Hi,

I am graduating in May 2010 from LSU, and I am so confused and just can't make up my mind as to what Bar Exam to take. The choices I have are NC, Va, or Texas. Here are the reasons for those 3 states:

NC: My parents live there and I went to undergraduate there. However I don't have any legal connections there.

Va: My sister lives there and there are a lot of government job opportunities there.

Texas: I worked there the summer of my 2L year however the firm said they were on a hiring freeze and did not make me an offer. I have a bunch of connections there (but they are not substantial where they will give me a job tomorrow morning. I just know a lot of people there), and I have been dating a guy who lives there whom I really like but it's not serious yet.

My heart tells me to go to Texas but since I dont have a job right now, the question is how will I survive there and study for the Bar at the same time.

My parents have offered me to go home and be with them until I find a job however after living away from home for so many years I don't know if I can move back home and be comfortable with that.

If you were in my shoes, what would you do? I have to submit my applications within a week or two. I already missed the initial deadline for NC and Texas because I just couldnt come to a decision. Now I have to pay late fees. Please please give any constructive advice and share your experiences.

Many thanks!

I have a friend who is a Big Firm pedigree who is in TX. He practiced here in California for a while, then recently moved back to Dallas. He couldn't find a job to save his life. He eventually found one, but it's on a contract basis. And his credentials are strong. On job prospects alone, I wouldn't recommend Texas.

Virginia...I'm assuming D.C., the govt is hiring so you'll find work. You'll also be close to your parents. Tell the boyfriend to pack his bags. If he follows, you'll know he's the one.

Do it.

Thanks to both of you for your replies. The one concern I have for moving to the Va. and DC area is that I keep thinking that it will be hard for me to compete with law students graduating from all the top ranking schools in that area (UVA, Georgetown, GWU, William and Mary, etc). Although LSU is in the top 100 schools it's not very well known in the Va and DC area. However in Texas it's more known and a more reputable school and there are a ton of LSU alums there.
On the other hand the unemployment rate in Va is one of the lowest in the country.

So that's where I get stuck on making my decision. What do you guys/gals think?

Thanks again!

Don't go to Texas! Also VA has a hard bar exam. I think you'd do great in NC.

Grasshopper, what's your reason for saying not to go to Texas? Just curious. ;-)

G-man jobs only require a license from somewhere- does not matter where.
Also look at reciprocity between the states you named (and any other states you might consider). Obviously, DC is the easiest place to waive into (133 or higher from a successful exam in another state + some money) and covers a lot of ground w/regard to law firm jobs in that area.
http://www.ncbex.org/fileadmin/mediafiles/downloads/Comp_Guide/CompGuide_2010.pdf
Also, you have to wear a suit while taking the VA exam - easily enough reason to skip that one.

If I were you, NC first and then VA. NC because for the bar exam would you definitely need a place where you can FULLY focus on studying. Sure, the bar is not a rocket-science, but you still need to spare some good amount of quality time for stuying, and for that nothging can beat your parents' home (which is open to you). So, pass the bar in NC, do well enough to get admitted to DC without having to wait for five years (135 or higher on MBE + 75 on MPRE). Move to VA and work in DC. This is the path I will take. Saying so with much caution, I am pretty sure you won't pass Texas bar with a guy around you whom you like so much (or like enough to consider Texas as an option).

Based on what you guys have posted and what I have read elsewhere, the Va. bar is really hard and I find it rather weird to walk in with a suit on and take one of the hardest exams of my life.

One thing that is mind boggling is that the NC bar passage rate is lower than Virginia's. NC's passage rate is 71% and Va. is 78%. The NC exam is 2 days and Va's is 3 days, so I am not sure why it's harder to pass the NC bar exam.

Also, the guy I am dating won't move to NC or Va because he recently got hired as a young professor at one of the universities and he is not going to leave his dream job that he worked so hard to get. So I am thinking maybe it's better if I move to Texas since I worked there the summer of my 2L year  and kinda know some folks in the legal field.

But then I would have to get a night job waiting tables or being a bartender so I can  pay for my expenses while I live in Texas. I don't know how feasible that is while I study for the bar exam. I have never been so confused and uncertain in my life. I simply do not know what is the best thing to do!!! I hate being in a depressive slump like this. I feel miserable. :-(

Thanks again for taking time to read this post. I could really use some unbiased advice.

