Does your mother see Yale as better? I don’t.
Maybe Harvard - and be done.
Respectfully, this is a Vanilla/Chocolate battle. You could rank those schools in any order, making many people happy and others mad. There’s no objective way to separate them. It’s purely a subjective distinction.
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I knew a number of lawyers who went to Gilman (an all boys prep school in Baltimore), then Princeton, then YLS. Really, it was weird how many took that same path. My boss was the outlier as he went to the Naval Academy and then YLS.
If you are destined to go to law school and become a judge, you can do that from Princeton.
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That’s really good to hear! Can you link the article they wrote on it? I think that showing it to my mom would definitely help assuage her concerns over grade deflation.
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Thank you so much, this will be great to show her! I think that a lot of what she’s saying is based off of what her friends from India who have kids going to school in the U.S. are telling her, and a lot of it seems either outdated or misinformed, so having data to back up my decision will hopefully make it a lot easier to convince her.
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If you want to go to law school, it is good that you are thinking about GPA early. What will likely be more important than college is your class selection and ability to avoid classes that have potential to hurt your GPA. Understanding the grading of the class/professor is going to be more important than the overall college.
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This is an old article but it speaks specifically to your mother’s concern: Dean of Admissions at Yale Law: Grade deflation isn't going to affect your chances | University Press Club
(PS: Princeton alumna here. I chose it over Yale; didn’t even apply to Harvard. I’ve never regretted the choice, nor have I felt that there was any stigma attached to going to what many consider the top undergraduate university in the country. Harvard/Yale/Stanford/etc. are wonderful places to go for grad school but for undergrad there’s nothing like Princeton, or SPIA – truly.)
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Chocolate is better, of course.
You can still go to Yale or Harvard law school later if you choose. As for the grade deflation, the law school will understand that, but the main consideration is the LSAT score so it probably would not matter that much anyway.
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Here you go. The author got so into the topic he even wrote up even more detailed information on a blog post:
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But which one is chocolate? 
Your mother is incorrect. Every Ivy has grade inflation, not deflation. As of 2022, the average GPA of a Princeton student was 3.64 with a strong upward trend. 20% of students have a 3.9+ GPA and 40% have a 3.8+. This is not deflation by any reasonable measure.
To the extent that Princeton’s average might be slightly lower than Yale, for example, law schools would know that. You could equally worry that if you went to Yale the average is so high that one bad final or misstep and you would be below the curve. They will also see the GPAs of other Princeton applicants and know where the real bar is. None of the Ivys have any trouble matriculating students into top law schools.
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Well…if those law schools choose you for admission…
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Y’all gotta love some of these conversations.
Which is better for me to attend, Harvard, Yale, or Princeton? Why, the one that accepts you, of course.
Which is better for me to attend, Harvard Law or Yale Law? Why, the one that accepts you, of course.
For the OP, as well as for users who are advising to OP to put effort into applying now for HY: Today is December 27. The applications are due 1/1 or 1/2. Both applications have supplemental essays which are not throwaway and are considered an important part of the application. Some may be able to crank out quality material in that short time; most will not.
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I’m just here to say that the worst thing you can say at a Harvard grad school event, forum, or discussion is, “my name is _________ and I go to the College…”
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The poster said the applications are basically done but they don’t want to spend the application fee.
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I think that reasoning is a distraction from the reality that they simply don’t want to apply. The OP’s mother would certainly pay the fee if she’s that adamant they apply.
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I was wondering about that. To the OP, is your mom really expecting you to pay application fees yourself?
REA at Princeton also restricts against other private school EA applications, but not RD or rolling applications. Different REA schools may have different restrictions.
https://admission.princeton.edu/apply/first-year-application-dates-deadlines
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That would give a slight advantage to attending colleges with fewer general education requirements like Brown over those with more like MIT.