First Month Law School Report
I’m about a month into my law school experience and it has been interesting so far. I’ve noticed some stark changes between this academic experience and my undergrad experience.
1. More reading.
It’s actually not THAT much more reading than I did in undergrad, but it’s definitely a noticeable uptick in page requirements. There are also little things that make it more extensive. For example, the books are pure text with virtually no pictures or diagrams to shorten the actual text length. In addition, the reading itself is a lot harder. Trying to parse the words from a 5 page case from 19th century England takes me just as long as reading 25 pages of undergrad textbook fluff. When you have to read 4-8 of those types of cases for each class and you have 2-3 classes a day, it adds up to a lot of reading — every day.
2. Level of understanding.
The professors demand a high level of understanding on the part of the students. This isn’t like undergrad where you can skim the text, listen and take notes in class and still get an A at the end of the semester. You have to take notes on all of the reading and you have to brief, or summarize, all of the cases. The professors randomly call on people to explain the cases and problems in the textbook, so you basically have to be prepared at all times. And it’s not like they just ask “what happened in this case” … they ask things like “how does the rule described by the court in this case differ from this case we read two weeks ago?” or “how would the rule be applied in this type of hypothetical situation?”. So the bottom line is that you have to really understand the case/general topic area prior to class and you also have to be able to think on your feet in front of 70 other smart people. It’s not easy.
3. All important final exam.
The good news about all of that participation stuff is that it really doesn’t count for your final grade. The bad news is that if you don’t get an understanding of the material in class, you’ll likely do poorly on the final unless you can catch up somehow during the course of the semester. And the final is everything … 100% of your grade. So you work for over 3 months and your grade in each class comes down to about 3 hours of performance. It sounds like a stressful time period. And for those of you who say “screw grades” you’re obviously not a candidate for law school. Everyone here seems to be grade-obsessed, especially because it’s so important for employment. The way jobs work is you are interviewed for summer internships during the fall of your 2nd year, so all the firms have to look at is your first year grades. And the way to get interviews with the best firms is pretty simple: get good grades. And that’s about the only way to get those interviews without extensive family connections. So you have 8 exams plus a few papers for your legal writing classes (you have four classes each semester plus legal writing). The summer internships are the key to full-time offers. That means your jumping off point in the legal profession will, in large part, be determined by 24 hours of performance. So you’ve got to be at your best. Of course, mediocre grades don’t mean you won’t be a good lawyer in the long-run, it just means you’ll have a very tough road with regards to getting a good job out of law school.
Conclusion:
So you now know about some of the major differences I’ve noticed so far. It’s a very different academic experience, but it’s one that I think I’ll enjoy. I like the pressure of the big final exam and I think there are some key strategic and tactical plays to be made that will make my grades a lot better without significantly greater effort. We’ll see how things play out.
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