Law school difficulty Forum

[tal32123]

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[tal32123]

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[tal32123]

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[InferenceOptional]

Tal, in all seriousness how is reading and writing not in line with doing? Every great NFL quarterback will tell you they win the game by studying tape. It is very hard to think of a six figure job where planning out the map of attack is not crucial to success.

[hoos89]

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[cinephile]

A friend who worked in the PD's office this summer said she had 90 cases. So that's 90 cases in less than 90 days. I doubt she had the opportunity to do much reading or writing for any of those, just had to push through one plea after another. But getting a job with a public defender's office can be difficult. They are good at screening for true believers.

[BaiAilian2013]

Being a lawyer is one of the few jobs where what you get paid for is reading, then thinking, then writing. Then reading more, then deleting, then re-reading, then thinking again, etc. It's like 90% sitting on your butt looking at words. If that's not what you're good at, then almost ANY other career would be a better fit.

[Geaux12]

Also i heard its not bad if you're a government employee. And I'm still an undergrad with time to choose whether I wanna go to law school or not so I'm trying to get it all sorted out a soon as possible.

I'm working in a government office right now. As a 1L summer intern, I'll have written like 8 memos and researched a bunch more (research=reading) issues in 10 weeks.

If you want to "do" things, go to trade school.

Curious, you say you've written eight memos; how long are your memos?


When I write a memo at work, the shorter the better. The partner doesn't want to read a bunch of shit. "Can I do X?" "Yes, and here are two pages explaining why."

[rinkrat19]

Also i heard its not bad if you're a government employee. And I'm still an undergrad with time to choose whether I wanna go to law school or not so I'm trying to get it all sorted out a soon as possible.

I'm working in a government office right now. As a 1L summer intern, I'll have written like 8 memos and researched a bunch more (research=reading) issues in 10 weeks.

If you want to "do" things, go to trade school.

Curious, you say you've written eight memos; how long are your memos?


When I write a memo at work, the shorter the better. The partner doesn't want to read a bunch of shit. "Can I do X?" "Yes, and here are two pages explaining why."

Some are an informal email, the equivalent of a page or two. The one I'm working on is 5 pages single-spaced so far, but not done.

[tal32123]

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[hichvichwoh]

Honestly, law school can only be considered "difficult" in comparison to undergrad. It's still waaay easier than a) being a lawyer or any somewhat demanding full-time job or even b) high school (imo).

Just a rising 2L's opinion, though.

Edit: I should refine my answer. What I meant was that the actual workload involved is really not significantly burdensome, but I do agree with what people are saying about the brutality of the grading curve.

[manofjustice]

Law school cannot be well described. You'll have to experience it. The experience probably has a different meaning for different people.

But it sounds like you're fucked (if you're going to law school.) Probably just a troll; if not, then uber-fucked.

[hoos89]

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[hichvichwoh]

Honestly, law school can only be considered "difficult" in comparison to undergrad. It's still waaay easier than a) being a lawyer or any somewhat demanding full-time job or even b) high school (imo).

Just a rising 2L's opinion, though.

Edit: I should refine my answer. What I meant was that the actual workload involved is really not significantly burdensome, but I do agree with what people are saying about the brutality of the grading curve.

I'm going to go ahead and call total bs on this one. Law school is 100 times harder than high school. Most people in halfway decent law schools were in the top 10% of their high school classes. And the amount of effort involved to achieve that is almost universally less than the amount of effort the average law student will put forth.

Well, I definitely had to devote more of each day in high school to class/schoolwork than I did this past year in law school.

[hoos89]

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[blsingindisguise]

I think the hardest thing about law school for most people is that, for the first time in your life you face the possibility of working as hard as you possibly can and STILL not doing well. Your classmates are mostly pretty smart and most of them were the "good" students in their classes, and now you're all thrown in together and put on a strict curve, where previously you just got an A for knowing the material and kissing your professor's ass. If you're in an 80-person class and 25 of you have complete 100% command of the material, it's still only going to be around 8 of you getting A's (arguably for just making better use of that material in the exam).

[hoos89]

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[blsingindisguise]

There's no "arguably" or "just" about it. How you make use of the material you know is more important for doing well on a law school exam than what you know.

I only put in the "arguably" caveat because some people insist that, at least at top schools, there are so many excellent exams in a class that the A's become a bit arbitrary. No idea whether that's true, because I didn't attend a top school.

[hoos89]

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[kalvano]

I got a B+ on a Contracts exam 1L, and the difference between my grade and the top grade was about 4 points.

[hichvichwoh]

I got a B+ on a Contracts exam 1L, and the difference between my grade and the top grade was about 4 points.

Man, that's pretty harsh. The one professor I had who was straightforward about grading said that the line between the A exams and the rest was somewhat clear, but that differentiating between the B, B+, and A- exams was very difficult to do without being arbitrary.

[spleenworship]

So is law school as difficult as everyone says it is? I personally am not that big of a reader or a writer, I'm much more of a doer. Also is most of law school just reading or are there mock trials as well and other things that have more action? What are the most difficult assignments you've had? Also please state your law schools if you comment. Thanks

The material is not conceptually difficult. It is a lot of work though, much more than most students have ever come close to doing. And it is ONLY reading and writing. You know that even when an attorney has a trial, that is preceded by MONTHS AND MONTHS AND MONTHS of reading and writing, right? You don't just stand up there and talk out of your ass.

The most difficult assignment I've had is reading a 12 page exam hypothetical and then typing 7,500 words in four hours for an exam that determines my entire grade for the semester and which is curved against the 100 other people in my class, all of whom are as smart and hard working as I am. And that's what every assignment is. There aren't assignments in law school, there is just your final exam or paper, that's it. Every class is graded by either a single 3-8 hour exam or a single research paper.

This

[spleenworship]

After reading this thread, please don't go to law school. Find a different job.

[hoos89]

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[Tiago Splitter]

Honestly, law school can only be considered "difficult" in comparison to undergrad. It's still waaay easier than a) being a lawyer or any somewhat demanding full-time job or even b) high school (imo).

Just a rising 2L's opinion, though.

Edit: I should refine my answer. What I meant was that the actual workload involved is really not significantly burdensome, but I do agree with what people are saying about the brutality of the grading curve.

I'm going to go ahead and call total bs on this one. Law school is 100 times harder than high school. Most people in halfway decent law schools were in the top 10% of their high school classes. And the amount of effort involved to achieve that is almost universally less than the amount of effort the average law student will put forth.

Well, I definitely had to devote more of each day in high school to class/schoolwork than I did this past year in law school.

Not sure what high school you went to, or whether you really HAD to devote that much time to your work. Or maybe you're just humble-bragging about how little work you do in law school. For the vast majority of people, law school will be far more work. Also, at most high schools, if you're reasonably smart, go to class and do your homework, you'll more or less get good grades. That is far from the case in law school.

I might agree with the idea that high school is harder than law school, but obviously that's only the case if you tried hard in high school. The big difference is the amount of class time. In high school you're in class for 30+ hours each week and then have homework and often outside activities on top of that. In law school you're supposed to be in class for like 12 hours each week and you don't have to go if you are too tired. Unlike high school and real life, you don't have to wake up 5 days a week in law school, but maybe that's a bigger deal to me than most.