Law School Thread Part-II

[logicallefty]

We had at least one thread not too long ago about law school.

From my perspective, I have two careers which are law enforcement (last worked as a Cyber Crime Detective for a medium sized city police dept), and IT Security (where I work now, and make pretty good money).

Going to law school is on my mind everyday. Until January 2015 there was no part-time/online law school that the Illinois State Bar would recognize. Now there is one, here:

http://web.wmitchell.edu/admissions/hybrid-program/

I won't pay full price but have been considering it if I can get some funding. Actually, I would love to be a part-time attorney, work like one big case at a time, and still keep my IT job which makes a lot more than any entry level lawyer around my area, but a lot less than the ones with experience.

Would any of you guys, particularly those of you who are lawyers already, consider a program like this? Bible? Dasein? bradd80?

 

[Bible_Belt]

US News ranks them 135 out of the 205 ABA approved schools. And now if they have this new on-line program, I would think that would only make their rating go down, not up. On the one hand, a US News rating is not everything, but on the other hand, on the law student forums that school would be referred to as a "third-tier toilet."

http://grad-schools.usnews.rankings...schools/william-mitchell-college-of-law-03086

The lesser schools have a con game going on with scholarships. More than half of my class had one, which sounds generous, but I know I lost mine and a lot of other kids did, too. My award letter said I had to keep a 2.6 GPA, which by undergrad standards is stupidly low. What the letter did not say is that, unlike any undergrad class I'd ever had, my law school graded on a 2.6 curve. That was mandated to be the median gpa. So to keep the scholarship, one had to be in the top 50% of the class. That sounds easy, but law school kids are the study skills all-stars. The grading system also penalizes outside-the-box thinking and any real world experience tends to work against you. Your only grade is typically the final exam, and everyone is in a contest to write an essay that most precisely matches the professor's essay. The best grade matches it the most closely, and the worst grade is the most different - not wrong, not poorly written, not reflecting a poor knowledge of the course material...just different.

I'm not trying to tell you what choice to make; I'm just trying to let you know what you're getting into. Good luck, man, whatever you do.

 

[dasein]

You already have the makings and experience to create a great data security niche company and then HIRE a lawyer to do the drafting/employment contracts part of that Do all the "law" you want and then pay them a pittance to review it and rubberstamp it. Security is hotter than hot right now, and you could target inhouse legal departments as prospects letting THEM do the stuff that requires a lawyer, YOU just provide it to them for their editing and review. "I help corporate legal departments create and enact meaningful security measures and policies." You network the IT department and the legal department simultaneously. Learn the applicable legal hotspots, e-discovery, telecommuting, BYOD, etc., and then package solutions. They and their IT dept are biased and hamstrung. They need an independent, outside knowledgeable person to help tailor effective solutions.

Law school is a grade A scam in so many ways. Any unprotected private sector industry that provided the quality of product law schools provide would be promptly shut down for fraud. The edu industry, and especially legal education, has been allowed to perpetuate a fraud on the public for decades now. Can't spell this out more clearly.

That said, if you really want to go, go, you only get one life and you'll never know til you do it.

 

[logicallefty]

Thanks for all replies. I agree that IT won't be going anywhere, especially my two specialties within IT, data security and networking. Data security has 0% unemployment right now and networking can make you a boat wad of money in a hurry if you are good at it, and I am. IT is getting so demanding that many people are dropping out because the stress level can be so high at times, while other times it's almost none. IT has a very serious problem that isn't just where I work now but it's been at almost all IT jobs I have had. That is, the incompetent people who lack the technical skills and the logic to succeed never get let go, they get promoted to oversee the technical people that they couldn't keep up with... It gets really old.

I'm more thinking about law school for my own enjoyment and that's probably not what I should be doing at 41. The 135 rating of the school I am looking at (thank you Bible) is a bit concerning. And I haven't had one single person tell me that any online school no matter what they did was worth the money. I'm reasonable driving distance from the University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign which is a very top dog law school. They just don't have a program for a person like me who works 40 hours at a day job.

For now I picked up some good law books and will hit those hard for several months and see if I still feel the same.

 

[dasein]

For now I picked up some good law books and will hit those hard for several months and see if I still feel the same.

If you do it, I am going to give you one very important piece of advice that I never got, but lots of law students with lawyers in the family DID get, and it's a tremendous advantage. Had I known it, I could have easily graduated in the top 5% of the class instead of the top 50%.

Get your hands on every single old bar review exam you can find from whatever source, especially in the state you go to school, but not just those. Get every single old BarBri and other bar prep essay question book you can get off of ebay cheap. You should spend 20% of your time reading the cases from your casebooks, learning the rules, worrying about what you say in class and making outlines, memorizing, and 80% of your time actually writing essay question answers, carefully reviewing and scoring them. Law school is cake if you allocate your time this way. It takes discipline because it's much easier just to read cases and memorize rules, but trust me, if you can make yourself do this, you will almost certainly do very well in LS.

Many LS professors recycle their exam questions from the same set of old bar exams. Use this to your advantage.

 

[logicallefty]

@PairPlusRoyalFlush - Honestly right now I'm not sure which area I would do. I have thought about specializing in Internet and computer related law. My experience as a Cyber Detective and in IT will be a huge plus to this. I have also thought about doing just family law and helping out needy families who can't afford good representation. At this point I'm thinking about law school because I love the field, not to get rich. I realize that I also have to consider that spending 100k plus is one hell of an expensive hobby. For right now I picked up some good books to read and will reevaluate this later in the year.


@dasein - Thank you for the tip. So in other words, don't just memorize the material by reading it, learn by writing it?

 

[Maximus Rex]

LSAT Prep

I'm going to be studying for the LSAT and I'm wondering what prep courses that you recommend. In speaking with one of my team members from the Debate Club, he recommended Power Score because it teaches to the methodology of the test. I was also leaning towards TestMasters because LSAT prep is all they teach.

The parts of the test I need to focus in on are those f*cked up logic games, so I'm looking for advice and recommendations on how to study for that and some study guides.

As far as my personal statement, what should I include to stand out? I was literally going to start my personal with this, To quote Phil Collins in the classic In the Air of the Night, I've been waiting for this moment all of my life. Finally, I have a really good rapport with some of my undergrad professors, so what should I have them say in in their letters of recommendation?

 

[Bible_Belt]

those f*cked up logic games

You got the right idea. I never did learn how to do those, and I had to guess on every single question.

The other two parts of the test were really easy for me. I tend to score perfect, except for missing one question, and then when I read the explanation, I'll still think my answer is right and the test-writers were wrong.

2/3 near perfect and 1/3 random guess got me a 152. 150 is median. My score kinda sucked, but funnily enough I only applied to one law school - the one where I live, and they gave me a scholarship for having a 152. My undergrad GPA was 3.5

 

[dasein]

Logic games are like word problems in math, not hard, you just have to practice tons of them and learn how to map them out.