Got to see my first courtroom fight/arrest today during clerkship. It made quite an interesting day.

TR please.

Two clients on same side decided to fight after one said the other was lying. Guy A says "Guy B tends to be lazy and lies alot" and Guy B, right on cue, "**** you say?" and slaps Guy A behind the head pretty hard. Instantly, Guy A turns around and jumps B, so they hit the ground brawling. It was broken up pretty quickly, but they each got a few solid blows in before they were separated.


This was family law, so they weren't handcuffed or anything. Probably have the best first day story of anyone in my class at least.

Definitely wasn't expecting it to be a fight between two people on the same side of a case.

Might be the most exciting part of your entire clerkship

Lawyers stage this kind of thing for new clerks so that by the time you recognize the drudgery of law practice it's too late.

That's exactly what counsel said to me when we were standing in the hallway in the aftermath lol.

its a trap!

Family law is the only type of law where the crazy **** you see on TV actually happens irl

Yeah, family law is wild'n the **** out this past week. We had a few fights in the holding area and at least one person got tazed. I probably don't want to end up in family law post-grad but at least it has provided some entertainment this summer.

My good friend working at a mid-size firm has spent the last few days fighting parking tickets in traffic court for partners lol. I personally thought that was a pretty awesome move by the partners. Make the interns fight your personal tickets.

hey guys,

How much does minority status matter when applying to law school? I'm a middle class American white kid but 3/8 Spanish and went to UG on a full ride (well respected state school) as a National Hispanic Scholar (PSAT score from junior year of high school qualifies you for this if you score above a certain bar). Only have to be 25% blood to be considered a minority by the government, and this includes all Hispanic peoples including from Spain itself (go figure).

Last summer I attended an Economics Training and Minority Fellowships program geared toward increasing the number of economics phD's that are minorities because the number is something scary like 2%. I wasn't even the whitest guy there, there was a dude who was "1/16 Cherokee". Anyway, this Econ program is the main entry on my resume (most recent example of my "minority status") that an admissions department would see.

So I guess I'm wondering:

- how much does minority status matter?
- how much does *actually being a minority* (or fitting whoever's preconceived notions of what constitutes a minority) matter?

Thx in advance if anyone has insight into this.

Depends on what minority, but it's always a little helpful. When you say "Spanish" you mean from Spain? It'll probably only make a minimal difference.

i would say it helps a decent bit. Even if it's only slightly helpful when getting in(which i think it probably matters a great deal in higher education), i got numerous emails every week from my law school just looking for minority students in the top part of the class for scholarships. Now i went to school in a super white area(middle america) but i would assume it's similar elsewhere.

I was only speaking about admission fwiw, that's an interesting point about what happens when you're already in.

+1 on the scholly offers. One of my close friends is 40% hispanic + female and she gets offers every week for limited opportunities like that. Also, fwiw, she said it helped her stand out in OCI's immensely.

Yes, Spain. My dad's dad was 1/2 Spanish, his mom full, so he's 3/4 Spanish, my mom is anglo-saxon whatever, so I'm 3/8 Spanish, 37.5%. Government considers anyone above 25% Hispanic ethnicity, including peoples of Spain, minorities in the U.S.

I guess partly I'm just confused how this government classification of me as a minority at least in the context of these specific scholar designation brackets for undergrad admissions (National Merit, National Hispanic, National Achievement for blacks), translate into other areas of my life. Like when I applied to this Econ program geared toward minorities, they basically just accept your implied declaration of minority status at face value, because to question actual lineage would be highly un-politically correct. But I have no idea how law school admissions would look at this/consider this.

Thanks for your responses, e1.

Would it help me in an OCI when I'm clearly just a white kid, though?

How impressive is it for someone to have a certificate from the Texas bar stating that they received the highest score on the bar exam the year they took it? Is this something that lots of people get each year, or 1 person, or between 1 and 5, etc.? Does this say anything about the likelihood of the person being a genius, or is it more likely only a statement about their ability to memorize, or their love of the law, or something else, etc? Probably very subjective answers, but I'd appreciate input from anyone who knows, because I have no clue.

I suspect that in a state as large as Texas multiple people achieve the top score on every exam. If I were hiring, I would consider that certificate more of a "fun fact" than anything worth spending significant time analyzing. If you made it to an interview I would congratulate you on it, but otherwise it would not be a factor in a hiring decision.

I mean, she doesn't look hispanic at all nor does she have a hispanic sounding name. However, she puts it on her resume and became an officer in the Hispanic Law Students society, so she definitely maximized it's ev. Again, like you said, as long as you are not completely phony, I doubt anyone would question you on it.

Hey guys, I need advice on transferring.

I currently go to a T2 in the NY/NJ metro area on a full ride. I have a 3.86 GPA. My school doesn't rank but I believe this is top 2-4%ish in a class of 300 or so (B curve, top 10% is usually 3.60ish and top 5% for graduating class is usually 3.68ish--they only go up to top 10 for 1L so). I'd like to stay in the area and so Columbia or NYU are my only real options if I want to transfer.

So the two obvious questions are what do you think my chances are of both/either and if I can get in, is it worth it to give up a full ride + law review + clinics/TAs/bonds with profs and friends etc to take on 100k+ more in debt.

I have some additional things in my favor and some additional things not in my favor. The good is that I have more connections than the average law student. I have many lawyers in my family. While most of them don't work in fields or firms I would be interested in, several have connections they could hook me up with. It may amount to nothing but it's at least possible I can score a few interviews (and go into them with a leg-up) I wouldn't have been able to otherwise.

The bad is that like many here I'm sure, I used to play poker full time and as such have a 3-4 year gap in my resume--this is assuming I do not include poker playing on my resume which I have done at various times only to change my mind and remove it again. Without the poker though, my resume looks pretty weak overall even if an employer happens to not notice the gap.

I don't have specific goals career wise. I know I know, don't go to law school unless you know exactly what you want to do, but I already did and here I am. FWIW I know I'm very interested in Labor and Employment but I'm really interested in many different areas. No strong interest in academia and only interested in clerking if it would increase my earning potential. I really just want to have a nice paying job whether it's big law or anything else, and want to do whatever will maximize my chances of not being a poor lawyer who wishes he didn't go to law school. I'm very ok with working 70-80 hours a week if it means I can make decent money, at least for as long as I can take it.

Can answer more specific questions if anyone needs more info.

Thanks.

Going to be first to say stay put. Graduate with no debt + some connections seems optimal compared to tons of debt.

Resume pre JD doesn't mean **** once you get that first job.

Just took LSAT monday. Was consistently in 160-162 on PTs but this test felt really hard. Didn't help I got stuck with RC as experimental section either. And logic games seemed exceptionally brutal. Not taking it again so long as I didn't grossly underperform say like <157

Don't remember but can u interview at oci prior to making transfer decision?

You should be accepted by nyu and Columbia. Kind of out of touch with biglaw hiring these days but you might not be competitive for getting a biglaw job from where you are now.

I'm summering at a biglaw firm right now, there aren't any summers outside of the top 20 law schools here. Sample size of one obv, but I imagine it's tough.