Is he right about study time in Law School?! Forum

[Newyorkcity3]

Hi all, finally posting in tls!

Situation: I will be going to a Tier 1 public college that does not require a minimum GPA to keep your scholarship.

My 1L Schedule:

M: 10:00 - 3:30 (2 hr Lunch in between)
T: 10:00 - 3:30 (1 hr Lunch in between)
W: 10:00 - 3:30 (1 hr Lunch in between)
Th: 1:00 - 4:00
F: 8:00 - 9:30

Dillemma: I showed my schedule to a recently graduated LS student and he told me that I will: need to study in the morning 2 hours M-W before school starts, study at lunch 30 minutes M-W, and after coming home I should study till I Sleep (6 hours), Daily. (dinner = 30 minute break) . He did mention to have one day as my free time, which means Fri and Sat are for studying except Sun if I made Sun my free day.
In other words, I am studying every second of my life except on Sunday afternoon.

This seems to be alot of studying to me according to speaking to others and reading tls posts. I of course want to, but it seems like i wont have time to even brush my hair.

What do you think? What is your recommendation?

Thanks!
NY

[Johann]

that's overkill. do what you want to do depnding on your career aspirations.

[hairbear7]

lol that's nuts.

I know people that just worked 8am-6/7pm M-F and did just fine.

[rnoodles]

Everybody's different. Maybe it worked for him, but it'll burn you out. Just do what makes you comfortable.

[White Dwarf]

Probably about what I'll do once finals start coming up (~November), but that's just crazy for the first couple months.

[Desert Fox]

[lavarman84]

Far too much. Outside of class, I typically spent 1 hour per every 10-15 pages of reading on each class until we got near exam time which is when I started to study for exams. It worked for me. Some will tell you to start prepping for exams far earlier than I did. And it might be good advice for you.

But no, that amount of studying will make you hate life and burn you out. It's not necessary.

[Newyorkcity3]

Wow,

So I believe I will study 2 hours before school M-W, a little during lunch, and an hour or two at home. (total 4-5 hrs M-W daily)

Then on Thursday I'll study that whole morning 9-1 (4 hrs)

Friday, I'll study 4 hours also, with the weekends being free until finals roll around.

All in all its about 35 hrs a week before finals.

Does this sound good to you (all)?

[hairbear7]

Do what works for you man

[jphiggo]

Until you have a couple of weeks under your belt, you're really not going to know how much time you'll need. I treated law school like a full-time job and did 8-5, but routinely cut out early. Someone mentioned 30 hours/week earlier and that was about right for me too for the typical week. If you get your studying done while you're at school, you can leave your heavy ass books there and then have nights and weekends to yourself. With the caveat that most learning for law school exams pretty much happens during outlining, and the last couple of weeks of the semester will likely be hell because of that.

[Nekrowizard]

This sounds crazy to me. I was near the top of my class at a CCN, for what it's worth. I just kind of tried to stick to a relaxed work-like schedule, like 8-4 with a pretty long lunch, breakfast, snack breaks, etc. until finals. Every once in a while, I think you see people like your friend, or that one guy at UCLA who slept for like 4.5 hours a night, but I honestly don't even know what you would do with all that time studying.

[BVest]

I usually stayed at school until 6:30 or 6:45 (home by 7), but I didn't do anything before class (which started at 10 usually), but I'd also waste some time during the day on TLS and FB.

[beepboopbeep]

Man this all sounds like way too much. DF's is pretty reasonable. I did about the same-ish as nekrowizard with similar results.

Honestly the biggest thing aside from do what works for you: maybe it makes you feel better now to plan all this shit out, but if something isn't working change it up. Having a rigid schedule would not work for me at all, and it'd just lead to unnecessary stress to be like, well shit according to the schedule I should be studying now, but I was out late and just want to sleep in today. Just fucking sleep in instead.

IMO managing the stress and staying relatively chilled out helps a lot more than an extra hour or two a week would.

[handsonthewheel]

I don't really understand the scheduling thing you're trying to do.

Why not just do the work you need to do in the time it takes to do it? Read the pages assigned and spend the time you need to so that you can walk away with a solid understanding of what you read; probably take some sort of notes.

Once you're done, you're done. If you still have reading to do, do it.

[Well Hung Jury]

You will not need to study that much. That's overkill.

[RaceJudicata]

you are more likely to confuse yourself/overthink things studying that much. And in terms of "studying" its really just reading and taking some notes... if you get it, then your done, if you don't go to office hours or send the prof an email. But don't sit there for hours on end reading/re-reading something if its not adding up.

You'll end up doing what works for you after 2-3 weeks. Finals is a different story

[UnicornHunter]

Just figure it out as you go. Some days you'll have a crapload of reading, somedays you'll have almost none. There's hugely diminishing returns on working hard in law school.

[First Offense]

At most all you have to do during the semester is your reading, and ramp it up around Thanksgiving for finals - making your outline and shit.