It doesn't matter how well-known your school is in any state if there are no jobs to give. TX, from what I'm hearing is a tough market right now. My friend went to Southern Methodist Law School, which is in Dallas, and he still couldn't find a job IN DALLAS for almost a year. I am in Southern California, but I went to UGA Law, which is a Top Tier school ranked 40 places higher than LSU but still isn't that well known in this area, and I got a job within a month.

Plus, pardon the cliche, but where there's a will, there's a way. If you network the crap out of whatever area you land in, you'll find a job.

To me, however, I REALLY think you need to make a decision on whether you are driven more by your career or by your personal life, and that's a decision we can't make for you. I personally think you're driven way more by your personal life - otherwise, assuming you really do have geographic flexibility, you'd be taking more proactive measures right now, like submitting for on-campus interviews and fanning out letters of interest to firms and checking the job sites - rather than quibbling about competition from other schools (which will always be there no matter where you go) and whether someone is or isn't living in the area.

In other words, if you were really trying to find a job rather than have people make your personal decisions for you, you'd be asking your future employers, not us, where you should go.

Mark, I understand what you're saying but I can't exactly ask future employers where I should take the bar exam because that automatically makes me look like an ass. I don't think future employers would be impressed by someone with uncertainty, who has not made up her mind where she wants to take the bar exam.
I am sharing this problem on this post to get advice from students or recent graduates who might have been in the same situation as me.

I am not driven by my personal life however it's not everyday when I'll meet someone that I care about and click with on so many levels. So all in all I am trying to make the BEST life decision which involves a balance of my career and personal life.

I think if I had a job offer, none of these questions would be on the table. Given the fact that my options are open to move to a number of places, I can't quite pin point the best place to start my career as I have no idea which state is better than the other.
Believe me I am submitting resumes to firms in all 3 states on a daily basis. My number one goal is to land a job .

One thing that is mind boggling is that the NC bar passage rate is lower than Virginia's. NC's passage rate is 71% and Va. is 78%. The NC exam is 2 days and Va's is 3 days, so I am not sure why it's harder to pass the NC bar exam.

Lo! heed my words Quty! ignore them at your utter peril... The passage rate of a state's bar exam DOES NOT indicate how 'easy' it is to pass. The reason Virginia's is so high is because there's A LOT of smart people taking it... and likely the opposite is true of NC. I'm not actually familiar with those states, but here in Washington state, the traditionally 80% passage rate of first-time takers has a lot of people decieved that it's easy, but in fact the barbri people have told us it's one of the hardest they've seen.... because the elite urban center of Seattle makes up the vast majority of the applicants... as oppossed to other states that have a wide range of middle-sized cities with more mediocre lawyers. Basically, if you want an easy state, do some homework and find one that has stupid takers.... my guess it would be a mountain or midwest state without any traces of Big Law in the cities (Wyoming?)

Okay, that makes more sense to me. I thought you meant that you hadn't done anything and were going to take a bar exam before you thought about applying for a job. That would be reckless.

When I said to ask your employers where to take the bar exam, I meant to ask them where they have their greatest need for your skills (i.e., what office they'd want you to work in, if they have a multistate practice, as most large firms do), not to ask them for the sake of getting their advice.

If you're strapped for cash, consider moving home with your parents for the short-term and basing your decision from there. You don't have to live in Texas to study for the Texas bar exam. So you could save a lot of money by avoiding rent and daily expenses by staying with the parents for the summer and studying for the bar exam from their home.

Also consider this fact: If you pass the bar exam in any state, it's easy to become a member of the DC bar. I THINK you just have to fill out a form or take a simplified test - I forget which. I say that because you could hypothetically kill two birds with one stone - take the TX or NC bar exam and then just waive into DC. That give you the option of working in either TX or NC as well as Northern Virginia (albeit in DC).

Bjorn,

I'm not from NC, but I wouldn't necessarily throw out the uninformed stereotype that North Carolina bar applicants are less smart than VA applicants. North Carolina is the east coast equivalent to Northern California's Silicon Valley. There are a number of high-tech companies in the state, which means there is a lot of IP work to be had there. I don't know about you, but I don't know of a single dumb patent attorney in my rolodex. Plus, consider the fact that Duke (#10 US News) and UNC (#30 US News) are in the state (practically in the same city), and it's just as rich in 'smart people' as VA.

I also disagree with your idea of taking a bar exam in a random "easy" state, like Wyoming. Good luck finding a job in Wyoming. For that reason, that advice is counterintuitive to her concern of taking a bar exam for the purpose of seeking the best opportunity to find a job.

