YOUR advice for prospective law students

[yara]

Don't do drugs!

[LostMyMonkeys]

I'll second what a lot of people have said so far... don't get caught up in the BS too much. Figure out a study plan that helps you learn the law, not just memorize the facts. Learn early one what is 'material' in a case and don't worry about the other stuff. It will help yoube able to brief your cases more quickly. I don't think its wise as a 1L not to brief cases, but I also don't think you need to have long drawn out briefs. Lots of times I just write a paragraph or 2 in my own words of what happened in the case (rather than parsing out who the parties are, the facts, the hodling, etc in separate headings). The point of a brief is to be able to pull out the RELAVANT information to spit out to th professor to show you understand the case. For me, that means sometimes I can do that writng a paragraph full of fragmented and run on sentences.

Also, supplements....especially the E&E series, I can't stress their value enough. Those things are my bibles and because of them, I understand the material. I read the case book and half the time it doesn't make any damn sense, no matter how many times I read it, but if I have read the E&E on that topic beforehand, I can breaze through the cases because I know what the concepts are they are talking about. I have a bunch of classmates who insist they don't have the time to read the supplements, but seriously, it is way worth it. If reading them (which doesn't take nearly the time reading the case book does) helps you understand the material so that you only have to read the casebook once, rather than 4 times, then it's worth it.
My Crim Law one and my Property one are my bibles becasue those professors tend to each much more esoteric theory rather than BLL in class, so the supps give me the BLL.

Oh, and if you have been a paralegal since God was a kid, please please please do not think that makes you smarter than the professor and try to prove them wrong EVERY DAY. And please, if you MUST raise your hand, please do not preface every statement with the words "At the law firm I work at we had this case where...". Trust me, no matter how much paralegal experience you have, I guarantee you the Professor knows more than you do. Guranfuckingtee it. Please...just don't be that guy...

Ok, mini rant over..

[jimmyjohn]

[quote author=LostMyMonkeys link=topic=3744.msg26504#msg26504 date=1140007378

Oh, and if you have been a paralegal since God was a kid, please please please do not think that makes you smarter than the professor and try to prove them wrong EVERY DAY. And please, if you MUST raise your hand, please do not preface every statement with the words "At the law firm I work at we had this case where...". Trust me, no matter how much paralegal experience you have, I guarantee you the Professor knows more than you do. Guranf**ckingtee it. Please...just don't be that guy...

Ok, mini rant over..
[/quote]

Very true, this is quite annoying. I'll also expand on it and say don't preface your remarks with anything.  In particular don't say "This might be a dumb question but..."  This means that whatever you are about to say is almost certainly a waste of everyone's time, including your own and you would be better off either not saying it, or not prefacing it so that people honestly think you're confused rather than just trying to carry on a conversation with the prof.

[Senior Belding]

My advice:

Take jd2b's advice and repeat it ad nausem. Dont worry about not knowing minute details during interrogation. 90% of the people in alw school are liberal arts majors who were BORN to regurgitate facts.

[antwan]

Keep class participation to a minimum. Only speak when the prof asks a q and u have the answer. Dont offer your opinion on anything cause noone really could care less. Ive noticed a direct corellaton between how much you talk in class and how much you will be despised and mercelessly ridiculed by your classmates. Besides, class participation and preparation have no impact on grades. The people i know who wrote holmesean briefs and kissed the profs ass were all dissapointed with their grades. Its all about the BLL and applying it on the exams..period!

[shao2007]

Live the law school life

Get up do some studying.
Go to class.
Do some more studying
A stiff drink to get to bed.
And somewhere in between that throw in 2-3 hours of working out or sex or both.

And Don't listen to teachers during the first weeks of school that tell you the commercial outlines are useless and not worth it. Only do that if you want to get good grades and have no life but be a teacher like them.
BLL and IRAC is what will get the good grades.

[eray01]

And please don't ask questions in class that you could answer on your own with a couple minutes of thought about what the prof just said.

Speaking of people who talk to much; In one of my classes we place bets before class with a classmate "Bookie" on how many times this particularly annoying girl in the front row is going to speak.

[CoxlessPair]

*

[BigPimpinBU]

Find an undergrad pre-law (find the pre-law Phi Alpha Delta chapter) who is just star struck with an older guy (of course this assumes you are a guy).

...genius...

[stuvxyz]

You have something against self-sacrifcing whores?