Illinois Law 1L Taking Questions Forum

[tmon]

Kind of random/early, but is everyone on their own to go get their I-card? I'm wondering if I could technically go get mine now and get into the rec center since I'm in town early.

[Ludo!]

Kind of random/early, but is everyone on their own to go get their I-card? I'm wondering if I could technically go get mine now and get into the rec center since I'm in town early.

Don't know when you can get your iCard but I know that unless you're taking sinner classes you can't get into the Arc during the summer without paying extra. (Like 85 bucks)

[tmon]

Foiled again.

[LSD22]

Looks like 2L OCI and job placement has been touched on but what about 1L OCI or job placement...do 1L's typically work their first summer?

[chitown2626]

Looks like 2L OCI and job placement has been touched on but what about 1L OCI or job placement...do 1L's typically work their first summer?

Rising 2L here, yes 1L's work their first summer. Every single 1L that I know is working a legal position this summer. A few have paid positions (whether it be a 1L summer associate position at a firm or an hourly wage with a public interest group) but most are unpaid positions. For these unpaid positions you can get between 2-4 credits that you can apply to your fall 2L semester, or another semester if you want (these are called externships). This can be very valuable as your 2L fall is busy with interviewing, applying for jobs, callbacks, ect. and having a lighter courseload can be helpful.

Most of these unpaid jobs seem to be with judges or the other government agencies (like the states attorney office for example). It seems the consensus is that what you do isn't very important, but you just want to have some legal job that you will be able to talk about in your interviews during the fall of your 2L year. If you finish with honors or high honors in legal research or legal writing (our 2 pass/fail classes here) you will be eligible for the Cook County Honors Program where essentially you will be assigned to a Cook County judge in Chicago for approximately 8 weeks. I have lots of friends who have done that and it has been a good experience. Dont hesitate to ask anymore questions. (1L summer is great and there is PLENTY of free time).

[Ludo!]

Great answer above. How many people in your class got firm jobs of any size? I don't know very many people who did private practice, and only one that did biglaw 1l summer. Just curious if it was any different this year

[chitown2626]

Great answer above. How many people in your class got firm jobs of any size? I don't know very many people who did private practice, and only one that did biglaw 1l summer. Just curious if it was any different this year

Yea i personally and anecdotally know of 1 in biglaw and then a number of people in smaller firms, most of which seem to be in towns like champaign or peoria, ect. Could be more though. But our classes look to be about the same.

[DreamsInDigital]

I'm at a firm with about 15 attorneys and know a few other people at similar size firms. Only know 2 people personally that are doing big law, both in Chicago. Then I know one person with a nicely paid position in-house with some big company. Aside from that, it does seem like the vast majority of people are with judges for the summer, I know lots of people with state judges and a couple with federal judges.

[adammac17]

Can any 3Ls (or competition editors ) clue us in on when Law Review decisions were made last year?

[MBZags]

We found out on July 18th last year.

[chitown2626]

For all you rising 3L's, did you receive any interviews from the resume collects on symplicity? And if so, did you hear back from any of the firms (or other legal employers) before the application deadline that is listed for each firm (basically, do they not even look at the resume's they've collected until the deadline passes, or do they look at them as they come in)? thanks

[Ludo!]

My experience with the resume collects was not good. I had more success just directly mailing the firms, even the ones doing resume collects. Other people might have different experience, but of the firms that did resume collects last year I don't know anybody working at any of them

[adammac17]

Ludo - since youre on here hopefully you can clear up something about symplicity for me. Were capped at 20 docs on there at a time but obvious with cover letters and everything you can pretty quickly exceed that. How quickly do the documents we use to apply to firms get "batched" together or saved so that we can then delete/replace them?

Like for early OCI - once the application deadline passes and materials get sent out its obviously ok to delete cover letters but can we do it earlier? Right away? I asked OCI and got a typical unhelpful response.

[Ludo!]

Ludo - since youre on here hopefully you can clear up something about symplicity for me. Were capped at 20 docs on there at a time but obvious with cover letters and everything you can pretty quickly exceed that. How quickly do the documents we use to apply to firms get "batched" together or saved so that we can then delete/replace them?

Like for early OCI - once the application deadline passes and materials get sent out its obviously ok to delete cover letters but can we do it earlier? Right away? I asked OCI and got a typical unhelpful response.

That's a good question. I didn't apply to that many firms that required cover letters so I never reached the cap. I think as soon as you bid on a firm your documents are saved and you can delete them from the system but I'm really not sure. Sorry, I am as unhelpful as OCS on this one!

[chitown2626]

Ludo - since youre on here hopefully you can clear up something about symplicity for me. Were capped at 20 docs on there at a time but obvious with cover letters and everything you can pretty quickly exceed that. How quickly do the documents we use to apply to firms get "batched" together or saved so that we can then delete/replace them?

Like for early OCI - once the application deadline passes and materials get sent out its obviously ok to delete cover letters but can we do it earlier? Right away? I asked OCI and got a typical unhelpful response.

Was concerned about this as well haha. Well, I deleted some of the cover letters that I used for OCI to apply for some of the resume collects and there was no problem with that. When I go to the early OCI and click on the CL "file" that I deleted, it comes up just fine.

However, unfortunately, I am not sure about deleting documents for the resume collects yet I havnt tried it.

[tmon]

Anyone have a barber recommendation?

[DreamsInDigital]

What kind of hair do you have? Mine is kind of difficult but the woman at Clutch Cuts does a really nice razor cut. It's pretty expensive because you are also paying for the atmosphere (very "man cave"-ish: you get a beer when you walk in, all the women are incredibly attractive, huge tv with sports on all the time). Honestly, I could do without all of that, but I get my hair cut so infrequently that it is worth it just because I know she is going to do a good job.

[diegoforlan10]

Anyone have a barber recommendation?

So much this. Got my hair cut at the local Hair Cuttery after 6 months of hippie growth (I have extremely thick hair) and it looks terrible. I'm thinking about buzzing it all down.

I get my hair cut so infrequently that it is worth it just because I know she is going to do a good job.

I agree 100%. You get what you pay for. I'm never going for the cheapest option again.

[tmon]

Mine's pretty thick, but not especially difficult to deal with. I usually try to find an actual barber shop because the old dudes seem a bit better at their job than the randoms in the generic chain places. Yelp seems to have a couple options that look decent, so maybe I'll give that a shot.

[tmon]

Update: look up Andy's Barber Shop if you're into the barbershop experience. They're just a little southwest of campus. TVs on sports, dude who cut my hair was good to talk to, gave a great cut, and they do the straight razor back of neck shave/hot towel routine when they're done. It was like $17 I think, which is right around what I expect to pay with tip. Very satisfied.

[diegoforlan10]

Update: look up Andy's Barber Shop if you're into the barbershop experience. They're just a little southwest of campus. TVs on sports, dude who cut my hair was good to talk to, gave a great cut, and they do the straight razor back of neck shave/hot towel routine when they're done. It was like $17 I think, which is right around what I expect to pay with tip. Very satisfied.

Are you serious? That cheap? I paid more than that for my POS hair cut!

[chitown2626]

how likely is it that alternates turn into selects? did that happen to you guys last year?

[adammac17]

how likely is it that alternates turn into selects? did that happen to you guys last year?

+1. I got 9 selects and 12 alternates lol

[Ludo!]

I got a couple last year. Don't get your hopes up, but it's definitely possible

[blurbz]

I think I had one or two alternates that turned into selects.