Top Law Schools

ok so i know the overwhelming consensus on here seems to be to NOT try to study beforehand for law school..
but what kinds of courses or classes are there that one would take and would seemingly be beneficial?

thanks

There are none. They are scams that prey off the very insecurity and curiosity that led you to ask this question in the first place. The key to the scam is to convince you that there is something you can actually learn from them that will give you a leg up on your peers. Utterly false.

Work on your resume/cover letter, improve your typing speed, contact alumni from your school and start making a network of contacts, research about law school exams with the threads on this site and the book "Getting to Maybe". Any of these will actually help you and give you a tangible benefit. And best of all, they are all free (minus the few bucks that a used copy of Getting to Maybe will cost you). Don't waste your money on a scam that preys off the insecurity and neuroticism of incoming 1L's. Hope this helps.

I received info from Law Preview and it seemed legitimate. Was actually thinking of doing it. So consensus might be that this would be a bad idea?

Wikipedia if you want some kind of basic info on legal concepts, not that you really need it.

Maybe the introduction of Getting to Maybe. The book is more useful once you are about about 1/2 way through the semester.

mrwarre85 wrote:I received info from Law Preview and it seemed legitimate. Was actually thinking of doing it. So consensus might be that this would be a bad idea?

I don't mean to imply it isn't legitimate. It just won't help you and is a way that they can squeeze money out of people who don't realize how useless it is, and couldn't possibly realize how useless it is until after school begins.

how bout for someone who is truly unprepared? by this I mean his knowledge of government, etc isn't the greatest, and also not the most extensive experience with research.

sangr wrote:how bout for someone who is truly unprepared? by this I mean his knowledge of government, etc isn't the greatest, and also not the most extensive experience with research.

They don't teach you about government or research in any of those courses, so it would be pointless. Second, you don't need to know either of these things prior to law school. You will learn everything you need to know when you get there.

Ipsa Dixit wrote:Wikipedia if you want some kind of basic info on legal concepts, not that you really need it.

Maybe the introduction of Getting to Maybe. The book is more useful once you are about about 1/2 way through the semester.

+ 1 At the very most, read GTM if you really wanna do something

starchinkilt wrote:

Ipsa Dixit wrote:Wikipedia if you want some kind of basic info on legal concepts, not that you really need it.

Maybe the introduction of Getting to Maybe. The book is more useful once you are about about 1/2 way through the semester.

+ 1 At the very most, read GTM if you really wanna do something

Also read the advice threads on how to do well in law school. There is no one right way to study, but reading all of these will give you some insight into what others have found useful.

Law school is kind of about knowing what you got taught in class, rather than knowing lots of things period, if that makes any sense. I can't really imagine a program that would be helpful. But showing up to orientation happy and rested and well-adjusted will be helpful.

0L Prep is worthless.

If you feel you must do something, read GTM and learn to type really well.

dakatz wrote: Work on your resume/cover letter...

This seems to be common advice for 0Ls. Is there any TLS specific advice for this that I'm missing? Do you just draft a different form letter for each type of employer [firm/PI/gov]? I know how to write a cover letter, but for legal employment I wouldn't know where to begin, considering that the complementary advice is often that they should also be specifically tailored.

reading Getting to Maybe is about the most I'd suggest someone do. Outside of that, you're screwing yourself.

My 0L Prep = Watching "My Cousin Vinny" to prepare for Civ Pro!

TTH wrote:0L Prep is worthless.

If you feel you must do something, read GTM and learn to type really well.

+1

0L Prep is a waste of time. Learning the BLL is a waste of time (almost always jurisdictional and rarely a bright line rule).
And GTM was also a waste of time.

If there is one universal truth in cracking law school exams it's tailoring your exams answer to your professor's style. For example, in my torts exam, our answers were to be short/concise and non-objective, i.e. advocating. If your answer was overly rhetoric accompanied with "forks"/brain dumps you did not score well.

The best advice (imho) for a 0L is to enjoy your last days of freedom. However, when you do get into lawl school make friends with 2Ls. I did extremely well my first year and I owe it to 2Ls. I picked their brains on what the professor tested on, the time pressure, the number of questions, etc... I also met with my professors and asked each one of them what their pet peeves were when grading exams. For example, in K's my professor hated when someone would write "parole" evidence instead of "parol." Another professor hated when students would write "see above" because often he would have to flip between pages to "see above."

