RSS FeedThree things to know if you are applying to law school
It’s mid-October. I’m halfway through the semester, and a quarter of the way through first-year hell.
One of my classmates has taken the liberty of describing what these first six weeks at McGill law have been like. I would have written something similar, but I lack the time management skills and energy that my classmate possesses. And so, with her permission, I have recopied her note from Facebook and pasted it below.
N.B.: To my friends and family — if you find that when you phone me I sometimes sound tired, busy and unenthusiastic, this is why:
Three things to know if you are applying to law school
I’ve noticed that there have been quite a few people I know whose statuses recently read something about law school applications and/or LSATs. Some of you may have perhaps contacted me asking about law school. Some of you may have simply attempted to contact me to keep in touch and I haven’t yet responded.
There’s probably a couple things you should be aware of. I’ll be brief. My opinions now may perhaps change soon enough and probably differ from experienced upper years. But this is what I see so far:
1) It’s hard.
People who got into law school told me it was hard. Yeah, I didn’t believe them. So I’m telling you it’s hard. I suppose it’s out of sheer idiocy that by writing that, I’d hope you’d believe me.
Now why is it hard? There’s a lot of readings. Generally, in undergrad, I made it through generally not reading stuff timely. I’ve only recently just fallen behind in readings in law – but the consequences are much higher than in business school. Following along in class really does not work well. You’re not talking about what was the content of the readings but you’re applying it and creating new hypotheticals. You’re comparing legal scholars’ points of view. You’re comparing cases that have opposing judgments with seemingly similar facts. Not reading timely makes this nearly impossible.
2) You’re on your own
This won’t make sense to you if you didn’t do a group-based undergrad like business. There’s no group work. Currently, it seems like it’s you versus the above-mentioned hundreds of pages of readings (note: I’ve probably read two semesters worth of reading in the past month, I’m not exaggerating). Some people form study groups; others don’t. Studying individually has benefits in that your mark doesn’t depend on someone else, but there’s the disadvantage of having only your point of view on a difficult subject.
Students generally seem to now disappear at lunch to bunker down in the library. In some cases, it seems to me that this takes away from a sense of community. You’ll probably pass people in the halls that you somehow have half your classes with but have not said a word to in a week.
3) Stress is in the air
There seems to be a lot of similarities to the LSAT and law school. If you’ve done the LSAT, you’ll remember the amount of anxiety in washroom lines at the break. Nervous people chattering, attempting to compare answers or find out which section was experimental.
From what I’ve heard of upper years, this stress anxiety atmosphere is characteristic of first year law school. Apparently it gets better in upper years. But you can really see it in people’s faces that we’re all getting a little nervous somehow, sometimes. Part of it is a common fear that all our efforts currently are useless and we’re spinning our wheels into the mud.
Notably, we haven’t gotten to the point of Scott Turow’s fragility in the opening pages of One L:
“By Friday my nerves will be so brittle from sleeplessness and pressure and intellectual fatigue that I will not be certain I can make it through the day […] I am distracted at most times and have difficulty keeping up a conversation, even with my wife. At random instants, I am likely to be stricken with acute feelings of panic, depression, indefinite need, and the pep talks and irony I practice on myself only seem to make it worse.
“I am a law student in my first year […] and there are many moments when I am simply a mess.”
It certainly does not seem too far off from the possible truth. Let’s see how we’ll be in late November.
My two cents (since that’s all I can afford right now): Add to this post to the new words I’ve learnt (“scintillated,” “interstitially,” “res judicata,” “res nullius,” “stare decisis,” et al) and constantly comparing common law and civil law (two legal systems + two languages = twice the mental work and a headache), and there you have it — my first few weeks at McGill law. It’s unlike anything I have ever experienced academically. You will begin to question your intelligence and everything you know to be true (like justice, the state, and other airy-fairy notions). I still don’t know what I am doing, or how I should be reading this stuff…
Strangely enough, I love it!
A New MOFO for a New Year
Middle Passage Law Series
Hahahahahahah…. I know what you are thinking, but no, not the expletive. “MOFO” is in fact short for the law firm of Morrison & Foerster.
