WUSTL Recent Grad (and others) Taking Questions Forum

[fl0w]

Starting a running list of courses and/or professors to take. Not sure what all has been mentioned in this monstrous thread, but from the last couple of pages I've got:

Health Law: Sepper
Fed Tax: Block
Corporations: Badawi or maybe Sale

Who/what else should be added to the list? Anything you'd like to agree/disagree with?

Critical Jurisprudence: Flagg
Game Theory Seminar: Baker
Regulating Drugs & Other Medical Technologies: Dresser
Intimacy Identity and the Law: Davis (if it's being taught again. I took it the first time it was taught)
International Law: Sadat
Survey of Intellectual Property: (whoever)

The first five were the most interesting classes I took. The last one, I would recommend that all students take survey of IP just to understand what IP is generally. It's a good life skill as a lawyer and comes up in a lot of areas of law that you wouldn't expect.

[hoos89]

I've heard not great things about survey of IP.

[fl0w]

I've heard not great things about survey of IP.

I mean I'd really recommend taking patents and trademarks & unfair competitoin (copyright is the last of the three i'd recommend).

But survey is good for people who don't have time for an in-depth semester on each or really just want to dip their toes into IP.

I know people that love it. I know people that get frustrated because it is too different from other areas of law.

[hoos89]

I've heard not great things about survey of IP.

I mean I'd really recommend taking patents and trademarks & unfair competitoin (copyright is the last of the three i'd recommend).

But survey is good for people who don't have time for an in-depth semester on each or really just want to dip their toes into IP.

I know people that love it. I know people that get frustrated because it is too different from other areas of law.

I'm not talking about the subject area, but the class itself.

[DoveBodyWash]

Kim has word limit and mandatory 1-hour outlining period with no typing
Legomsky has mandatory 1-hour outlining period with no typing
I have Law for Con Law and i suck at it.

Median here i come. This is worse than Mandelker.

[notedgarfigaro]

Kim has word limit and mandatory 1-hour outlining period with no typing
Legomsky has mandatory 1-hour outlining period with no typing
I have Law for Con Law and i suck at it.

Median here i come. This is worse than Mandelker.

I think I'd go insane with a 1 hour outlining period. As a prof, if you want to limit word vomit and reward good structure and flow, say it up front and set a strict word limit (though not as strict as Mandelker).

[fl0w]

I've heard not great things about survey of IP.

I mean I'd really recommend taking patents and trademarks & unfair competitoin (copyright is the last of the three i'd recommend).

But survey is good for people who don't have time for an in-depth semester on each or really just want to dip their toes into IP.

I know people that love it. I know people that get frustrated because it is too different from other areas of law.

I'm not talking about the subject area, but the class itself.

The two are related. You'd have to ask people why they say not great things. Many people I know that said not great things was because they didn't appreciate the subject matter and the fact that it is meant to be an intro to all... and not because of the class itself. It's a survey. Wide, not deep. For those who want a little but don't have time to touch all individual courses. <shrug>

I mean if you don't want to learn about IP, seriously don't take it, haha. I personally think everyone should be required to learn a bit about IP in law school. And should be required to take some critical theory. But that's me.

[fl0w]

Kim has word limit and mandatory 1-hour outlining period with no typing
Legomsky has mandatory 1-hour outlining period with no typing
I have Law for Con Law and i suck at it.

Median here i come. This is worse than Mandelker.

I think I'd go insane with a 1 hour outlining period. As a prof, if you want to limit word vomit and reward good structure and flow, say it up front and set a strict word limit (though not as strict as Mandelker).

get used to it for the bar exam. Not mandatory... but that's how you do it.

[hoos89]

Kim has word limit and mandatory 1-hour outlining period with no typing
Legomsky has mandatory 1-hour outlining period with no typing
I have Law for Con Law and i suck at it.

Median here i come. This is worse than Mandelker.

I think I'd go insane with a 1 hour outlining period. As a prof, if you want to limit word vomit and reward good structure and flow, say it up front and set a strict word limit (though not as strict as Mandelker).

get used to it for the bar exam. Not mandatory... but that's how you do it.

Too bad the bar exam is pass/fail and 90+% of people pass. It doesn't matter how well you do as long as you pass, whereas a handicap like that on a law school exam could be the difference between getting the job you want or not. Also the "not mandatory" thing kind of distinguishes it as well.

[fl0w]

Too bad the bar exam is pass/fail and 90+% of people pass. It doesn't matter how well you do as long as you pass, whereas a handicap like that on a law school exam could be the difference between getting the job you want or not. Also the "not mandatory" thing kind of distinguishes it as well.

all accurate. I just meant that 1) it's good to develop the habit for the bar / real world and 2) it's not a handicap w/in the universe of that class when everyone is doing it. It's just a constraint everyone has to work within.

