hi all.this is my first post.i am a finaly year law student graduating soon.can someone tell me if i come from a law school which is somewhere in the top 15 of india,have an aggreggate of about 62%,two national level moot court wins,about 5 publications(not very standard ones),2 paper presentations,what are my chances of getting into the above law schools for an LLM?

Your post is unclear and difficult to read though I am going to guess that you want to know if you can get into the schools listed in the title of your post. My guess is that your admissions chances depend heavily on your rank at your institution. Where exactly does your 62% grade place you in your class. Also where in the top 15 schools does your school lie. Is it closer to #1 or #15.

The schools you have mentioned are very difficult to get into especially for a student from India because there are so many indian applicants. Also based on your post I would consider improving your english as that will help your admissions chances.

hi.thanks for the response.well let me try to answer the questions posed by you.

with regard to what my ranking is -it is within the top 15 of my class.
with regard to my law school ranking-i would put it closer to 15 than 1.
hope this clarifies certain aspects and helps you in answering my question.

Top 15 percent or #15. If you are in the top 15 people out of how many people is it?

top 15 in my batch of 100...

Watch out LLM-Guide users, there's a hurricane on its way and its SickandTired of your "non-researched", "non-clear" and "bad-English" posts and questions.

For goodness sake man, some people's posts could be unclear and "not up to your standards", but try and help as oppsosed to being patronising and arrogant.

Just a thought, use it, don't use it.

Two of the most important skills to have as a lawyer are the ability to figure things out on your own without relying on others to do everything for you and good communication skills. The vast majority of posts on this message board do not indicate that the posters have these skills. It is disappointing to me when people see easy answers rather than actually doing some work on their own. If you really are up to the standards of being admitted to a top notch LLM program and you really want it bad enough then you should be able to figure out 90% of the questions asked on this board.

Dear SickandTired,

I'm very pleased, and grateful, that you have figured out what chatacteristics combined make the ultimate lawyer. Now I can go and work on my "figuring-things-out-on-my-own"- and "good communication"-skills, and once I've done that, go and make partner at BigLaw as the youngest ever Non-Common Law "lawyer". But seriously...

My view of the legal profession is that it is full of different types of professional roles ranging from tax law researchers, to human rights activists, to law professors. Even within those fields there are hundreds upon hundreds of different roles, and more to come. Each of these roles require different types of skills, and while I can see that one would imagine that all of them should have good "finding-out-things-on-your-own"- and communication-skills, I think such a view is rather naive, and restricted.

Furthermore, to think that the best law schools in the world (I'm thinking about Cambridge, Oxford, Harvard, Yale, NYU here) are restricted to grooming legal professionals only to one area of the profession is quite silly. I can assure you that there are people with LL.Ms from Harvard equally at white-shoe companies in Manhattan, as well as working for think-tanks developing a new critique to contemporary legal-philosophy.

Finally, one has to bear in mind that there might be (and in fact are) a multitude of different kind of people looking for help on this site. E.g It isn't out of the realm of possibility that some of those who can't satisfy your standards of personal research might be professionals working 14 hour days, or have families, or have other personal commitments, or can't understand what is said on the program's website as they aren't familiar with the educational system of the country, etc., or don't have the possibility of spending hours upon hours online everyday, and are thus simply asking for help.

Therefore I would be very grateful if you could take into consideration the diverse and global nature of the modern legal community, rather than assume that people are acting mala fide.

yours,

NoFoundations

While the roles lawyers do perform are indeed varied, the skills I mentioned are the basic foundation skills that every lawyer must have. While it is true that my experiences with the legal profession and legal education are limited to the US, I would be very surprised to find that in other countries research and communication skills aren't as important as they are in this country. No matter what type of lawyer you end up becoming you will be required to have a certain amount of self reliance and ability to convey your ideas.

