Is Going to Law School Easier for Some and Harder on Others?

Is Going to Law School Easier for Some and Harder on Others?This week we welcome back guest writer Zoila Sanchez to talk about how different people can have an easier or more difficult time getting in to law school and how to handle that.

If you are a prospective law student and in the process of applying to law school — then you know that the path to get into law school is a major commitment and requires several, difficult steps! As a prospective student, you have likely discovered by now that the Law School Admissions Test (LSAT) was only the beginning, and that law school can be competitive and takes a lot of hard work to excel.

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Things I’m Stressing About Before Starting Law School (And What I’m Telling Myself)

Things I’m Stressing About Before Starting Law School (And What I’m Telling Myself)This week we welcome back guest writer Julia Gourary to talk about getting ready for law school.

Starting law school is exciting, but it’s also a big transition, filled with lots of new and challenging experiences. While I’m looking forward to embarking on this new adventure, there are also some (okay, a lot) of things I’m stressing about, from all the costs of law school to those infamous cold calls to maintaining mental and physical health and wellbeing through long hours of studying and a high-stress environment.

Read on to find out the five things I’m stressing about most before starting law school, and what I’m telling myself to ease my worries. [Read more…]

Managing Test Anxiety on the LSAT and Beyond

Managing Test Anxiety on the LSAT and BeyondJulia Gourary, incoming 1L, discusses some ideas for managing test anxiety on any exam.

For me, tests have always been accompanied by anxiety: sweaty palms, racing heart, shallow breathing, stomachaches, you name it. It was a rare occurrence if I didn’t feel slightly ill before a big test. Over the years, from high school AP exams to the SAT to college midterms and finals, I’ve learned, if not to eliminate test anxiety, to better manage it.

When it came to the LSAT, which would have a big impact on my law school admissions chances, I knew I had to put all the strategies in my arsenal to work and maybe even develop some new ones. During my first attempt at the test, though, things went sideways in a way I never would have predicted (I was affected by the Great October 2021 Outage). Paradoxically, that experience helped my test anxiety: the worst had already happened, and I had come out the other side. [Read more…]

How to Keep up with the Law

How to Keep up with the LawThis week we welcome back guest writer Zoila Sanchez to discuss how to keep yourself informed about what’s going on in the legal field.

If you are interested in going to law school, you have likely learned about the various steps you need to take to successfully get there. For example, you must take the Law School Admissions Test (“LSAT”), write a personal statement, and obtain letters of recommendation.

While you are in the pre-law process of exploring the possibility of attending law school and familiarizing yourself with the requirements to be a successful applicant, it can sometimes feel like you are not engaging with the reason why you wanted to attend in the first place. For example, in my own personal experience, I spent so much time carving out hours to study for the LSAT aside from my full-time job and other commitments, that I did not have the time to connect with the social justice issues that inspired me to attend law school. I discovered through an incredible pre-law program that there are easy ways to quickly plug into legal issues in the world today. [Read more…]

Experiential Learning in Law School: Presenting to a Tribal Council

Experiential Learning in Law School: Presenting to a Tribal CouncilThis week we welcome back guest writer Tiffany Lo to talk about experiential learning in law school.

Before I was in law school, I remember hearing about stories of law students making a difference in the world, whether through exonerating death row prisoners, assisting small businesses, or working on immigration and deportation cases. Inspired and motivated, I wanted to do that myself someday.

Flash forward to law school now, and I finally got my chance. This fall, I joined a policy practicum where I had the chance to assist the Yurok Tribe’s Office of the Tribal Council with some of their current legal issues. The Yurok Tribe’s reservation is located in Del Norte and Humboldt counties in North California, sitting on a stretch of the Klamath River. I worked on two different projects: one, advising on a potential discrimination suit and two, preparing a whitepaper to describe the process of tribes contracting with the federal government in order to gain funding and coordinate in wildfire prevention and management. [Read more…]

Misconceptions About Law School: What Law School Is Really About

Misconceptions About Law School: What Law School Is Really AboutThis week we hear from law student Justine Huang about what she’s learned in her first semester of law school about what law school really is.

The main expectation I had going into law school was that it was going to be a lot of reading. While that turned out to be true, life as a law school student wasn’t exactly as I had imagined. Having been through one semester of law school, I hope to give you a sense of what 1L year is like.

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Trailblazing As A First-Generation Law Student

Trailblazing As A First-Generation Law StudentThis week we welcome new guest writer Zoila Sanchez to talk about her experience as a first generation law student.

You made it past the LSAT and now you are taking law classes! It seems like a dream come true as you have come so far as the first in your family and/or community to pursue a legal career journey. Maybe your journey has been especially challenging and you left your home country to pursue an LLM, or you are a non-traditional law student. Sometimes the initial excitement deflates at certain points in law school, when you are overwhelmed, struggling to keep up, and/or find students who come from a family of attorneys or have siblings that provided them with tips or outlines. Being a trailblazing law student can be discouraging at times. Here are encouraging tips to embrace being a leader in this respect: [Read more…]

Law School Perspective – Tips to Help You Transition from Summertime to Studying

Law School Perspective - Tips to Help You Transition from Summertime to StudyingThis week we welcome back guest writer Shirlene Brown to discuss how to get back into school mode after a summer off.

Summer is the best time for law students. You can earn money through your summer jobs, catch-up with family and friends, and just relax! Unfortunately, summer went by so fast and the Fall semester is just around the corner. Now that the summer is winding down, it is time to get prepared for the school year to begin! I have been through three years of law school and thus I have lots of experience transitioning from summertime to school time. I have created a list of some tips that helped me get through the summertime sadness and get ready for the grind of a new school year. I hope these help you feel prepared for what another year of law school brings!  [Read more…]

Personal Mission, Vision, and Values Statements in Law School

Personal Mission, Vision, and Values Statements in Law SchoolThis week we welcome back guest writer Cathlyn Melvin to talk about finding a personal mission and figuring out your values as a law student and future lawyer.

Standing at a gas pump, your eyes glaze over at a posted paragraph about the fuel supplier’s mission to be “the world’s premier petroleum company.”

Okay.

Corporate mission statements, according to former Forbes contributor Len Sherman, “all say the right things about management’s deep concern for customers, employees, shareholders, communities and even planet Earth.”

Since they all sound kinda alike, and we’re all kinda jaded, business mission statements just don’t matter that much to consumers. [Read more…]

Motherhood as a Law Student

Motherhood as a Law StudentThis week we welcome guest writer Rigien Bagekany-Jackson, a recent law school graduate, to talk about how she has balanced motherhood and law school the last three years.

Do you ever reflect on how you got to where you are now? I do.

Sometimes you can pinpoint that moment or decision that brought you to where you are. For me, that moment was in June 2016. I was 35 weeks pregnant with my first child working at a bank when an armed man walked in and held me up at gunpoint. This was the point when I decided to start law school. I had initially thought to postpone my offer of acceptance, but at that moment, I knew that there had to be a way to make law school work with having a newborn child. [Read more…]