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I think it would be really helpful to fellow OL's if you could post what your daily schedule was like during 1L, 2L, etc. Ie, what time you woke up, classes, studying, gym, tv, dinner etc.

When I look at how many hours there are in a day, and the fact that class takes up a decent portion, how do you fit outlining and reading into the day. Do you just read casebooks during the day or do you read each supplement with it (do you read the hornbook E&E and Gilbert). I feel like just reading those would take up almost all of the day. Thanks for your help in advance.

1st semester: wake up around 6AM to do reading; class; lunch; outlining for one class; more classes; more reading; dinner; more outlining. Weekends were for reading or LRW or outlining or practice tests while preparing to drink (Saturday) or watching sports (Sunday).

2nd semester: wake up around 12PM; watch YouTube; watch a dozen episodes of whatever TV show I'm into; some fucking meal; read; talk hypothetically but not seriously with next-door neighbor about leaving the building to try and have sex; leave the building to drink, but not to have sex; get home; consider doing reading; read Wikipedia instead; write stream-of-consciousness allegories to the horror of law school; watch more TV and gchat randoms; fall asleep around 4 or 5.

mallard wrote:1st semester: wake up around 6AM to do reading; class; lunch; outlining for one class; more classes; more reading; dinner; more outlining. Weekends were for reading or LRW or outlining or practice tests while preparing to drink (Saturday) or watching sports (Sunday).

2nd semester: wake up around 12PM; watch YouTube; watch a dozen episodes of whatever TV show I'm into; some fucking meal; read; talk hypothetically but not seriously with next-door neighbor about leaving the building to try and have sex; leave the building to drink, but not to have sex; get home; consider doing reading; read Wikipedia instead; write stream-of-consciousness allegories to the horror of law school; watch more TV and gchat randoms; fall asleep around 4 or 5.

Amazing.

I won't bore anyone with what I did each and every hour, but here is the short version:

I treated law school like a job. I got up around 7 or 8, triple S'd, Got on the train to go to school. Prepped for class with whatever time I had before class. Stayed till anywhere from 4-6. 1L year, I also studied most evenings and always put at a least a half day in on Saturdays. Sundays I did no work.

Let me put it this way: If you can muster the effort it takes to get into a good law school, then you can easily muster the effort it takes to graduate from one. Want to make law review? Want to be a federal clerk? Want an especially prestigious job? Then study more. Study a lot more, even. But rest assured that if you can get into a T14, then you can get out of one too.

In fact, I found the amount of time I studied for the LSAT to dwarf the amount of time I studied for school. And by way of disclosure, I got my first choice job and went to NYU.

If you're concerned about whether or not you can have a life while in school. You most certainly can. In fact, I got married and had a kid while in school and still managed to graduate comfortably in the upper-middle of the pack.

Thanks. I just want to know if one can maintain somewhat of a life and still do well.

As far as the reading is concerned, do you just do the casebook reading or do you read each supplement assigned for each lecture and casebook reading? I figured reading the supplements could add on an additional 2-4 hours each day. How does all that work?

Its good to know that on fridays, saturdays, and sundays, there is time to maintain a life. Fridays Im going to want to chill with and bang my gf. Saturdays I don't mind studiyng most of the day but would like to have some time to occasionally go out at night or even chill with a movie. Sundays I obviously want to watch football, and if you don't want to do that you should move to another country. Im just kidding.... No I'm not.

RP1983 wrote:Thanks. I just want to know if one can maintain somewhat of a life and still do well.

As far as the reading is concerned, do you just do the casebook reading or do you read each supplement assigned for each lecture and casebook reading? I figured reading the supplements could add on an additional 2-4 hours each day. How does all that work?

Its good to know that on fridays, saturdays, and sundays, there is time to maintain a life. Fridays Im going to want to chill with and bang my gf. Saturdays I don't mind studiyng most of the day but would like to have some time to occasionally go out at night or even chill with a movie. Sundays I obviously want to watch football, and if you don't want to do that you should move to another country. Im just kidding.... No I'm not.

You should only read outlines.

Okay, that's a lie, but no, you don't need 2-4 hours of supplements a day.

I think my schedule was roughly the same first and second semester, so second semester I had class at 8:30 twice a week, and on those days I would get up around 7 and be at the law school by 8, so I had some time to look through my reading notes beforehand and just be more alert for class. I had class 8:30-9:30, then an hour-long break where I would usually just type up notes from my classes where we weren't allowed to use laptops (which, I highly recommend doing as the year progresses instead of at the end b/c it made outlining a lot easier). If I didn't have the 8:30 class, I would get to the law school around 9 and then do work for an hour and a half. Then I had a class til 12, after which I would run home and eat or stay at the law school for a talk and free food if there was something interesting going on.

I either had class or was doing reading from 1-4pm. After 4pm I would usually try and stay at the law school for a couple hours or until I got hungry, and then I went home or out with friends for dinner. I didn't do too much work after dinner, b/c I was usually feeling burnt out or I just wanted to watch TV or something. I tried to do a lot of the stuff for student groups or finding an internship during the week (either in the day or after dinner), b/c I study best when I have a long block of uninterrupted time to do reading, which isn't really the case during the week b/c there's class and meetings and stuff. I also went to the law school Friday morning and stayed until 5 or 6 getting ahead on reading. The full day let me get about 5 days of reading done for different classes (an average day's assignment was probably 25-30 pages). I usually also worked from 9-6 on Saturday (also taking a solid hour break for lunch). Toward the end of the semester I started doing the 9-6 thing on Sunday too, but this was necessary mostly b/c by then I had started making outlines or doing practice tests.

mallard wrote:1st semester: wake up around 6AM to do reading; class; lunch; outlining for one class; more classes; more reading; dinner; more outlining. Weekends were for reading or LRW or outlining or practice tests while preparing to drink (Saturday) or watching sports (Sunday).

