"Success in Law School - A Unique Perspective" - Thoughts? Forum

[hurricane12345]

Wanted to get current student's (1L's/2L's) thoughts on this TLS article. Specifically interested in what you think about:

1. The author's thoughts on 0L substantive prep? He says "E&E books are an essential supplement...I find going through the entire E&E book before classes start or early in the semester to be extremely helpful to get a picture of the entire course as quickly as possible."
and "If you are a gunner...I would probably recommend reading all E&E books and hornbooks before class...If you were to do this before law school... I could not see how you would fail to get nearly all A's (a few scattered A-s are probably unavoidable because there is some subjective judgment in picking the A's from the A-'s)."

Note: I think the general TLS consensus is that 0L substantive prep is at best a waste of time, at worst can hurt your 1L performance. There are numerous threads on this subject already. However, this author suggests otherwise. I realize that the benefit to be gained varies depending on who your professors are, but the article suggests that 0L prep will always be beneficial to some extent. The fact that the article is featured prominently on TLS with a foreword by Ken himself makes the article quite convincing and credible.

[thederangedwang]

what r E&E books and interested in this as well

[hurricane12345]

what r E&E books and interested in this as well

This might be what you're looking for http://www.top-law-schools.com/forums/v ... =5&t=79688

Also, I've found this thread and the links within it useful http://www.top-law-schools.com/forums/v ... =4&t=26949

[CanadianWolf]

People often have different learning styles; what works for one, may not work for another. Reading multiple supplements before law school may waste time by focusing on too many areas & may cause burn-out. Why not read on a broader topic such as legal reasoning (e.g., "Thinking Like A Lawyer") or test taking methods (e.g., Getting To Maybe).

Memorization & regurgitation does not assure that one will do well in law school.

[CanadianWolf]

E&E books are "Examples & Explanations" of specific law school subjects.

[adonai]

If you have free time to kill, I don't see how it would hurt, but it won't be as beneficial as the article states ("guaranteed" straight As). I read a couple of E&Es over the summer, and it gave me some insight with familiarity of terms and stuff, but everyone in the class eventually catches up so any advantage you had quickly diminishes. Just note that half of what you read may not even be taught in your particular class, and profs have their own interpretations/wordings of the law that they may want you to use. I would suggest you try to obtain a good outline for your prof/class and then use it as a guide to reading through an E&E. Obviously you cannot do this until near the summer when your schedule of classes is released. Until then, probably learn how to outline and read a case and other small things like that. Learning those things in advance will free up a lot of time going to seminars during school and making the learning curve a bit easier. Also, the most important thing is probably to learn how a law school exam works, not learning the law itself. I recommend "Open Book" and "How to do your best on law school exams". I did not enjoy getting to maybe personally.

[Bildungsroman]

There was never a time this quarter when I wished I had read substantive material during the summer. There were numerous times this quarter when I was thankful that I hadn't read material over the summer. Your mileage may vary.

[delusional]

The wasteful part of pre-law prepping is that you will expend a lot of energy on stuff that your professor might not care about at all. If I had read an entire E and E on torts, I would have worked about 990% harder than it was to just show up to class. If I had read one on Civ Pro, I would have known Erie well, and my professor didn't care about Erie. But I wouldn't have known much about CAFA (or possibly Iqbal/Twombly), and he cared about those.

What might actually be worthwhile is getting an outline of that professor before the semester, if possible. Then you can fine tune the outline, and track the points that you're supposed to be hitting.

[Mce252]

Success in law school classes = listening to your professor and tailoring your studying to their expectations.

[therunningman]

I am a 2l. I read all the first year E&E's prior to law school. I have received A's in all of my substantive classes (with the exception of 1 class) and did not suffer burn out -- nor did I feel like I wasted my time because if my prof didn't cover the material it will still probably be a part of my bar prep. Furthermore, people tend to underestimate all the background material that is not taught in law school (like the lingo or general procedural stuff). Reading the E&E's before hand can really help get you up to speed on this stuff. Ultimately the most valuable part of reading the E&E's before law school was that they gave me extremely valuable context for each case I read for class during my first year. In other words, I avoided spinning my wheels during the semester because I understood which cases were important and why.

Any 0L would be wise to follow the advice of "success in law school -- a unique perspective." But do not take it as doctrine. There are many other useful advice threads on here such as arrows thread on success in law school. If you read enough advice threads, you will begin to build your own strategy based on common themes and your personal style.