Workload in Undergrad was INTENSE Forum

[hangnail]

hey

[Br3v]

LOL. GROW UP.

But actually...I worked hard in undergrad (I also had a full-time job at the time so factor that in as well). Was not an engineering/science/math major--I just had a LOT of intense reading and writing assignments. In order to do well, I many a time had to skip the bar or socializing or...etc. And I can't say I always had the most wonderful "work/life" balance (and I was mostly leaning towards work).

I know that the common sentiment on TLS is that law school is 5000x more intense than undergrad. Can someone elaborate on what this means? Are there enough hours in the day?

I'm not in law school but I think the common sentiment is that law school is just a little harder than UG (though different) most of the year, and then things get really crazy during exam prep/exam time.

Will your "intense" UG exam experience better prepare you for LS? Probably not outside of just going you good time management skills because, as I said, LS is different.

[jbagelboy]

LOL. GROW UP.

But actually...I worked hard in undergrad (I also had a full-time job at the time so factor that in as well). Was not an engineering/science/math major--I just had a LOT of intense reading and writing assignments. In order to do well, I many a time had to skip the bar or socializing or...etc. And I can't say I always had the most wonderful "work/life" balance (and I was mostly leaning towards work).

I know that the common sentiment on TLS is that law school is 5000x more intense than undergrad. Can someone elaborate on what this means? Are there enough hours in the day?

Different kind of challenge.

If you were working 35-40 hrs a week and taking 4-5 classes, then your law school classes will be more work intensive than UG classes by virtue of raw hours. Imagine taking those 35 hrs of work and putting them towards class. That will begin to resemble the intensity of your law courseload, and you still wont feel like you have enough time to study.

[cinephile]

One of my professors last fall told us, on our last day of class, that she purposely assigned more cases than anyone could conceivably read because time management is an essential part of being a lawyer. It was up to us, she said, to figure out what was worth reading, what was worth skimming, and what we should skip altogether. That's an important skills and rather than exercise that judgment, people often try to read absolutely everything and take notes on it, only to burn out or get overwhelmed.

[Tom Joad]

You can't have a job 1L so your hours of doing stuff aren't much different than working through undergrad.

But it is all the same stuff rather than half school/half job, so it seems more tedious.

And certain times of the year are really busy.

[09042014]

1L is about 200-300 pages of reading a week. Plus probably 5-10 hours a week of Legal Writing, but that's bunched up around deadlines. Some weeks it is zero, other weeks its 30.

You could do all of law school in 30 hours a week, and do all reading, briefing, outlining. About two weeks before finals, it's more like 60 hours a week. And during finals, maybe 80.

Almost everyone can handle it.

[Bronte]

What's intense about law school is not so much the hours but the curve, the primacy of grades, and the treacherous job market.

[Tekrul]

[rickgrimes69]

It's definitely more intense than undergrad, for two main reasons.

1) The work never stops. Undergrad had a fairly predictable ebb and flow of work load that lessened between finals. This is what law school feels like. Say you miss one class, and you normally have 3 hours of reading for that class per night. That means you have to find 3 hours somewhere else in the week to make it up. If you miss a whole day of classes, and you had three classes that day, you now need to find 9 hours somewhere that week to make it up. You can see where I'm going with this. Falling behind is the kiss of death because it's substantially more difficult to catch back up.

2) Dat curve. In Undergrad, everybody could (theoretically) get a good grade if they tried hard and produced good work. Not so in law school. 50% has to end up below median by definition, and when 100% of your grade is based on a single test, minor mistakes and omissions become quickly amplified in significance. The spread in nominal point values between an A and a B is actually probably very minor for most classes. But because you don't get any feedback until the class is already over, there's 0 room for error. You're really competing against your classmates more than anything else.

[LeDique]

1) The work never stops. Undergrad had a fairly predictable ebb and flow of work load that lessened between finals. This is what law school feels like. Say you miss one class, and you normally have 3 hours of reading for that class per night. That means you have to find 3 hours somewhere else in the week to make it up. If you miss a whole day of classes, and you had three classes that day, you now need to find 9 hours somewhere that week to make it up. You can see where I'm going with this. Falling behind is the kiss of death because it's substantially more difficult to catch back up.

50% has to end up below median by definition

lol

[Herr Brun]

1) The work never stops. Undergrad had a fairly predictable ebb and flow of work load that lessened between finals. This is what law school feels like. Say you miss one class, and you normally have 3 hours of reading for that class per night. That means you have to find 3 hours somewhere else in the week to make it up. If you miss a whole day of classes, and you had three classes that day, you now need to find 9 hours somewhere that week to make it up. You can see where I'm going with this. Falling behind is the kiss of death because it's substantially more difficult to catch back up.

50% has to end up below median by definition

lol

Please do tell me what is wrong with this statement.

[Bronte]

50% has to end up below median by definition

lol

Please do tell me what is wrong with this statement.

I'm not certain what the other person was getting at, but as a matter of math 50% do not have have to end up below median. Consider the following distribution.

3.6
3.3
3.3
3.3
3.0

The majority are not below median. Only 20% are below median. Instead, the majority are at median. Although this is obviously a wildly unrealistic law school curve, I think in reality you do get a lot of clustering around the median such that a lot of people are "at" median and less than half are substantially below median.

But maybe I'm wrong.

[Tiago Splitter]

I thought the first part was more LOL-worthy. I doubt my worst reading assignment all year took three hours to complete. I certainly never had to power through nine hours of reading for one day of classes.

Law school is easier than a 40-hour a week job. Even on the rare weeks when you actually have to put in more than 40 hours you get to pick when you want to study.

[LeDique]

I thought the first part was more LOL-worthy. I doubt my worst reading assignment all year took three hours to complete. I certainly never had to power through nine hours of reading for one day of classes.

Law school is easier than a 40-hour a week job. Even on the rare weeks when you actually have to put in more than 40 hours you get to pick when you want to study.

And that "catching up" on class is a giant flame.