College Courses For Corporate Law?

stainluss

I would love to work in the area of corporate law in New York. I am currently choosing college courses and I was wondering wether it would be more beneficial to me to have a degree in:

Business and Law from University College Dublin (#2 for Law in Ireland, #1 for Business in Ireland)
Law from Trinity College Dublin (#1 for Law in Ireland)

For Corporate Law, would the involvement of business in the degree or the prodigiousness of the law school itself be more important? (I understand I must also take the bar examinations)

PS This is looking forward 4/5/6 years when there isnt complete economic turmoil (hopefully)

jimmylawman

stainluss wrote: »

I would love to work in the area of corporate law in New York. I am currently choosing college courses and I was wondering wether it would be more beneficial to me to have a degree in:

Business and Law from University College Dublin (#2 for Law in Ireland, #1 for Business in Ireland)
Law from Trinity College Dublin (#1 for Law in Ireland)

For Corporate Law, would the involvement of business in the degree or the prodigiousness of the law school itself be more important? (I understand I must also take the bar examinations)

PS This is looking forward 4/5/6 years when there isnt complete economic turmoil (hopefully)

I would think your grades, your attitude at interview and your interest in the topic in 5 or 6 years time when it comes about would be more relevant than whether you went to the #1 first in ireland law school or the #2 in ireland business school (or whatever). Possibly having a second subject with your degree may broaden your options later. But I would not pin all your academic choices now on a specific path which may or may not still interest you in 6 years time.

bear17

To get to work in corporate law in NYC, I'd say you'll probably need to study in a top US law school, by either doing an LLM/JD. An Irish degree alone would most likely not suffice. To get into such a school, a law degree from Trinity may be better because it carries more value internationally. However, in terms of subjects, the B&L degree (along with Law & Acc in UL and Corp Law in NUIG) would be better and more practical for a career in corporate law.

stainluss

bear17 wrote: »

To get to work in corporate law in NYC, I'd say you'll probably need to study in a top US law school, by either doing an LLM/JD. An Irish degree alone would most likely not suffice.

Would Oxford be good enough?

I heard of people going there after Trinity..

jimmylawman

Oxford is internationally renowned academically, as is Trinity.

But the big NY firms may have links with the more local (relative) law schools.

The same way an applicant to a Dublin firm may be more likely to get a foot in the door with a UCD or TCD degree than a Stanford one.

bear17

jimmylawman wrote: »

Oxford is internationally renowned academically, as is Trinity.

But the big NY firms may have links with the more local (relative) law schools.

The same way an applicant to a Dublin firm may be more likely to get a foot in the door with a UCD or TCD degree than a Stanford one.

Very true, legal recruiters can be quite parochial in who they recruit imo. However, if I was a Harvard graduate I would not expect to be refused by a Dublin firm .
Regardless of whichever degree you choose OP, it might be best to do one of the NY Bar prep courses after, as I've heard that these have links with NY law schools, and many of their students go on to study in those schools. Of course, if you went to Trinity you could ask the programme director about that!

stainluss

Oh right, cheers everyone:D

Just one more question, if i was to try to apply to one of these US law schools, i would probably be better off with the TCD rather than the UCD in order to gain admission??

I heard you can 'incorporate' your TCD degree with an Oxford one, but that might just be a 'perversion of the truth':p

Arsenal1986

To be honest I wouldnt base the decision on which college to choose on reputation with US firms, Trinity wouldnt have much of a rep amongst big US law firms, the diff between that and UCD would be minimal.

Id agree youd definitly need an LLM from tier one school in the states to even think of a big wall st firm. Tier one is the top 14 schools ie Harvard, Columbia etc. Even then the JD is THE degree for these firms recruitment wise.

Arsenal1986

On a pure getting a traineeship in Ireland regard, then certainly B and L is the way to go. At all the interviews for the big firms I attended by far the most numerous were B and L graduates, Trinity were a distant second not far above UCD BCL graduates.

Jev/N

I'll give my 2 cents another time but briefly, one of the big things you could go for in college is the 'international' side of the degree where you get any extra 4th/5th year abroad in either Canada, US or Australia. Having studied B&L in UCD I know this is definitely available but I'm not sure about other colleges