Dear masterbruce,

Columbia and NYU are highly competitive, so these are reach schools for any applicant. While you have a good GMAT and GPA, I think there will be quite a bit of concern on your rationale for getting a MBA and your career goals. In particular, you need to explicitly address why you went to law school and have not worked since graduating. Also, you need to have a plan for what you will be doing between now and the time you would enter business school. I think you have a chance at these two schools, but it will greatly depend on how well you put your application together and address these concerns. I would suggest identifying some other schools that are not as selective as safety options for a backup plan. For additional insight on identifying schools, please see our sticky on school selection.

Good luck,
Lisa

There are many options in the New York area if you want to remain in New York. I think it depends on what you want to do. Most schools post their placement statistics, so you can get an idea of how many graduates go into different industries and functional areas. I would also encourage you to visit any school you are considering to get a full picture of what the program has to offer. Finally, you can probably even expand your search into the northeast (Boston to Baltimore) as most schools place predominantly in their region. Once you start looking, I think you will find some great options out there that are not recognized in the traditional rankings as a top 10 school--yet still have very successful graduates and great programs.

Good luck,
Lisa