University of Virginia

This past Monday, November 15, was another big day for me (seems like Mondays are good for me and law school!). I had a phone interview with Harvard Law around lunch time. I am still not entirely sure how well it went, mostly because it only lasted for seven minutes. He asked me two questions: (1) why am I deciding to go to law school now, after being at CRA for 2.5 years, and (2) why Harvard Law? I think I had good answers to both of them, particularly the second one. HLS has a large number of clinics, and one of them places students with the US Attorney's office in Boston to work on economic crimes, which immediately interested me, so I mentioned that as one of many reasons. He then asked me if I had any questions, and I had three, but I think the first two were not the greatest questions (i.e., I already knew the general answer), so I hope that does not count against me. After looking some more into HLS, it really does look like an amazing school, and I would have a great and enriching time there.

To make my Monday even better, I got an email from the Director of Admissions at UVA a couple hours later asking me to call him about my application. I figured he would ask me some general questions about why UVA, but it was not that at all. When I called, he commented that I had emailed them a few months ago, asking if my previous application/withdrawal three years ago would hurt my chances of getting in. He said he wanted to disabuse me of that idea because, in fact, they were admitting me! I was a little shell-shocked, and so my response may not have been optimal, because it was along the lines of, "oh, wow, that's awesome!" He then went on to say that he had more good news, because in fact they were offering me a scholarship of $75,000 over three years (he in fact said "at least" $75k, which gives me the hope that there may be some wriggle room). So that was awesome news. He told me to keep an eye out in the mail for the official package, and lo and behold, it arrived on Friday afternoon!