towards NYU because of the composition of the faculty.

Just a thought. Interested to hear yours!

I don't really agree with Santa. I was a BCL at Oxford and LL.M at YLS. Considering more than 400 LL.M students plus those in NUS& NYU LLM programs, I am not so convinced of the quality of the program that NYU could offer (let alone hundreds of JDs sitting with LL.M, too!) Oxford, on the other hand, as far as I know, is the only law school keeping the traditional tutorial system, which means that every individual is subject to Professor's supervision. As for quality and reputation, I have no idea how could you compare NYU to Oxford.

Yet, NYU may offer more courses in PIL, but how many PIL courses will you really take if you are there? 24 credits? or merely focus on 2 or 3 subjects? Don't forget the minimum requirement for the two core courses to sit the NY Bar!! Taking NY bar requirement into account and other subjects such as corporate law or banking law, I don't think you may take more than 6 courses in PIL.

I think it is not so correct to compare Top 10 US law schools with Oxbridge generally. To be honest, If you were admitted into, say, Duke or NW or even Penn and Oxbridge, where would you go? If you check the website of HLS, YLS or CLS, you may find that, many professors used to be educated in Oxbridge. Last, name and ranking, at least in legal circle, are almost everything.

Everyone, thanks a lot for your ideas. It is of a great help in making my decision.

I am still waiting for the funding conditions from my college in Oxford, so I think it will influence the choice I need to make in a way (I was offered a half-tuition scholarship to NUY as also I have received another grant from AC to study in the US, as for Oxford they did not offer me any financial aid for now).

Again thanks, it really helps to speak with people who are into this issue.

m

Agreed with P.E.T. :

People have been quick to suggest Oxon over NYU for international legal studies. If we leave prestige aside for a while and concentrate on the composition of the respective faculty, it seems to me that NYU has the most accomplished faculty with the widest range of subjects and interests.

Some Oxford names that pop up are impressive, indeed, Vaughan Lowe, Adam Roberts, Dan Sarooshi, Franklin Berman, Stefan Talmon, plus a number of scholars that I must have missed. But with names like Tom Franck, Simon Chesterman, José Alvarez, Ryan Goodman, Philip Alston, Benedict Kingsbury, Andreas Lowenfeld, Joseph Weiler, Mattias Kumm, Rob Howse, Theodor Meron (yes, he might not be teaching a lot these days), Dick Stewart and Jeremy Waldron (plus a most impressive Hauser Global Faculty), can anyone honestly dispute the slam-dunk for NYU in this regard?

Surely, Oxford admissions is more competitive than NYU but I still think that a lot of highly qualified PIL-oriented LLM students will gravitate towards NYU because of the composition of the faculty.

Just a thought. Interested to hear yours!

again thanks everyone. i am visiting oxford these days, so i hope that will help. the only thing is that new york is new york:)

again thanks everyone. i am visiting oxford these days, so i hope that will help. the only thing is that new york is new york:)

In my opinion you should go for oxford but also keep in mind where you will like to work after you finish your LLM.

I'll throw my opinion in here:

I had offers for both Oxford BCL (now nearly identical to Mjur) and NYU.

I chose Oxford. I'm perfectly happy with the program. I suggest you take Oxford. Here's why:

The Mjur is, unlike the NYU (or other US LLMs) a true graduate degree. This means the following -

You will work with only similarly qualified (and able) graduates on graduate level courses.

On a US LLM, you can choose from the full range of JD courses. No matter what position the Americans take, the JD is equvalent to a UK UNDERGRADUATE DEGREE. Also, the NYU LLM has a particular reputation for being a 'factory' in this respect.

In view of the above, and the fact you have an undergrad, there is little point in repeating undergrad level courses.

My advice is, do the MJur, and if next year, you still wish to do a US LLM, all the top programmes will still be there. They may even be more open to you as a result of your MJur qualification.

I wish you the best of luck.

HJ