Scholarships and Financial Aid?

Dear Everyone, No One, and Everything in Between,

I met for an interview with a potential prospect the other day to discuss his application, and, somewhere in the middle of it, the roles of 'interviewer' and 'interviewee' got confused. I'm pretty sure that I was supposed to be the one asking the questions, seeing as this student was applying to Brown Law and I wanted to know whether he was worthy, but, by the end, it really seemed like he was the one that was in charge of the interview. It's a little embarrassing when something like that happens, but, all in all, I thought that he asked some good questions that I thought might be of interest to all you potential rejects out there, and so I'm going to share them with you. Now, I myself am actually unable to distinguish between qualities such as 'good' and 'bad', and so I'm just going to present you with all the questions I can remember and let you sort them out for yourself.

So, one of the first questions the interviewee asked me was where exactly the Brown School of Law is at. I thought this was pretty obvious; clearly the name suggests it's in Brown University. The applicant then proceeded to ask me where Brown University was located, and, much to my dismay, I realized that I forgot where the school is located. Or, perhaps, I just never knew where the school was in the first place (which is certainly a possibility). I took a bite of my Twix bar, and then thought about where the other Ivy League schools were located. Princeton, for example, is located in the town of Princeton, NJ. The University of Pennsylvania is in Pennsylvania, PA, Columbia is in NYC (which, I believe, stands for New York's Columbus--every state, after all, has a city of Columbus), and Stanford is in Stanford, CA. I think, but am not 100% sure, that the University of Chicago is in Chicago, but I know that Harvard is something of an outlier in this trend, since it's located in Cambridge, arguably the premier university of the UK. But, apart from that, it seemed like all the Ivy League schools are named after the city they're in. And, so I concluded, Brown University must be located in Brown City, Vermont. I'm a little iffy on the state, considering I picked it at random, but I announced it with confidence and the student wrote it down, which I took to be a favorable sign that I was in the right. Whew!

The prospect then asked me what sex I was. I opened my mouth, but no answer automatically came out, so I shut it, paused for a second, and then dug around in my pants for a bit, in search of the answer. The student looked a little awkward when I began to do this, and, much to my dismay, I was unable to find sufficient evidence to suggest an answer one way or the other after about 30 seconds of looking. My eyes shifted around uncomfortably, I coughed, muttered something offensive about his mother under my breath, and then waved the question off. It probably wasn't relevant to anything anyway. And then the student asked, after an extended moment of silence, whether or not BS Law had any scholarships or financial aid.

Finally! A question I definitely knew the answer to! I gasped a sigh of relief, and then announced that Brown Law has a very robust scholarship and financial aid program, based upon both need and merit. I said that, out of any law school, Brown's tuition is the most affordable even without aid, since the tuition is as existent as the school. Furthermore, every student who applies to Brown Law is considered for full- and half-tuition scholarships, and will likely receive notification of their award well before their admissions decision. This, of course, is the opposite of what usually happens at other law schools, who admit first and then consider the applicant for scholarships. Indeed, some have even told me that this is akin to putting the cart in front of the horse. I say, what's wrong with that? Why shouldn't the cart be in front of the horse? I don't know about you, but I always find things easier to move if I push rather than pull, and so, if I were a horse (which I am not), I'd be damn happy to have the cart in front of me, thank you very much. And, in any given year, we're likely to award more scholarships than offers of admission, so it makes sense to do it this way anyways.

In addition to our scholarships, we have a Matching Scholarship Program as well. Berkeley, as most of you are aware, has such a program, where if you receive a scholarship at some other T14 school (except, arbitrarily, Northwestern), they will give you a matching offer. However, our Program is much better, since we will not only match the scholarship offers of our peer schools, but we will also double the offer, relative to the percent of tuition it covers. Thus, if you receive one of Harvard's numerous full tuition merit scholarships, we will offer you a scholarship that is two times full tuition at Brown Law. Chicago offers you half tuition? We'll make it full tuition. What if the scholarship includes a stipend? Well, we'll actually triple that amount, multiply it by 0, and then award you a stipend of the resulting number. What more could you ask for? I believe that it is safe to say that Brown Law has the best scholarship program out of any school.

After that question, I was very pleased with myself for definitely getting one right, and so I thought that it was an appropriate time to conclude the interview. The applicant seemed happy, I was happy, it seemed like a good ending. I thanked him for coming and said that I looked forward to reviewing his application.  I then offered my hand for a handshake and then, much to my surprise, he refused to shake my hand. He just left me hanging, right there, with my hand reaching over my desk in my very own office! He looked at my hand as though it were unclean. The nerve of that kid! He had no problem shaking my hand at the beginning of it all--what, did my hand somehow become sullied during the course of the interview? Such audacity is unbecoming in an applicant, or anyone, for that matter. After that awkward moment, I sat down at my desk, he left the room, and I pulled out his file and a sharpie and wrote, in big capital letters, REJECTED, APPLICANT IS A PRETENTIOUS SNOB AND DOES NOT WANT A HAPPY ENDING TO HIS INTERVIEWS. Let that be a lesson--the way into Brown Law does not include snubbing an Admissions Officer at the end of an interview. Or, really, ever. I am most peeved by this, and I believe that the next few applications I look at will be really quick rejects as a result.

Well, folks, that's it for today. Be sure to check back with us often, and also become a fan of us on Facebook. Send any questions to Brown.University.School.of.Law@gmail.com, or just post them right there in the comment box. Tell your friends, your parents, your cat about us. Until next time!

Apoplectically yours,

The Admissions Team