I think stuff that is on the bar should be your #1 or #2 priority.

I have a second interview coming up with a criminal defense firm. They want someone who is proficient in Spanish and my espanol skills are not that great anymore since I don't use it. But they seemed to like me and be impressed by me for some reason. Well anywho, I am trying to prepare by listening to CDs and using Spanish textbooks and online translators. If anyone has any other ideas, please help !

heyy…i see a lot of my fellow poker players took the tactic of "if you can't beat em, join em!" after black friday as well. I'm just finishing up my 1L year, looking forward to catching up on this thread.

I disagree; you'll have plenty of time to bore yourself to tears with bar exam subjects when you study for the bar exam. I say enjoy yourself and take "Law and [non-law-subject]" or philosophy courses masquerading as law school classes. Or better yet, if you actually plan on practicing law, do a clinic or an externship or something useful instead of wasting time on black-letter law you're just going to have to relearn anyway.

Agreed with this 100%.

I don't see why you are "going to have to relearn" the material that you learned in class when it is time to study for the bar. I would think that if you learned it the first time, then when it comes time to prepare for the bar, you would just be reviewing and refreshing, which would free up time for learning the material that you are being exposed to for the first time. The most stressful part of bar prep for me was trying to learn subjects like family law, wills/trusts, and secured transactions from scratch. On one hand I felt that spending a lot of time on subjects that would likely not make up a huge portion of the exam was horribly inefficient; on the other, I did not want to risk getting a bad draw and exposing myself by blowing those subjects off.

Yeah I agree with Aj. The bar was like 90% review for me because I took stuff like family law. It made bar review at least a little less stressful. Your class material will be more in depth too than bar review, whixh means more useful for practice. I dont really see why anyone would intentionally take literally useless classes when you can take classes useful for practice. I mean I get it that you want to be a tax lawyer so you don't want to "waste time" in family law but it seems to me people burn out in the field due to stagnation, so maybe getting well rounded is a good idea. Plus you might decide you actually like family law.

I also agree with this 100%.

Law students tend to over-exaggerate the importance of everything from the bar exam to their general existence. Over 70% of people pass and if you went to a crappy school like I did you'd realize there are a large number of not very bright persons in that group. To say the least.

Take classes that actually allow you to think about society and maybe make some connections between different fields and ideas. Get those synapses firing.

You aren't learning anything new or interesting in Trusts & Estates or Secured Transactions.

Wat.

That is exactly what Superfluous is saying- take classes that are useful for your practice or for shaping your perspective on life.

Don't waste time in courses that would only be useful for memorizing information to regurgitate on the bar and then immediately forgetting.

I have a student who is choosing between Syracuse on a full ride and Case Western with no money. He's also on the waiting list at Minnesota and William & Mary. I told him to go to Syracuse for free but consider the waiting list schools if he gets in. But I'm not convinced this is good advice.

He has a Ph.D. in neuroscience so he has better job prospects than some no matter where he goes, but I think he should be prepared for having a non/crappy job in the future and look at the Syracuse gig as a freeroll (without considering time). Thoughts?

What has taken him from pursuing an advanced degree in neuroscience to applying for law school?

Job market for neuroscience is worse than lawyers. At least that's what he says.

I mean...if he's gonna go then take the full ride and hope for the best obviously, but he doesn't sound like he really cares about being a lawyer and as such he probably should be finding another direction.

That was stressful for me too, until I realized I was < 5% to get a question on commercial paper or secured transactions so that semi-punting those and concentrating on knowing MBE subjects cold and being able to write decent essays all but ensures passage (at least in Nevada). Sure you "expose yourself" by not knowing everything about an obscure subject that is unlikely to come up at all, but you "expose yourself" even more by not knowing as much as you can about subjects you know for a fact will appear in both the MBE and the essays.

Also, the notion that "you don't have to relearn it if you already took the class" is counterproductive. First off, most prospective lawyers are at least two years removed from the 1L subjects that determine whether they'll pass or fail the bar exam. Going into it with the attitude of "I got an A- in contracts five semesters ago I don't need to concentrate on it as hard" will result in punting points. Also, your class's curriculum will differ from what you're expected to know for the bar exam (eg we never covered recording statutes in my 1L property class, but you're all but guaranteed to see 3-4 recording statute questions on the MBE if not the essays).

I think you're overestimating the effect a law school course taken several years in the past has on a lawyer's practice area or potential for burnout.

This times a million. Tell him to google opportunity cost or something.

I live in Ohio- the value of a Case Western degree really isn't that great despite its decent ranking. IMO, it'd be pretty dumb to choose Case over the full ride. That being said, I get the sense law school itself might be a very bad decision for this person, as it is for 90+% of law students imo.

Even if he's planning on being in Ohio, Case isn't even going to get him a job. OSU> Case every single time, even in Cleveland imo.

syracuse for free is by far the best option imo

It is hard enough to get a job out of Ohio State, I would not even consider paying to attend any other law school in Ohio.

No, he just plays one on TV.

Actually what he said was:

People that complain about 3rd year being useless, are doing it wrong because they took classes that had no real world application. I wish they would make everyone do a clinic or internship, but for your other 3-4 classes if you waste your time in "law and noise noise" that's your own fault. The only exception is if you go to a handful of schools where you might actually get a job where you shape policy soon.

In my family law class, we talked about child support guidelines and how they're calculated (not on the bar, very useful for real practice) and the rules about who owes under weird circumstances. We also talked about theoretical stuff about what happens when gay couples get married (in 2009 not a lot of states recognized it but obviously a cutting edge issue to be anticipated for practice), move to other states, have kids etc. That's how these classes SHOULD be taught. A little bit of theory that anticipates where things are going, and a little bit of practice. Find the classes that do this well by asking other students, and take them.

It is precisely because you need to overload on the core MBE subjects that taking a class on a bar subject while in law school is valuable. When I took the DE bar, I spent most of my time/energy on the MBE, leaving whatever time I had left to deal with corporations, agency, equity, civ pro, wills/trusts, family law, UCC other than article 2. Regardless of whether I took the class in my first year (civ pro) or my last (equity), studying for those subjects was vastly easier than studying for wills/trusts, family law and secured transactions. The argument isn't between not taking the MBE subjects seriously and taking them seriously - it is between taking classes that will in some measure make studying for the bar easier than not taking them. Note that I also took Contracts II and Torts II my last semester of law school, which was like a bar review in and of itself. Clearly there is value to taking a class that may appear on the bar, when you have to take something in order to graduate. Whether that value exceeds the value of taking a seminar or some esoteric class is an individual decision. As a parent and sole breadwinner (I did the evening program while in LS and upon graduation worked full time up until 4th of July weekend), efficiency was at a premium for me. While I am all for taking advantage of the opportunity to branch out and think about different legal/social issues, to me that would have been more of a luxury - I would have needed something else to motivate me to go that route, e.g. favorable time of day, crappy professors in other classes that were offered at the same time.

anybody know where to get some good multiple choice questions for constitutional law?

Is there anywhere on 2p2 to ask for basic legal advice re tenant lease agreements? I had a question and this is the only legal thread I know about...Thanks.

No. Call a lawyer. Rules vary by state.

This was my experience for AR as well. Followed my business partner's blueprint and only studied for MBE. Squeaked by but my license looks like everyone else's ... well not really due to the date but that was application related not score related


JAASH, start an OOT thread

If I have had two meetings with a client where they promise payment on the morning of court, is it ethically okay to not represent them when they bring no money on the morning of court?

Non-crim because I know that does make a certain amount of difference and no filing of entry because I wanted to wait and see. Did rep, just want to know if in future gfy is an option.