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benwyatt · Post by **benwyatt** » Sun Aug 02, 2015 12:24 pm

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CanadianWolf · Post by **CanadianWolf** » Sun Aug 02, 2015 12:50 pm

Good, but the final paragraph needs work.

CONSIDER: " I approach law school knowing that it entails three years of challenging academics. Laws shape our society affecting nearly every aspect of our lives."

"...and see what changes the next chapter of my life will bring." = This is a very weak ending as it portrays you as a passive player when your prior sentence--and your entire PS-- told us otherwise.

shump92 · Post by **shump92** » Sun Aug 02, 2015 1:07 pm

I'm really impressed with the edits this time. I agree the final paragraph needs some work, but that is just more because your very last sentence is a bit weak. I think there would be potential for someone to be really impressed with this and then be a bit let down at the end.

The grammatical phrasing at the end of the second paragraph sounded a bit weird but that just might be a preference I have for colons. Definitely use an exclamation point there though. Periods are meh, exclamation points are OKAY!! I know you want the second one more and not as absurdly as I just did.

My only general comment is a bit too much passive voice. I don't think it really hurts you here since the organization and content are strong, but fewer uses of "to be" could help you even more.

cocos · Post by **cocos** » Sun Aug 02, 2015 4:49 pm

It's definitely a moving story and I like your overall theme of hunger. This might just be me, but I'd like to hear little bit more about where you ended up (your "comfortable life" now). Show the reader that the hunger took you places.
I also didn't quite understand this part: "My arguments--cobbled together from hasty internet searches--were surely flawed in a number of ways, but they taught me that the law has power in and of itself." Were you making legal arguments on behalf of yourself or your siblings? If so I'd state more explicitly as I think that adds to your overall conclusion about your interest in law.

CanadianWolf · Post by **CanadianWolf** » Sun Aug 02, 2015 5:25 pm

Please do not use any exclamation points !!! The exclamation point is just a shorthand way of saying " I really mean this but don't know how to put it in words in an effective manner." Seriously, never use exclamation points unless trying to be humorous.

shump92 · Post by **shump92** » Sun Aug 02, 2015 5:29 pm

CanadianWolf wrote:Please do not use any exclamation points !!! The exclamation point is just a shorthand way of saying " I really mean this but don't know how to put it in words in an effective manner." Seriously, never use exclamation points unless trying to be humorous.

agree to disagree. Generally I think you are right but signaling can be important for emphasis in rare cases.

CanadianWolf · Post by **CanadianWolf** » Sun Aug 02, 2015 5:30 pm

Not here & never in legal writing !

shump92 · Post by **shump92** » Sun Aug 02, 2015 5:37 pm

CanadianWolf wrote:Not here & never in legal writing !

Fair enough. OP I will rephrase that advice to say that the "Of course I am" line does not stick out well enough. I do not want to generalize what would be the best way to do this for legal writing. But you need to make that line literally stick out in some manner. It's clearly an overarching thesis.

benwyatt · Post by **benwyatt** » Sun Aug 02, 2015 5:41 pm

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shump92 · Post by **shump92** » Sun Aug 02, 2015 5:49 pm

benwyatt wrote:
shump92 wrote:
CanadianWolf wrote:Not here & never in legal writing !
Fair enough. OP I will rephrase that advice to say that the "Of course I am" line does not stick out well enough. I do not want to generalize what would be the best way to do this for legal writing. But you need to make that line literally stick out in some manner. It's clearly an overarching thesis.
I felt like "of course I am" was clear, concise and confident. Adding anything else to it seems a little unnecessary to me.

I agree that the wording is pretty much ideal but I'm just trying to talk about it's physical placement on the electronic page. I'm trying to say that you should make your reader automatically think about those words more than anything else for a bit. Think about how strong PPT slides are created as an example. Adcomms will likely be bored of reading essays so you want to avoid any possible reason they would have to not give you a generous reading.

Honestly though, if you are comfortable with how it is buried on the lines here that is all that matters. I bolded my keywords as an example (though not one you should probably use) of what I am trying to say. You clearly know what you are doing though, especially in filtering all of this feedback. Maybe it looks better in your document. I'm happy to further clarify or qualify this.

CanadianWolf · Post by **CanadianWolf** » Sun Aug 02, 2015 6:01 pm

Rule No.2: Please do not bold any sentence or portion of any sentence in your law school PS.

P.S. I suspect that the poster suggesting these edits is probably on his third glass of wine; I, on the other hand, have only had two.

benwyatt · Post by **benwyatt** » Mon Aug 03, 2015 10:57 am

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LawsRUs · Post by **LawsRUs** » Mon Aug 03, 2015 2:58 pm

Fifth paragraph, "...I entered into my teenage years." I would consider changing it to "...I became a teenager." (Have you tried reading your statement out loud? It'll help catch bits of sentences like here where you could improve on phrasing.)

Content is excellent. I appreciated that you were being genuine and honest, and I felt like your passion and commitment were communicated. Having said that, it felt a bit long to me, and as I was reading it, I felt that there were sentences in there where they felt redundant and they could be taken out. Good luck