Best uni for studying Law?

[ekoolish]

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Originally Posted by LA88

I wonder, do the Australian Law Students Association competition rankings from 2008 change your perceptions of which law school is the best? It's one thing to have a high UAI cut-off and a prestige to boot. It's another to turn out students who have sought after skills and a practical aptitude that many undergraduates lack.

Final Standings

The short answer, to whoever started this thread, is that there is no short answer. Read as much as you can about the structure of the course offered at each uni, make sure each uni offers a good quality secondary degree and speak to some students currently enrolled at the unis you are interested in.

Keep an open mind, make an informed decision, and don't stress too much (you can transfer after your first year if you don't like it).

Good Hunting!

That is interesting!
Thanks for the info. I never pay particular attention to posts regarding 'prestige' of unis anyway

[jtyler]

Bash it all you want (on "principle"), but there is a basis for notions of prestige...

[Strawbaby]

Originally Posted by nicko1990

wtf haha. who claims that. 'we're one of the top 8 unis in australia'. gee, that's totally awesome.

Whenever anyone says 'top 8', it just means '8th, but we don't want to sounds bad'.
Painful.

[Oxbridge]

I haven't heard University of Adelaide mentioned amoungst all of this, TER for entry to Law at Adelaide is 95, so entry isn't exactly easy! Australia's third oldest Law School (behind Sydney and Melbourne), and (correct me if I'm wrong) but, given that Sydney and Melbourne no longer offer Law to new undergraduates, would make it the oldest in terms of Law undergrad courses. Adelaide is also a member of the 'Group of 8', I am doing the LLB programme this year there so will let you know what it's like.
I suppose when deciding on what law school to go to convenience and lifestyle play a part in which Uni to choose.

[Lucid Scintilla]

Melbourne stopped the LLB program a while back, but it has provisional/guaranteed law afterwards, leading to the award JD.

Sydney has combined undergraduate (three years of blurgh, or four if you're doing Engo or Media/Comm (these years have law sprinkled here and there), then two more years of law - like Melbourne in a way, except Melbourne requires you to maintain a certain level of achievement) and stand-alone graduate law.

[SoAmazing]

Originally Posted by Lucid Scintilla

Then remember there are bonus points.

Correct me if im wrong but they do not apply bonus points for entry to a law degree. and as for best uni to study law
well in my opinion the best uni for law would be the uni of melb. it has a stellar international reputation which could be quite useful when seeking employment. well as they have abolished their undergrad law (and the fact that you asked about nsw) you may well turn to Usyd which is quite comparable to melbourne in perhaps most aspects. i myself am at ANU because i believe it to be a great uni and its reputation as the top university in australia wont hurt my chances of employment. Just to give you an idea these are rankings of the faculties of social science and law at the respective universities as compared to the world published by The Times higher education
ANU- 6th
Uni of Melb- 10th
Uni of Syd- 19th
Monash- 16th
UNSW- 21st
hope that helps

[Lucid Scintilla]

Originally Posted by SoAmazing

Correct me if im wrong but they do not apply bonus points for entry to a law degree. and as for best uni to study law

Bonus points, flexi-entry applies to Wollongong (I know you're like totally asking, 'that's a uni?'), non-G8 ones, shit ones.

USyd:
+New law building! Now at Darlington/Camperdown; now get mugged on your way from Redfern!
+Huge, aircon'd library.
+Good tute rooms.
+Timetabling is preeetty awesome.
-Law building's still being built, olol.
---At USyd; why aren't there more non-socialist, non-whitewashed, non-wanky [your ethnicity] people?
No bias. :P
Good for law combined with science, economics, social science, etc.

Buuut yeah, Melbourne's, like, the best. Its award is the JD. OH MY GOooD.


Pretty fucking timely of me.

[spence]

Originally Posted by Lucid Scintilla

USyd:
+Timetabling is preeetty awesome.

Is that a joke?

[bell531]

The JD is coming in soon to UNSW and USYD, right? Will that change anything major to the relative competitiveness of these two uni's?

[Venom.]

I'm gonna throw UWS out there.

[PrettyVacant]

Each university has its own merits, so it really depends what you define as "best". I'd say Usyd definitely has the most prestigious Law program of all the universities around Sydney, though if you wanted to do Engo/Law or Comm/Law the Engo+Comm components are probably better @ UNSW.

Arts/Law - USyd, Hands down IMO.

And screw UAI cutoffs, honestly, they don't indicate a better program at all. It just shows that a program is in high demand which doesn't mean it's BETTER, it just means more people would like to do it for reasons like prestige, 'doing it not to waste their high uais', or locality.

Plus I always think (correct me if I'm wrong) but people who are like 4u maths or science nerds from yr 12 with uber high UAIs are likely to try to gain access to courses like Law @ Usyd or UNSW because they "don't want to waste their UAI" and thus fill up the spots and bump the cutoff up. These people may find they do not necessarily enjoy/excel at Law, and as a result may not be good Lawyers. CORRECT ME IF I'M WRONG.

[Lucid Scintilla]

Originally Posted by spence

Is that a joke?

For law, absolutely not.
For freshpeople, law tends to be all in one day.

Maybe you were referring to the other degree. Since the degree with which you combine it is probably one offered by the Arts, Science, or Commerce/Business faculty, your tt. probably sucks.

Oh, USyd sucks; its Internet policy is tight.

ETA:

Originally Posted by Marmalade.

I think UAIs are at least one indicator of a program's quality.

Let go of that notion.

Also, it is known that USyd and UNSW actually have shown some leeway in their selection of law kiddos; not much, but enough.

[Marmalade.]

Originally Posted by PrettyVacant

And screw UAI cutoffs, honestly, they don't indicate a better program at all. It just shows that a program is in high demand which doesn't mean it's BETTER, it just means more people would like to do it for reasons like prestige, 'doing it not to waste their high uais', or locality.

I think UAIs are at least one indicator of a program's quality. If a course is in high demand, there are reasons for it. There is a reason that people want to get into USyd over UWS, and that's reflected in the UAI. I don't think location makes a big difference (except in the case of ANU, because who wants to move to canberra).

Of course, there are better ways to determine a course's quality/reputation

[nikkigirl]

There really is no "best" uni for studying law different uni's suit different people and its just a matter of figuring out which uni best suits you.

The only reason some uni's have higher UAI cut off's is because they have been around for longer and then the prestige factor comes into play (but remember up until a few decades ago USyd had the only law school in sydney) and it is certainly not an indicator as to the quality of the program I can assure you.

If you want to become a lawyer then consider uni's like UNSW, UWS and UTS. If on the other hand you just want the university name then go to USyd or MacU who's law programs, by admission for their own graduates are far behind other universities.

[AsyLum]

It also depends on what type of 'education' in law you want, a vocational one or a more humanities focused one.