After reading your post I am not exactly sure why you think my view is naive in restricted, I am not saying every lawyer must be completely self reliant and handle everything on their own. Rather I am saying that coming to this message board and asking for easy answers rather than spending 5 minutes doing some research is quite frankly lazy. I am figuring most people found this website by doing a simple google search, perhaps if these people spent as much time on the websites of the schools they want to go to they would have been able to find the information they seek just as easily.

With regard to your second point of people having busy lives, I am not criticizing all questions asked on this board. I am just tired of the same repeated questions that are asked over and over, as well as the very very simple questions that can easily be found on school websites. I could be wrong but to me it appears that people would rather just have answers handed to them rather than doing a little digging themselves. If you look at the messages I have responded to with criticism you will see that the questions are all quite simple with answers that could be found quite quickly if the person did some searching themselves.

Perhaps our disagreement is indicative of a difference in cultures. I am not sure where you are from but allow me to explain how things in the US work if you would like to obtain a position in a large law firm (as many of the posters here would like to). You will be expected to maintain a certain amount of independence in your work. When you are given an assignment by a partner, they will not be very appreciative if you are constantly coming into their office asking basic questions. I dont know if that is how things work in other countries but that is how it works here in the US, and for people seeking these types of positions it would be best if they learn this sooner rather than later.

It is kind of sad to see all your snippy comments on this board, discouraging some people (who probably then in your mind is not cut out to be lawyers) from asking questions. I am also not sure doing research on your own is always the most efficient way of getting information. If you get annoyed by these questions, then just don't answer them. I think that probably would be better for everyone anyway. And I agree with the comments above, some people might not have the time or the skill to understand what is said on some web pages. After all, it is foreign. I asked plenty of easy (or you would probably call them silly) questions when I started looking at LLM programs, cause our system is so different. I just didn't know all these answers existed. But they do. And people will figure that out eventually, but I am sure they can do that without snippy comments from you.

Peace out.

SickandTired, one of the requirements to be a good professional also, specially if you want to be a good lawyer and become a partner, is to treat people with a certain level of respect. If some of these people should be more diligent, you should be more polite. If you dont know this rule yet, I am sure you will be learning very soon, particularly if you are in NY.

Sick and Tired,

Because of your .... the very question for which this blog was created lost its importance. As the previous poster said, you could have kept silent.

Dear prospective LLM student from India,

from the information I gathered so far, you really have a good chance of being admitted even to the top tier law schools in the states. Just work hard on your statement of purpose and try to get excellent letters of recommendation. Also if you have time ( if you are going to apply for 2009) try to refine and polish a couple of your articles and get them published in a standard journal/law review. I am sure you will make it. Be strong and never be disapointed by some negative remarks from sick and tired-of-life pple.

Good luck

It is good that you are thinking of the great schools you have mentioned. Yes, there are chances of your getting into there; by 2009 you will be having two years' experience also if you get enrolled with any Bar council immediately after your degree. Rather by now you might have been enrolled?

More than admissions, I am more interested that you get some scholarship or at least partial fee-waiver; OR some part time work to take care of your expenses while u r in USA.

Besides the law schools you have thought of, also consider applying to AU-WCL, CWRU, UoMN, TEMPLE, SMU and CARDOZO.

It has been rightly commented by another friend above that you need to work hard on your SoP. The SoP and Letters of Recommendations from your law faculty are equally important. You need to define your objectives - practice of law back home, or practice of law in USA, or academics?
The law schools you have thought of mostly prefer candidates wanting to go for academics.

To sickandtired in USA

Kindly keep in mind that many candidates aspiring for LL.M in USA are internatinal applicants who will return to their home country after gaining an introductory knowledge of
American Legal System. They are not likely to work in a US Law firm. The need for them to have an elementary knowledge of US Laws has increased because of globalisation and also because majority of big MNCs are from USA. These country prefer to hire people with some background of US education. Therefore, please do not expect from all of them the same standards as are expected from say a US LL.M applicant post-JD degree.