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Written by S. Colin Mabrito
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Saturday, 16 February 2008 22:59 |
Much of the vocabulary, course content, and administrative procedure of law school is novel to a first semester 1L. That being the case, there is a learning curve every law student faces, regardless of intelligence level.
However, there are certain actions one can take prior to orientation that will help shorten this learning curve. The following pre-law preparation plans are designed to help a pre-law student achieve this. The level of preparation is divided by the results desired.
Plan 1- I’m attending law school pass/fail:
For some, law school is more of a social pursuit than anything else. There is absolutely nothing wrong with this approach. Academically, it requires only the barebones, black-letter law. However, it will still go much more smoothly if you take the time to prepare at least somewhat before being thrust into such a foreign situation.
Here, it will still be necessary to have at least seen some of the language that gets tossed around in a law school classroom. Much of it is intuitive, but some will be nonsensical at first glance. That is why even someone attending law school to have fun, make contacts and figure out life should (at bare minimum) have perused a condensed (even pocket) law dictionary once before ever entering a classroom.
Beyond that, the other issues will be speed reading and comprehension. These can easily be improved by taking the time to read magazine articles or books prior to the first day. I would recommend that you place a pocket law dictionary, several magazines, and a book, in locations like the bathroom and bed-side table, for the summer before law school.
Plan 2- I’m a future top-quarter student in a time crunch:
Many aspiring attorneys have the desire to do well in law school, but little time to execute any strategy toward this goal prior to the first day. If this is you, it is time to rope off a couple of weeks designated primarily for studying, as if it were a job.
This approach involves the use of a law dictionary, outlines for the classes, and the textbook itself. To perform moderately well in your first semester, you must have some idea of the legal landscape you’ve wondered into. To do this, a brief overview of each course of study is necessary. The best approach, in limited time, is to obtain an outline from a 2L/3L or from an online outline bank (there are many resources for this). If it is a professor specific outline, that is even better. This document should give you the best overview of where this class is actually going.
By reading and hi-lighting an outline of the class, you will get an idea of what is important. This will also be a good resource to consult during the year when you need to figure out how a certain case fits into the scheme of the class, or why the case is significant. Additionally, after you buy your textbooks, you should quickly review the table of contents provided in them. This will give you some insightful clues as to what will be covered in the course.
Plan 3- I’m a “bona fide” first year gunner:
For those who know they want to grade onto law review, the first two semesters of law school are critical. Because of that, new 1Ls with the gunner ambition need to have a solid understanding of what they face, before they face it. Ultimately, this requires you to learn much of what you are supposed to learn as a first semester 1L during the summer preceding that semester.
A great start would be to obtain the Bar/Bri materials for your state. These are the references many people use to decide what the black letter law actually is. Next, I would recommend you find out what text is being used by your professor and get the corresponding supplementary materials. This may end up only being a reference tool, but can help you understand the layout of the class as well as quickly brief cases in a pinch. Finally, you should talk to as many former and current students as possible to find out your professors’ tactics for recitation and how they structure their final exam. You may want to tailor the course outline you make to the style of the exam being administered by that professor.
A thorough reading of supplementary materials and former students’ outlines will give you a good idea of the content of the class. I would also begin outlining the course yourself by taking the table of contents to the text and typing it into an outline form. From this, you can add in more specific things that the professor says throughout the semester. To get a good reading of the materials for each class, it will probably take one to two solid weeks preparation per course. Though this amounts to almost the full summer’s worth of preparation time, it could really provide the edge needed to be a top 10% student.
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