Some questions regarding law school

drusba
Fri, 24 May 2013 10:58:23 +0000

1,2 and 7: Many law schools offer partial tuition scholarships to highly qualified candidates which often apply to every year as long as a designated minimum GPA is kept. Absent that, as an international, you will most likely be on your own, relegated to finding any loans you can get because you will not qualify for US government backed loans and your ability to get any loans may actually depend on your ability to find a co-signer who has the demonstrable ability to be able to pay off the likely $50,000+ a year you are likely going to need to borrow to cover law school and living expenses.


Joint programs vary and it depends on law school when you must declare for the joint program but it would likely be as part of the application process or sometime before end of first year. Usually, you can fall back into just the JD progam.
Law schools often have Oct (or Sep) to March application periods and usually do not have early action or early decision but most follow a rolling admissions process: beginning with some certain date in the fall, they just start making decisions as applications are received and thus, though the application period may run from October to March, the earlier during that period you apply the better off you are.
Law schools each have their own rules for Internationals to prove English proficiency and you may or may not have to to submit TOEFL if you are in a US university.
For visa, you always need to check for any rule changes but currently I believe you would need to go through the same US Embassy or consulate process you did for your original visa for college.