A bit of a sticky wicket
Posted: Thu Jul 10, 2014 10:54 am
Rising 2L at a T1 in a very large market.
As I'm getting ready for the bloodbath that is OCI, I've selected firms that are, from what I've been told by career services and fellow law students, less selective. I had a rough second semester (more on that later) and have finished around median for my school.
Here's the dilemma, if, during an interview, the interviewer asks why my second semester grades dropped should I bring this up:
During the peak of the second semester, my family was served with a $1.1 million civil suit in federal court. I commute from home, so I was in the thick of all the stress that came along with that. My parents, unfortunately for them, do not have $1.1 million to throw around for frivolous lawsuits and really didn't have enough money for an attorney to fight the charges in federal court. My uncle is an attorney and was able to help a bit, but I ended up doing the bulk of the research. Luckily, the plaintiff voluntarily dismissed the complaint after they were threatened with a countersuit and their attorney was threatened with Rule 11 sanctions. Needless to say, this threw a wrench in my second semester, I didn't do as well on my finals as I did the first semester, and my GPA dropped from near the top 33%, to median.
I'm not one to kvetch about things, but if the question of "wtf happened during the second semester" comes up, should I tell this story? Needless to say it was a good learning experience for my legal education, but it wasn't particularly helpful for my top-law-schools.com.
Thanks in advance.
As I'm getting ready for the bloodbath that is OCI, I've selected firms that are, from what I've been told by career services and fellow law students, less selective. I had a rough second semester (more on that later) and have finished around median for my school.
Here's the dilemma, if, during an interview, the interviewer asks why my second semester grades dropped should I bring this up:
During the peak of the second semester, my family was served with a $1.1 million civil suit in federal court. I commute from home, so I was in the thick of all the stress that came along with that. My parents, unfortunately for them, do not have $1.1 million to throw around for frivolous lawsuits and really didn't have enough money for an attorney to fight the charges in federal court. My uncle is an attorney and was able to help a bit, but I ended up doing the bulk of the research. Luckily, the plaintiff voluntarily dismissed the complaint after they were threatened with a countersuit and their attorney was threatened with Rule 11 sanctions. Needless to say, this threw a wrench in my second semester, I didn't do as well on my finals as I did the first semester, and my GPA dropped from near the top 33%, to median.
I'm not one to kvetch about things, but if the question of "wtf happened during the second semester" comes up, should I tell this story? Needless to say it was a good learning experience for my legal education, but it wasn't particularly helpful for my top-law-schools.com.
Thanks in advance.