But yeah the grade pressure is a real thing and a) if you think you can get a better grade in a class where everyone can just type all the things vs a class where everyone is similarly constrained and b) you have to focus on GPA like that, then do you.

Personally I never came close to approaching the massive word dumps of my classmates and enjoyed classes w/ constraints.

[Birdnals]

Warning: I have heard nothing but bad things from the more conservative leaning classmates taking Health Law with Seper or Critical Jurisprudence with Flagg.

So if that is your particular political leanings and you don't want to fake it for a semester on exams/papers, those might not be the classes for you.

My two cents:
Employment Law with Kim was awesome.
So was Tamanaha's Jurisprudence seminar.
Evidence with Rosen requires literally zero work during the semester, which is awesome.
Pretrial is relatively easy, but make sure you ask around about the person teaching you. Alison Lee was awesome, but some can be sticklers about staying the whole class time and making you turn in twice as much work as others.

ETA: Sale Corporations has a 5 hour final exam, but I heard she is a good teacher, but a 5 hour in-class exam would SUCK IMO.

[sublime]

..

[fl0w]

So I just try to take prereqs (Corporations and Evidence) and get requirements out of the way first semester of 2L or....

sure.. with the caveat that not all classes are offered every year or every semester. Make sure you don't miss out on something you are legit interested in. This is the last time you'll just get to study an area of law because you have a passing interest in it.

[hoos89]

Too bad the bar exam is pass/fail and 90+% of people pass. It doesn't matter how well you do as long as you pass, whereas a handicap like that on a law school exam could be the difference between getting the job you want or not. Also the "not mandatory" thing kind of distinguishes it as well.

all accurate. I just meant that 1) it's good to develop the habit for the bar / real world and 2) it's not a handicap w/in the universe of that class when everyone is doing it. It's just a constraint everyone has to work within.

But yeah the grade pressure is a real thing and a) if you think you can get a better grade in a class where everyone can just type all the things vs a class where everyone is similarly constrained and b) you have to focus on GPA like that, then do you.

Personally I never came close to approaching the massive word dumps of my classmates and enjoyed classes w/ constraints.

It's a handicap to people who don't really need to outline as much as their peers / are better at organizing their answers on the fly. If those are your strengths, then it hurts you to have that constraint. If you usually require more time for outlining than your peers or usually end up with a jumbled answer due to poor planning then it helps you.

[fl0w]

Too bad the bar exam is pass/fail and 90+% of people pass. It doesn't matter how well you do as long as you pass, whereas a handicap like that on a law school exam could be the difference between getting the job you want or not. Also the "not mandatory" thing kind of distinguishes it as well.

all accurate. I just meant that 1) it's good to develop the habit for the bar / real world and 2) it's not a handicap w/in the universe of that class when everyone is doing it. It's just a constraint everyone has to work within.

But yeah the grade pressure is a real thing and a) if you think you can get a better grade in a class where everyone can just type all the things vs a class where everyone is similarly constrained and b) you have to focus on GPA like that, then do you.

Personally I never came close to approaching the massive word dumps of my classmates and enjoyed classes w/ constraints.

It's a handicap to people who don't really need to outline as much as their peers / are better at organizing their answers on the fly. If those are your strengths, then it hurts you to have that constraint. If you usually require more time for outlining than your peers or usually end up with a jumbled answer due to poor planning then it helps you.

I'm not one of these people, so I'm genuinely asking... There is such a thing as being "better at organizing on the fly?" I would think that if you were "good at organizing on the fly" more time to organize wouldn't hurt you. I get that in competition it may help others which in aggregate hurts you, but you didn't mean that more time actually makes someone's answer worse did you?

Like not being allowed to rush makes this type of person's answer worse in a vacuum? I'm asking just in general w/o comparison to the class.

[sublime]

..

[DoveBodyWash]

I'm not one of these people, so I'm genuinely asking... There is such a thing as being "better at organizing on the fly?" I would think that if you were "good at organizing on the fly" more time to organize wouldn't hurt you. I get that in competition it may help others which in aggregate hurts you, but you didn't mean that more time actually makes someone's answer worse did you?

Like not being allowed to rush makes this type of person's answer worse in a vacuum? I'm asking just in general w/o comparison to the class.

I mean i don't think having more time to organize will hurt me. But it won't help me as much as it would my classmates. Like i typed 17k words in torts and 12k in contracts. CALI'd one and high A on the other. I had a word limit on Mandelker and i got screwed. My strength is burying my classmates in analysis, i can't do that when there's a word limit because i need to ration those words into spotting the issues.

