Law to Political Science

[deadshoppingmalls]

Hi,

I have a B.A. in Political Science from a top 40 US undergrad (graduated six years ago cum laude), and just received a JD from a T100 law school. I plan to take the bar and I have a clerkship for the year but I do not want to practice law afterwards. I always knew law school was a mistake but I decided after my first year that it wasn't worth dropping out. My interests are in political science/economy with a concentration in labor/employment, although I have other interests. More specifically, I am interested in European politics. I want to teach and do research.

I won't seek a Masters in the US due to the cost and also because I want to eventually settle in a European country. I have UK citizenship which I know makes things complicated on mainland Europe after Brexit. 

The question isn't "if" I want to leave law but "when." I know if I go this route, I'll take a salary cut by seeking a Masters in Europe but it is something I am fine with due to my ultimate ambitions to teach and conduct research. I also know law will not get me to where I want to be because a JD is not a research degree. For what it's worth, I wasn't going to make big bucks in the US as a lawyer, I would be a lawyer only in the public sector due to student loan forgiveness.

I could start this process next year (Fall 2021) after a year of salary or wait longer (3-10 years). The latter could be less financially risky but I'm afraid that waiting so long into my legal career, would create a sense of comfort, and ultimately I would not pursue my dreams.

Does anyone have insight regarding Masters/Phd in Europe (e.g. UK, France, Germany, Netherlands, Belgium, etc)?
Is the job market just as rough as in the US?

Would a PhD make the most sense after this type of Masters?
Would it make sense to work only a year out of law school or longer before going back to school?
Will my JD be any worth to top European Political Science programmes?

Thank you.

[irinmn]

3 hours ago, deadshoppingmalls said:

Does anyone have insight regarding Masters/Phd in Europe (e.g. UK, France, Germany, Netherlands, Belgium, etc)?
Is the job market just as rough as in the US?

Would a PhD make the most sense after this type of Masters?
Would it make sense to work only a year out of law school or longer before going back to school?
Will my JD be any worth to top European Political Science programmes?

Thank you.

I got my MPhil in POLIS at Clare College, Cambridge. Good news and bad news. The good news is, Cambridge is an awesome place. Great town, breathtakingly beautiful school/campus, and the residential college system there is just fantastic, even for grad students. Also, the MPhil program is significantly easier to get into than the PhD at POLIS at least. The bad news is that the POLIS department puts overwhelming emphasis on undergraduate GPA during the application process. I don't know what their official GPA average is, but for Americans I was told the minimum cutoff to be considered was a 3.7 UGPA. Most of the people I knew in my mphil program who were Americans were closer to 3.9/4.0 UGPA's from US T20 schools, including the a few ivies, Cal/UCLA and Michigan. 

A few other cons: the faculty are primarily focused on their PhD students so you won't get much attention, which is great for self starters but not so much if you need help. Do not expect a close relationship with your advisor. The tuition is high even if you, as you say, are a UK citizen. POLIS MPhil tuition (including the maintenance fee) for UK "Home" citizens is 30,000 GBP for the full year. If you don't have it and don't want to take out student loans, the Cambridge Trust, Fulbright and Gates scholarships are possibilities but also not easy to get. Occasionally there will also be scholarships available from your specific residential college. If you're a UK citizen, I don't think you're eligible for the Fulbright for a UK school. Anyway, unlike most US polisci graduate programs, do not expect funding from the department, especially if you have less than a 3.7 UGPA. Departmental funding in the form of Cambridge Trust money for master's students is prioritized typically by GPA and few people get funded by that. If you're interested in US style quant analysis, you also won't get much of that at Cambridge, or (from what I've heard) at Oxford. There's a few classes you can take but have no illusions, there is no quant rigor in a one year MPhil at Cambridge at least, and that might put you at a disadvantage in the long run if you're competing for positions with people who have strong quantitative research backgrounds/skills from other schools. 

To answer your other questions, if you want to teach and do research on the continent or in the UK, and you want to do it at a major school in a permanent/tenure track style type of job, you will need to get a PhD. I do NOT recommend getting your PhD in the UK if you can help it. UK polisci PhD's are ok if you want to stay in the UK but otherwise you might want to go somewhere with more quantitative rigor. Depending on what specific subfields you're interested in, and if you have your heart set on studying in Europe rather than the US, consider English language PhD programs in Sweden, Germany and the Netherlands (among others). Tuition is usually free or very cheap and they tend to at least have more quant requirements than UK schools, maybe with the exception of LSE. 