Thanks for everyone's input.  I think you guys have a good point that I should either take the NC or Texas exam and waive into DC.

The unemployment rate in Texas and Va are in the single digits and in it's pretty awful in NC. This is the map where I am getting my data from:

http://money.cnn.com/news/storysupplement/economy/gapmap/index.htm

Also, one of you mentioned that I could move back home and study for the Texas or Va bar from my parents home. That's something that I had not considered. I was under the impression that I need to physically be in the state that I am going to take the exam so I can participate in the barbri classroom sessions. I guess I could go with the option to upgrade to the online version and iphone feature of the barbri and do all my studies from home. Any thoughts on that?

Hi I would take va. I have friends there and the gov jobs are plentiful and its beautfal there
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-----Original Message-----
From:

1. Ask God for guidance.

2. Where are the significant people in your life (friends, family, church, mentors, etc.)

3. Ask yourself where you would want to spend summer, Christmas, watch the Supper Bowl, etc…



By the time you are through the third step you will have your answer.



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From:

Posted By on 05 Feb 2010 04:45 AM
Bjorn,

I'm not from NC, but I wouldn't necessarily throw out the uninformed stereotype that North Carolina bar applicants are less smart than VA applicants. North Carolina is the east coast equivalent to Northern California's Silicon Valley. There are a number of high-tech companies in the state, which means there is a lot of IP work to be had there. I don't know about you, but I don't know of a single dumb patent attorney in my rolodex. Plus, consider the fact that Duke (#10 US News) and UNC (#30 US News) are in the state (practically in the same city), and it's just as rich in 'smart people' as VA.

I also disagree with your idea of taking a bar exam in a random "easy" state, like Wyoming. Good luck finding a job in Wyoming. For that reason, that advice is counterintuitive to her concern of taking a bar exam for the purpose of seeking the best opportunity to find a job.

Mark,
I wasn't making any of those assertions at all, I was just giving hypothetical examples to the OP so she'd understand why the statistics can be deceptive (higher passage rate doesn't equal ease of passing). I know absolutely nothing about NC or VA. That's all :)

(1) The people who take the NC bar are dumber than those taking the VA bar--true. Research Triangle Park may be the East Coast answer (albeit a pathetic one) to No. Cal., but most of the work there is science and engineering, not law. Additionally, people from Duke and UNC don't take the NC bar; they take the NY or CA bar.

(2) Why are you all placating this nonsense? OP clearly wants to go to TX to be near the dude who she has hot pants for. Get past the smokescreen; there's no dilemma here in her mind. Fact: the TX job market SUX! Fact: there are plenty of good law schools in TX that naturally feed TX jobs. Fact: OP admitted she has poor connections there, at best. Fact: despite everyone's reasoning, she still keeps coming back to the 'yeah, but...TX will be better for me..." bit. Case closed, people. The girl's going to TX, whether it makes one bit of rational sense to you/me or not.

Hopefully, it will work out between her and this dude. If so, hopefully he's got the kind of dough to put her up while she embarks on an 18+ month, futile, soul-crushing job search. If not, she'll be alone, in TX, w/a TX law license, depressed, probably still jobless, and wishing that she had moved somewhere closer to family that could at least put her up while she continues to look for jobs.

All the best in TX, OP. At the very least, Austin is a $$$$ town!!

To Anon,

Thanks for your feedback, do you know anything about the job market in NC or VA?
I am actually leaning more and more towards taking the VA Bar Exam. Haven't decided completely but trying to figure out which job market is better.

At the end, my career is my number one priority. I didn't spend 3 years in law school to blow it off for a guy. Yeah the relationship is important to me but my legal career is very crucial as well. So take the guy out of the equation and don't let that bias your mind. Give me true feedback.

Thanks!

I really have no idea what the job market is like in NC or VA. I'm a NY/NJ lawyer, and the job market here is in the toilet and probably isn't coming back for a long time.

I got really lucky and wound-up at the firm I worked at during 2L summer, largely b/c one of the partners liked me. But, the overwhelming majority of my fellow BLS alumni remain unemployed and seemingly unemployable--irrespective of class rank, friend-based connections, etc.

I'd primarily balance these 2 factors, if I were you. (1) The probability that you can actually land a job at 'x' location. (2) The family/friend connections that you have at 'x' location who will let you stay with them, indefinitely and rent-free.