Additionally, professors love it when you use the same language that they always use, for example, my Property teacher always said: "the question then becomes" and my Conlaw professor always said "notice that" and my Torts Professor always said "You should also know" yada, yada. I would regurgitate this rhetoric in my exam answers and I think it helped (law school professors have egos and they like hearing themselves talk). Using the professors same language you can write an exam so that your professor feels like he is reading his own model answer... thus, an easy way to stand out that most students fail to utilize.

Look at me, totally off track. Back to the point... there is pretty much nothing you can do to properly prepare for law school as a 0L. The best thing you could do is go out and try to volunteer in legal related field in order to get experience (it will help you out when searching for a job next summer).

Proper 0L prep -

squ1rtle wrote:My 0L Prep = Watching "My Cousin Vinny" to prepare for Civ Pro!

You watched a criminal law movie to prep for civ pro?

GTFO

Things that might be useful, in no specific order:

(a) Read Getting to Maybe.
(b) Work on typing speed/accuracy.
(c) Get your resume in order, and think about possible 1L summer jobs. (yes, it feels like you have no idea now, but it's not like a couple months of law school and finals breathing down your neck is going to put you in any better position)
(d) Read a Bryan Garner book on legal writing, e.g. Legal Writing in Plain English.
(e) I don't know how useful this step would be, but think about looking through the Bluebook, if that's what your school uses for its LRW classes (and it's probably used for the law review competition, although that will be a ways off)
(f) Read an intro-to-legal-thinking book, e.g. Thinking Like a Lawyer by F. Schauer, or The Legal Analyst by W. Farnsworth.
(g) Above all, relax and enjoy life. Do something you've been wanting to do. Go somewhere you've been wanting to go. Spend time with people you love and do fun things. Try to pack as many happy memories into your 0L summer as possible.

I think one of the big problems with substantive 0L prep is that, during 1L, you want to tailor things to how your professor teaches the class and what he is going to be looking for in exams. My civil procedure professor didn't cover joinder. We never made it to third-party interests in contract law. I think you would end up learning a lot of material that will serve absolutely no purpose. You're not going to get any points on a criminal law exam by mentioning arson laws if that was never covered in class.

A lot of people's minds end up turning to this soupy jumble of concepts by exam time and it's often difficult to remember if a concept came from a supplement that you read, or if it was something that was mentioned by your prof in the fifth week of class, etc. My property professor took a heavier-than-usual economics-and-law approach to the way he taught class. The whole way through the semester, I was tailoring my notes and my exam strategy to this. There is a lot to be said about starting law school with a relatively blank slate when it comes to legal concepts. I would really be scared about having preconceived notions of a topic color the way I prepare for class, or even worse, how I answered the questions on the exam. I think you may end up learning material that could actually hurt your exam performance.

Finally, I have serious doubts about how much of the actual, useful substance you're going to remember from 0L prep (it's a little scary how little I remembered of a first-semester topic only a month or two into my second semester).

if you really have to blow your money, I hear from this guy I email that he has 1,000,000,000$ in a bank account in Nigeria. he says he is a Nigerian price. if you want his contact info, he says I send him 1,000$ then he can unlock his bank account and we can split it. I am sure he will offer you the same deal

Just chill before your 1L year. It'll be a while before you get to legitimately relax again.

Like someone else said, these "prep" courses are just stealing your money. Save that money for some supplements when law school starts. There is plenty of time in law school to study the law.

I think people in this thread are not really addressing your question.

You can take a the Law Preview course. There are mixed review about it on this site. Some people thought it helped a lot. Others thought it was crap. I think the consensus is there is no magic bullet to help you in your 1L year.

If money is no object or they give you a scholarship I would take it. But just realize that the course is neither necessary nor sufficient to guarantee success on your 1L exams.

Read this thread to see it discussed at length:
http://www.top-law-schools.com/forums/v ... =3&t=30021

G. T. L. Rev. wrote:

PKSebben wrote:reading Getting to Maybe is about the most I'd suggest someone do. Outside of that, you're screwing yourself.

+1, with the caveat that I see no problem in cleaning up your resume or starting to think about the kind of 1L summer jobs you'd be interested in.

This. I know a couple of people who took prep courses...and....don't.