Things you wish you would have known...

[benny149]

what things do you all wish you would have known going into law school? any specific books you wish you would have read that helped for exams? any advice would be great!

[TDJD84]

I recommend Law School Confidential.  It is a pretty good read, discussing the inns and outs of law school.  Definetly get a laptop with as much RAM as possible, and buy the best warranty plan you can get!

[UHLAW09]

Ditto on that warranty. I would even suggest a "tough box" those laptops that can be dropped, spilled on etc.(Although I have no idea how much those costs). My laptop starting messing up right as the warranty expired. Make sure you have a good laptop, you'll want it.

[Bob Loblaw Esq.]

I recommend Law School Confidential.  It is a pretty good read, discussing the inns and outs of law school.  Definetly get a laptop with as much RAM as possible, and buy the best warranty plan you can get!

Law school confidential is trash.  Well, maybe not trash, but its pretty lame.  I would reccomend Planet Law School, I read both, and if you really want to learn about law school, PLS is where its at.  LSC gives you lame suggestion like how to set your study area up.  PLS give you the down and dirty about how to prep, study, hypos etc...  But if you read PLS, read it early, its hefty and has a lot of things that you mkay want to consider months before you start ls in the fall.

[jacy85]

Just as a warning re: PLS.  Don't buy into it right away.  Go flip through it in the library.  The author has some pretty embittered views about law school.  His idea of "prepping" for law school is slaving away for 6 months (or more...I don't remember) reading through supplements and other crap.

Not all of it is BS, there is some good stuff in there.  But go read through it at the library, take it with a HUGE grain of salt, and remember that probably the majority of law students that do well didn't buy into Atticus Falcon's hysteria.

[UChi2L]

Here is an excellent article written by Dahlia Lithwick, so I suppose it's double advice.  Read this column, and start reading Slate.com if you want to be able to keep up in discussions/interviews with other legal types.

http://www.slate.com/?id=2069512

[benny149]

very good article!....I actually read law school confidential, but I don't know how good his idea of briefing with highlighters is...I just think typing them out will work better for me, but to each his own.

[LegalLatin78]

Very good article UChi2L.  Sent it to some friends who are starting law school in the fall.

[rhombot]

what things do you all wish you would have known going into law school?

legal skills class is much more important than the number of credits suggests.

[GA-fan]

1/3 of the class gave up before they got here. And they don't want to be lawyers. They just didn't know what else to do.
And, force yourself to be the outgoing one during orientation that meets everyone. It's the last time you'll see most of the ones not in your section until 2L. Very few students took the initiative to meet classmates not sitting at their table the first day, and I remember every one of them. Perhaps it's just a self-selective personality thing though, because the most outgoing tend to be the most social and popular in general. Be one of these people!

And one more: try not to walk in the first day thinking how you stack up to the rest of the class. It will screw with your head.