STYLETHREAD -- LET'S TALK SHOP!

DISCLAIMER: I am one law student, at one school. So things that apply to my school may not apply everywhere. Also, there are people here who are having a completely wonderful time. It's not all bad. And the things that are bad could have been avoided if I'd known then what I know now... Also, writing clears my head, so this post is as much for me as it is for anyone else.
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Ok, everyone knows that I absolutely despise my law school, legal education in general, and am having the crappiest time ever. This is, however, pretty much my own fault. There are some big things that I just didn't think about when I decided to go to law school. So, since I know a bunch of you are planning to do this too, here are a few don't-do-what-I-did tips:

1) Visit the school. And pay attention to your interactions. I visited twice, and both times noticed that I couldn't talk to anyone but other prospective students WHO WERE ALL PLANNING TO GO SOMEWHERE ELSE. (clue dizzy, CLUE!) Then I enrolled anyway because I got a fat scholarship. There's more to life than money, and I would GLADLY trade the scholarship to be in a group of people who don't look at my like I'm crazy every time I open my mouth.

2) Understand your relationship with authority. I basically had no parents. So I generally get along great with bosses because I don't expect them to be anything more than a higher link in the chain of command. But profs are much more parental - there's a "because I said so..." thing that just does not compute with me at all. So if you liked your parents, profs will make you feel secure (except when they're crazy, but even then you'll have an easier time understanding the relationship). However, if you don't want or need a parental relationship in your life, you will freak eachother out.

3) UNDERSTAND THAT STUDENTS ARE NOT THE PURPOSE OF LAW SCHOOL! Students provide the money to keep the law school going, much as a squirrel provides the energy which spins the wheel which runs the engine. In this case, the "engine" is a system that allows law prof types to be law profs. Economic factors are increasing the number of applicants for every spot. And tuition doesn't even cover the cost of education you, anyway. So there are probably 100 other people who will pay MORE than tuition to get your spot. Which means basically anything you get from the school is a privilege, and staff, adminstration and faculty all view you as totally replaceable.

4) Law school is not, like business, a place where you get things done, and are judged by the result. It is more like a completely dysfunctional family, where you all decide what you're going to pretend now, and the one who pretends the best gets the most respect. Summer jobs are a joke. You're not being trained to pass the bar, which is the only way you can become a lawyer. And law profs don't even pretend they're trying to educate you about the law - instead they hide the completely subjective criteria being used under a mantle of "we want to change the way you think..." This allows all sorts of completely weird things to flourish. For example, the people who make the best grades are often the biggest procrastinators. The hardest workers may flunk out. And nasty, competitive behavior does happen!

5) You can find awesome friends here, but don't trust everyone. In general, just stay upbeat, and tell no one anythign even remotely negative about yourself ever. The rumor mill is out of control, because students use it to be agressive and keep eachother down. If I had a $1 for every person I've heard is "crazy" or "completely schizo" or "going to flunk," I'd have $1 for every person in my class. Oh, and the slut rumor is a BIG one.

6) Do not expect to be treated fairly. Some women succeed - brilliantly - but at least at my school, there is a pretty prevalent undertone against women. The girls who do well may be attractive, but they hold themselves back in some ways. Their outfits tend to be interchangeable peices of VERY conservative looks, and they don't pair them very well. They all have a smooth bob haircut too - well, except two girls, and both are ethnic, so they don't have that option (these two both also wear glasses and no makeup, even though they would be very pretty). Girls who do well also are labeled kiss ups by the rumor mill. While boys, oh, the boys are just being agressive... (of course). Some things may just be coincidences, but I've become very cynical about this one. For example: I know two guys who told me they earned very poor grades last year (everyone tells me everything - I guess because I'm not seen as competition). The dean set both of them up with "directed reading" assignments which are a joke, and a certain A, to help their gpa. I know two girls who got bad grades. The dean told both of them to leave school because they wouldn't pass the bar and weren't a good fit with the law culture. Maybe he was just making individual judgment calls, but it is still a suspiscious break along gender lines.

7) The drinking is insane. If you don't drink, don't advertise that - it makes the people who do feel a little nervous. If you do drink, it is AMAZING how quickly binge drinking seems normal. Don't go along with the crowd. You're buying those rounds on borrowed money, for one thing, and seriously,in the long run it just makes you feel worse.

8) The books are crap. Everyone else reads "Getting to Maybe," and "Succeeding in Law School," and so on. They aren't exactly huge secrets. Actually, there are no huge secrets. My friends that get excellent grades all have different methods.

9) Train yourself to think like an engineer, not an English major or environmental student. The information should be categorized, broken down and managed. The students who do worst are the students who tend to think about things holistically (I got this from a law prof, I'm not just making this up) because they may be right, but their exams are harder to read.

10) Know what makes you happy, and plan to have at least a little of that in law school. I lvoe to eat, but like an idiot I moved to a small town with crap restaurants. And I KNEW THIS GOING IN! It's my own fault. (I thought I'd have time to cook, uh, ha!) Some people succeed by denying themselves everything and working as if, well, as if the profs have become the parents who never loved them and approval will fix everything that's wrong witht eh world. This is pretty much the origin of: a) law's workaholic culture (which is crap, btw, they're at the office forever, but not very many lawyers are half as productive as the journalists I've known) b) law school's authortiarian structure and c) society at large's general hatred of lawyers and law types. There are some really awesome people here, but most of rest weren't hugged as children, and it shows.

11) Ok, I was goign to stop at ten, but I just thought of this one: ELMINATE ALL EMOTION AND EMOTIONAL VOCABULARY. It makes lawyers extremely nervous. In my clinic, the judges will rule against the client who shows anything, anger, tears, whatever, almost every time. Even the nicest profs are just baffled by it - they see it as weakness. I remember one prof describing finding a girl crying in the hall. It was like an android discovering that humans can make water come from their eyes. And he's a prof who's generally MORE human than the rest.

-- Edited by Dizzy at 16:37, 2006-06-26