2nd semester: wake up around 12PM; watch YouTube; watch a dozen episodes of whatever TV show I'm into; some fucking meal; read; talk hypothetically but not seriously with next-door neighbor about leaving the building to try and have sex; leave the building to drink, but not to have sex; get home; consider doing reading; read Wikipedia instead; write stream-of-consciousness allegories to the horror of law school; watch more TV and gchat randoms; fall asleep around 4 or 5.

I was going to write "180," but I think that's one of the lamest things a person can do on TLS.

Also curious to read answers! Thanks.

Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday
Morning: sleep in as late as possible
Class: 9/10 - 12:00
Afternoon: time in between classes reserved for eating, lunch info sessions, MAYBE looking back over reading for upcoming class - occasionally work out (the benefit of law school is that you usually don't eat enough so working out to avoid getting fat is less of an issue)
Class: 1:00 to 2:30/4:00
4:30 - 5:30 - wander around, tired, watch TV sort-of, eat sort-of
5:30 - 8:30 - read, read, read, sometimes take reading notes
8:31 - watch three hours of television because too numb to do anything else
REPEAT

Thursday
All things the same except:
2:30/4 - BAR
6:30-8:00 - Home, stare at television, drink more

Friday
10:00 - wake up and wander around, eat, try to clean my apartment
12:00 - 5:00/6:00 - transfer hand-written notes to word document, outline, read supplements
6:00 - drink
11:00 - bed

Saturday
Same as Friday

Sunday
Same with the exception I have to make sure I've read for Monday.
This is my "light" drinking day - like three glasses of wine instead of six.

General mood during this time: tired, cranky, tired.

seespotrun wrote:I was going to write "180," but I think that's one of the lamest things a person can do on TLS.

These always tickle me.
The classic "I was going to [does X] but doing X is not cool" (unless I pull off doing X like a ninja!)

RP1983 wrote:Thanks. I just want to know if one can maintain somewhat of a life and still do well.

As far as the reading is concerned, do you just do the casebook reading or do you read each supplement assigned for each lecture and casebook reading? I figured reading the supplements could add on an additional 2-4 hours each day. How does all that work?

Its good to know that on fridays, saturdays, and sundays, there is time to maintain a life. Fridays Im going to want to chill with and bang my gf. Saturdays I don't mind studiyng most of the day but would like to have some time to occasionally go out at night or even chill with a movie. Sundays I obviously want to watch football, and if you don't want to do that you should move to another country. Im just kidding.... No I'm not.

Most normal people deal with the supplements in the last 1/3 of the semester. There is no point spending 2-4 hours supplementing shit that you already know or could easily understand from the readings. But when you start to review for the exam, that's when its time to pull out those supps and read the parts that you don't have down.

Law school is as much about learning to be efficient with your time as it about learning causes of action.

1st semester: Wake up at 6:30, shower etc, make a big breakfast and be at school by 7:30 to re-read my notes. Be in class until about 2 and take insane amounts of notes. 2-11 pm: meticulously outline, read supplements, meticulously transcribe notes from supplements, take full-length practice tests, read every damn word in the casebook, etc. 11pm-midnight: watch southpark or porn to try to de-stress, take a tylenol PM to fall asleep. Went to the lawschool about 12 hours each day on weekends to study with a massive hangover. Finished around top third and my health was shot.

2nd semester: Wake up at 8:30, roll out of bed and munch a granola bar on my way to class. 9-2: cruise the internet, play zelda and space out during class. From 2-6: read online briefs and stare at my casebook in a cat-like manner, occasionally glancing at E&Es to just think about shit without writing. Go home at 6, make dinner, bang my girlfriend, play videogames or watch movies, and be in bed by 10-11. Chill out on the weekends and sleep in or w/e. Finished with close to a 4.0 and jumped to just outside the top 10%.

Work =/= Grades.

jalong wrote: I treated law school like a job. I got up around 7 or 8, triple S'd, Got on the train to go to school. Prepped for class with whatever time I had before class. Stayed till anywhere from 4-6. 1L year, I also studied most evenings and always put at a least a half day in on Saturdays. Sundays I did no work.

+1

I did basically this, and I feel like it worked out very well both QoL-wise and grade-wise. YMMV.

1st semester: Wake up an hour before class. Go to class. Nap if more than 2 hour break between classes. 1-2 hours of reading at some point. Sunday maybe 2-3 hours. Saturday be hungover. Rest of time spent w SO/playing xbox/watching netflix/youtubing.

2nd semester: Similar altho less reading and skipped more classes. Marginally more xbox.

First and second semesters, I basically got up about two hours before my first class, got to the law school about 45 minutes early, and studied until class started. I studied in between every class (except the lunch hour), got done at about 4, and read until about 6. 6 became 7 became 8 became 9 as the semester went on.

This semester, my earliest class is 11, but I don't imagine that things will significantly change. Less reading and more work, I suppose.