Work experience is always a good thing, and it will help at least with the argument that you aren't just indecisive and/or giving up on law right after getting a JD. The JD itself will probably hold you back at Oxbridge unfortunately; they don't really care that US law schools grade on a B curve, they don't care about the socratic method, and they don't care about how competitive US law schools are. They just care about your law school GPA, and if it isn't impressive, it will hinder you rather than help you. Doesn't mean you can't get into Oxbridge, but if your law school GPA was particularly low (below a 3.3/4.0), you should probably pad your CV with as much as you can, including work experience and publications. The unfortunate reality of Oxbridge is that they are snobby, and they can afford to be extraordinarily selective in terms of applicants and grades. They do not employ "holistic" admissions like the top US schools; they don't require GRE's and they don't emphasize anything as much as grades and GPA history. CV, EC's, essay and references do make a difference, but not they are not given the same weight as your grades by the department. Good luck!

[Ethanf]

18 hours ago, irinmn said:

I got my MPhil in POLIS at Clare College, Cambridge. Good news and bad news. The good news is, Cambridge is an awesome place. Great town, breathtakingly beautiful school/campus, and the residential college system there is just fantastic, even for grad students. Also, the MPhil program is significantly easier to get into than the PhD at POLIS at least. The bad news is that the POLIS department puts overwhelming emphasis on undergraduate GPA during the application process. I don't know what their official GPA average is, but for Americans I was told the minimum cutoff to be considered was a 3.7 UGPA. Most of the people I knew in my mphil program who were Americans were closer to 3.9/4.0 UGPA's from US T20 schools, including the a few ivies, Cal/UCLA and Michigan. 

 

How did you feel about the coursework/research in your Cambridge M.Phil? Level of difficulty compared to undergrad, how in depth it was and how much you feel you learned, and how much work was required for your thesis? (I'm interested in the program)

[irinmn]

On 6/3/2020 at 12:37 PM, Ethanf said:

How did you feel about the coursework/research in your Cambridge M.Phil? Level of difficulty compared to undergrad, how in depth it was and how much you feel you learned, and how much work was required for your thesis? (I'm interested in the program)

I'll preface my answers by saying that I came into the experience at Cambridge expecting it to be very intellectually rigorous, and I went to an undergraduate institution notorious for grade deflation and student suicides/mental health issues, so I expected more of that at Cam. I also think the answer to your questions very much depends on what you are used to in terms of workload, grading and atmosphere, as well as how quickly/easily you adjust to British-style education and being overseas (if you're American specifically). 

So with all of that said, I found Cam to be easier overall than my undergrad institution in terms of grading and workload, but also very different. There was quite a bit of reading but most of the substantive coursework was just attending lectures without much actual work (other than reading assignments) until the end of each term. I don't think I had a single lecture course that included attendance as part of the course grade, and I don't recall any profs/instructors ever actually taking attendance. In some ways this is great because they treat you like an adult, unlike my undergrad U.S. institution, where each prof/instructor micromanaged everything and attendance was always mandatory. At Cam, you are definitely in control of your own destiny. If you don't want to go to lectures, don't. If you want to hang out in the pub at your residential college all day and become a residential alcoholic, cool. I might have "read" (majored in) Politics & International Studies but I am pretty sure I minored in drinking room temperature beer and pub crawls for 9 months. And by the way, most residential colleges have their own on-site pub, and most of them are fantastic. 

The downside to all of this is it is sink or swim at exam time. If you aren't self disciplined, it's going to hurt, and not to be too cliche, but you absolutely get out of it what you put into it. If you take advantage of all of the resources including the fantastic libraries and scholars, attend the lectures, do the reading, etc., I think you'll learn a lot and get a lot out of it. If you don't but you happen to be very intelligent or good at BSing, the beauty of Cam (and Oxford from what I hear) is that you can fake it until you make it and basically just show up for exams and write a thesis. As far as length, for the MPhil I think the average for POLIS was 10,000-15,000 words, so not at all difficult considering the max for PhD's is 80,000 words and people routinely get close to that. It's definitely a qualitative program, not a quantitative program, but then again, I think that's the case for most British grad polisci programs. It was a great experience and a lot of fun to spend a year there, but I'd never get a PhD there.