So, I’ve spent a considerable amount of time thinking about how to improve upon my first semester (not that I know how I did yet). The result is this short list of tall tasks…
My classes this spring are Contracts (second half of a year-long course), Property (2nd half), Torts, and Lawyering Skills (writing and research). The kicker about this schedule is there are three finals here. Since Property and Contracts are year long courses, these exams were mid-terms - still difficult, but not the be all, end all of those courses’ grades.
The ultimate law school study tool is the outline. I actually really like the outlining process. It forces me to understand how things fit together and how concepts are developed. Fights over the outlining in The Paper Chase were classic, but it didn’t really work that way for me the first semester - thankfully. My goal on outlining is to do it more regularly throughout the semester, instead of waiting to the latter part of it. Hopefully, this will make our study group sessions that much more productive too!
The other goal is to get on a better schedule - doing all studying on weekends, waking up early to get some exercise in, and avoiding (as much as possible) late weeknights. 11 years after my undergrad freshman year, I’ve now learned that’s much easier to add weight.
I took my last exam on December 13, and in the 16 days since, no grades have arrived. Given the rigor of the academic process, you would imagine that the administration would be equally rigorous in rounding up our marks for the semester. This, it turns out, is incorrect.
What I find most frustrating about all this is that I have no empirical measure of how I’ve done. The work, the strain, the extra pounds, may have been just what the doctor ordered, or may have been futile.
For those of you who don’t know, law school is graded on a curve. This means that the grades in every class have to conform to a university mandated average, in our case B/B- for first year classes. While this may seem like just another quirk of law school, it has real consequences. Law school is a strict meritocracy, and money is handed out as a function of class rank. As an added bonus, if you do poorly enough in your first year classes, they give you boot.
And while there are two full pages in the course catalogue that explain how these grades are to be derived (auspices + tea leaves + casting of lots = law review), there is not so much as one jot written about when the grades will fall from the heavens. It’s almost like they are an afterthought, which would be fine if it didn’t have such serious consequences. (Insert grunt of deep frustration here).
So please check back to track my descent into madness. Should be fun.
We returned from our Christmas visit to the Keystone State to a huge stack of mail and, more importantly, a few boxes. (Incidentally, you know you’ve become a law student when you ask for books on legal writing by Bryan Garner). Of the 25 or so Christmas cards was one from a legal recruiting firm. I can’t even remember the name of it now and am cursing myself for having thrown the card away. But it came complete with writing on the inside that looks like handwriting. You know the kind - it’s in blue and looks like it could be someone’s quick note to say “hi” or “thanks” or “merry christmas.”
In the guise of holiday wishes, Mr. Legal Recruiter says he hopes that my holiday is blessed and happy. I nearly thought “that’s nice” before I realized two things: (a) the writing is just a fancy font and (b) someone sold my address to this d-bag.
Sadly I suspect that whoever sold my name to him - Lexis, West, ABA, my lender, etc, etc, etc - probably did so legally based on the fine print of some user agreement I signed without thinking twice - something my contracts professor might call “non-dickered terms.” I’ll tell you one thing though… if I could sue ‘em for harassment, I’d be happy to call it my very first lawsuit.
Huh? What’s that? Have I finally cracked? Only you can tell…. and if you tell anyone, I’d be happy to call you my very first lawsuit…
I’m sitting here at my parents house on the morning of Christmas Eve, thinking about how to explain what going to law school at night. The best I can come up is that it’s like a second job - in both the time and energy required to do it well (not that I’ve gotten any grades back yet to know that I’ve done anything well):
11 credit hours. Works out to about 10.5 hours at school per week (Monday-Thursday).
15 hours of homework per week, with significant spikes for exam review and paper-writing.
12 hours of commuting per week (Nearly 3 hours each day, 4 days per week).
1.5 hours for after-class BS sessions.
= 39.5 hours/week.
I, of course, have no one to blame but myself for this. But I do really love it. And while I might not do it part-time if I had it to all over again, so far it has been quite rewarding. There are definite advantages and disadvantages when compared to a full-time program. But that’s for another post.
If you’re like me, you’ve probably sat through a majority of Property praying for death. Not that I didn’t go in with high hopes. The acquisition and transfer of real Property is fundamental to the way I eke out a living, so I thought it would be a great start to law school.
Wrong. ‘Property’ is largely the study of a set of byzantine rules that have been superseded by contractual interpretations of the same material. Who really cares if at Common Law, landlords were able to utilize self-help to get rid of non-paying tenants if you have to call the cops to get rid of a deadbeat now? For the five large I’m paying for the class, I want tools I can use.
But wait! Turns out that you can still use property law for fun and profit. Just ask retired judge Richard McLean and his wife, attorney Edith Stevens. Seems that for the last 18 years, they had used a lot on the outskirts of Boulder, Colorado, primarily for a small garden and stacking firewood.
Trouble is, they didn’t own the land. It belonged to Don and Susie Kirlin who had planned to build their dream house there. Judge McLean and Ms. Stevens (clearly having been more attentive in class than me) sued under a theory of adverse possession, and were awarded a third of the property, valued at about $300,000. While the couples are now in settlement negotiations, I for one am on my way the nearest vacant beachfront lot to set up a tent and small garden. Let me know if you find a choice location in Aspen or the Hamptons.
Major League Baseball contracted with Former Maine Senator to investigate the use and abuse of steroids by baseball players. He was given the full blessing of the league and his contract included an indemnification clause shielding him (to an as-yet-unknown extent) from liability.
The 400-page report delivered by Senator Mitchell included many copies of checks and press reports detailing the use of steroids. It named some 80 players as having used performance enhancing drugs over the last decade, including likely Hall of Fame pitcher Roger Clemens. Senator Mitchell has suggested publicly that he is certain use runs much higher.
His report also relied in large part on the testimony of two men. One source is Kirk Radomski, a former Mets clubhouse attendant. Radomski has struck a deal with federal prosecutors in exchange for his cooperation in their investigation of the drug use. Brian McNamee is a former trainer who claims to have personally administered steroids to Roger Clemens and who is also cooperating with federal investigators.
If Clemens were to sue, who would he sue? To what extent can he access the testimony of Radomski and McNamee? Can he get at the records of Mitchell and his investigation team? What other issues must Clemens consider in deciding whether to file a lawsuit?
