This week, a girl in my professional responsibility class indicated that she would bill the client for time she spent SLEEPING on an out of town deposition trip.
And I used to wonder why people hate lawyers? Not anymore!
This Yale Law Review article is hilarious. I can't believe they actually published it. As an extra added bonus, they mention my favorite band on page 1689.
It basically analyzes the different players in law schools. It was written a while ago, and refers to gunners by the old school term, "turkeys."
Enjoy!
While I was looking for information on professor's salaries, I found the IRS Form 990 (Statement of income, expenses, etc for a 501(c)(3) org) for the law school's tiny little bookstore.
Turns out that the manager of the bookstore only works 35 hours a week and makes $52,000 plus $10,000 in contributions to his/her retirement plan.
The bookstore is only open for 5.5 hours a day most of the year. The only time I see it as being busy is at the beginning of the semester when all of us buy our books for the semester. I have purchased stuff from the bookstore before, and was always waited on by someone who looked like a student getting work-study.
Here is a damn good question: Why isn't the manager the one working the counter if she is getting paid so much? I would like to offer to take her job for $45,000. The school would save $5K a year, and I would have a job that is likely to be more lucrative than the public interest position I intend to pursue after graduation.
Better yet, perhaps we should just buy our books from the University Bookstore, located less than a block away and eliminate the law school bookstore entirely. I might end up paying 2% more for books, but I would also be able to pay with a credit card and be able to shop from 8 am until 8 pm or so (more than 7 hours longer than I can here).
As a bonus, the school could take the $60,000 they are saving (not to mention the cost of the student help and other operations costs) and put it into the LRAP every year. This would more than triple the amount that they could give to public interest students.
What is more of a social value - law students avoiding a block-long stroll to the bookstore, or us encouraging and fostering public interest work?
Seems that this school is choosing the former.
"I want to be a leader. I want to be an example." This was the statement made by an impoverished 12 year old South African girl interviewing for Oprah's LeaderShip Academy. If this child who has suffered so much can dream big dreams, I should too. I think that I sell myself short too much. Being an older student sometimes make me feel like I don't fit in. When did I start thinking that way? I have been all over the country. I have met all kinds of people, rich and poor, educated and illiterate. I was able to relate to them all. This should be no exception.
Another girl asked Oprah, "Am I good enough to be at this school?" This indeed is the question I ask myself at least once a month, when I am having a bad day. The answer that Oprah gave the girl, "you know you are" is the same one that I sometimes have a hard time telling myself. I know that I wouldn't be here if I wasn't good enough.
I may not always make the right choices or work as hard as I should, but when I do, I can do anything!
If you are considering law school and reading this, know that this experience can make you doubt yourself. It can also remind you that you are capable of more than you ever dreamed. It will test you, and "making it" is the reward for enduring.
If those girls can endure, so can I.
All over the prelaw sites, there are people who think that this guy knows something about preparing for law school that the rest of the world doesn't. As far as I am concerned - he's just another low rent scammer trying to breed on the paranoia of future law students. I always want to call the author of posts like this one, and tell them to stop driving themselves nuts. Most law students don't do much to prepare, and I agree with that.
If you read Black's Dictionary before you start law school, you will be in the same place as the rest of your class within a week or two. Unless you are going to school with morons, no amount of preparation is going to help you, outside of sneaking into classes a year before you actually start school and taping the lectures yourself.
Relax pre-law students. You will learn the material - all in good time.
Sometimes, I wonder why some of my classmates came here. They don't seem that interested in the law academically. Those who volunteer or participate in class a lot are called "gunners", making the rest of us afraid of the stigma of being an active participant in class. Many of them only seem to care about the money they can make, and not about doing something good in the world. I feel like I am on an island here.
I started this blog, and then haven't even bothered to make a second post. What an idiot! Speaking of idiots, I found out recently that a guy with no personality whatsover in my law school class is #1. Well, good for him.
My mama says that I shouldn't worry about how others are doing, and worry about my own shit instead. She has a point, but she certainly doesn't know "Martin the Gunner." Martin is so stiff that I sometimes wonder if he is a cardboard cutout and not an actual human.
Well, time to do more civil procedure.