So the mandatory outlining period isn't too much of a problem. But the word count is what i'm annoyed with. Because i don't word dump. It's not like i'm just throwing words at the page hoping that they stick. If i can spot issues and analyze them quicker then my classmates in the same amount of time, I'm gonna have more words. But if there's a word limit then i'm not going to get all the points I could have gotten if there wasn't one.

I suspect that my professors want to even the playing field. Which is noble, but at the end of the day they know that it's going to be curved. So i don't really understand what the point is. The constraints are going to force all the exam answers to cluster together, which means they'll have to draw more hair-line distinctions when awarding grades. Whereas if there are no constraints, then there's a wider range of answers, which in my mind makes the grade distribution more legitimate since the difference between an A and a B+ is much clearer.

[sublime]

..

[splitsplat]

I suspect that my professors want to even the playing field. Which is noble, but at the end of the day, they know that it's going to be curved. So i don't really understand what the point is.

i doubt it's for something as noble as leveling the playing field. professors are lazy and would prefer to read 60 10k word exams, rather than 60 15k word exams...

[DoveBodyWash]

I suspect that my professors want to even the playing field. Which is noble, but at the end of the day, they know that it's going to be curved. So i don't really understand what the point is.

i doubt it's for something as noble as leveling the playing field. professors are lazy and would prefer to read 60 10k word exams, rather than 60 15k word exams...

Yeah I thought about that...but Legomsky especially has been extremely paternalistic this semester. There's been a lot of hand holding this term. He spent several classes teaching us how to outline and how to take a law school exam (even though we all did it last term already). I think Kim's constraints are because she wants to read well-structured answers, but I think paternalism is at least a part of Legomsky's motivation

[Cellar-door]

So I just try to take prereqs (Corporations and Evidence) and get requirements out of the way first semester of 2L or....

sure.. with the caveat that not all classes are offered every year or every semester. Make sure you don't miss out on something you are legit interested in. This is the last time you'll just get to study an area of law because you have a passing interest in it.

So Corporations and Tamanaha's Jurisprudence Seminar are at the same time. Suggestion on which one to take?

Leaning Corporations just because it is a prerequisite for so many other courses.

[hoos89]

I imagine he meant it levels the playing field meaning it hurts you compared to the curve, which is what matters.

Mostly this. Taking away an advantage you have relative to the class is tantamount to giving you a disadvantage.

It depends on the exam, but I could certainly see it hurting me on some exams in a vaccum. As in, there would probably be time where I was either twiddling my thumbs or hand-writing part of my answer (and then transcribing it after the hour). I honestly can't imagine planning an answer for a full hour. It might prevent me from fully fleshing out my answers or getting to every issue I want to. I say this as someone who does almost 0 outlining on exams.

[notedgarfigaro]

Too bad the bar exam is pass/fail and 90+% of people pass. It doesn't matter how well you do as long as you pass, whereas a handicap like that on a law school exam could be the difference between getting the job you want or not. Also the "not mandatory" thing kind of distinguishes it as well.

all accurate. I just meant that 1) it's good to develop the habit for the bar / real world and 2) it's not a handicap w/in the universe of that class when everyone is doing it. It's just a constraint everyone has to work within.

But yeah the grade pressure is a real thing and a) if you think you can get a better grade in a class where everyone can just type all the things vs a class where everyone is similarly constrained and b) you have to focus on GPA like that, then do you.

Personally I never came close to approaching the massive word dumps of my classmates and enjoyed classes w/ constraints.

I normally do sketch out a rough outline before I go, and I've never really done a massive text dump on an exam (only hit 7k on tamanaha's exam and did fairly well). It's just the hard 1 hour thing would aggravate me.

[Randomnumbers]

Warning: I have heard nothing but bad things from the more conservative leaning classmates taking Health Law with Seper or Critical Jurisprudence with Flagg.

So if that is your particular political leanings and you don't want to fake it for a semester on exams/papers, those might not be the classes for you.

My two cents:
Employment Law with Kim was awesome.
So was Tamanaha's Jurisprudence seminar.
Evidence with Rosen requires literally zero work during the semester, which is awesome.
Pretrial is relatively easy, but make sure you ask around about the person teaching you. Alison Lee was awesome, but some can be sticklers about staying the whole class time and making you turn in twice as much work as others.

ETA: Sale Corporations has a 5 hour final exam, but I heard she is a good teacher, but a 5 hour in-class exam would SUCK IMO.

Sale's Corporations final is/was brutal. The class itself is great.

I'd try to take Corporations as soon as possible. It's a prereq for a lot of things. But I've heard great things about the Tamanaha Jurisprudence Seminar. But you probably won't get into it.

[hoos89]

Badawi's Corporations is pretty tough to get into as well. It waitlisted in about 30 seconds last year (not exaggerating).