I was wondering how best to kick off the New Year with the Middle Passage Law series and I thought it best to start with positive news.
A new MOFO for a New Year refers to Trevor James, a UK tax partner in Morrison & Foerster, who has been elevated to managing partner in the firm’s London office. And, oh yeah, Mr. James just happens to be black.
This is a first for an international law firm.
Please do not misread this post. It isn’t that UK law firms are light years ahead of their Canadian counterparts in terms of black diversity — for they are not, as the UK based Black Solicitors Network’s 2008 diversity league table makes clear. However, UK law firms and the legal establishment are ahead of their Canadian counterparts in two significant ways worthy of note.
The first of these is Mr. James’ appointment — earned on merit.
What is the probability of such an appointment at a Canadian national or international law firm in the near or medium term?
To be honest I just don’t see it happening, but I could be wrong — in fact I want to be wrong.
The second area to note is the fact that such a thing as a diversity league table exists.
It is not that Canadian law firms or the larger legal establishment does not measure diversity — for they do. However, on closer examination it will be observed that these measurements are largely confined to gender. Don’t get me wrong, this is a good thing and should be lauded; however, I believe that such measures should be expanded to other diversity communities.
Why the comfort with measuring gender and the fear — yes, I said fear, because that is the only way I can characterize it — with measuring race?
I really cannot answer this questions as it is far beyond my current knowledge and skills — I want to answer it and maybe one day I will.
I didn’t mean to harp on the negative but I just wanted to make you aware, that is if you were not already, of all too real an issue.
So back to the positive.
I wish Mr. James – A New MOFO For A New Year – all the best and I hope that his current and future successes will serve as a shining example of what is possible.
First-Year Law Student Teaches Ethics to Chinese Delegation
(reproduced with the author’s permission)
First-Year Law Student Teaches Ethics to Chinese Delegation
TORONTO – Omar Ha-Redeye, a law student at the University of Western Ontario, presented a seminar on ethical behaviour in disasters to a diplomatic delegation on Nov. 9, 2007.
The Chinese dignitaries were from China, and represented the Commission of Science, Technology, and Industry for National Defense (COSTIND). They were in Canada for one week, on a trip to meet with specialists in disaster management and learn from best practices here.
Mr. Ha-Redeye worked internationally in disaster and emergency management prior to starting law at the University of Western Ontario in September 2007. He shared an ethical model he developed in the review of successes and failures of major environmental and unnatural disasters.
The topics covered included the SARS epidemic in Canada, relief to families of Sept. 11, 2001, and the 2004 Tsunami in South-East Asia.
“In the study of ethics, there is no one single right course of action,” said Mr. Ha-Redeye. “What we try to do is present different ethical approaches, and try to reconcile competing needs in an emergent situation.”
Mr. Ha-Redeye explained that in disasters and emergencies there is little time for extensive ethical analysis, requiring professionals to be at least be familiar with ethical theory. The model he presented could also be used in other fields, or in daily situations in life.
First-year law students study ethics in their Spring semester of law at the University of Western Ontario. Western students begin their first class of ethics on Feb. 13, 2008.
“Although I am familiar with ethical concepts, their application specifically to the field of law is something I look forward to,”said Ha-Redeye.
Discussion around ethical behaviour in the legal profession has increased in recent months following the release of a book by a former Dean of Western Law, Phillip Slayton, entitled Lawyers Gone Bad: Money, Sex and Madness in Canada’s Legal Profession.
The training session was held at the Holiday Inn in downtown Toronto, and was hosted by the Foundation for International Training (FIT).
Below: Omar Ha-Redeye offers a session on ethics in disasters to a diplomatic delegation from China (Photo Credit: Omar Ha-Redeye)
Notes
Western Law was featured in the current issue of the CBA National magazine for the legal study of ethics. Western was the first law school to offer a mandatory ethics class in Ontario, and the first to have a mandatory course in the first year.
Ethics is usually more uniformly required in other jurisdictions.
Updates
The Law Society of Upper Canada is debating whether ethics should be a mandatory subject in Ontario.
