The Racism Issue

[Lawprofessor]

Racism manifests itself in many different ways...from not giving out outlines to minorities, to keeping study techniques from minorities, to excluding minorities from get togethers, to outright hostility and being upfront about it.  Of course like most places in society it is much more subtle than it used to be.  Each individual deals with it in their own way, but one way is to have the support of minority professors, administrators and students/organizations.  If you dont feel like it is you against the school, it makes it a little easier to deal with it.  I hope that is a straight answer, but it is a hard question to answer because it is different for everyone and everyone handles it differently.

So what do you recommend for minorities going to law school this year on predominantly white campuses?  What if you don’t have many minority law professors or administrative staff to reach out to?

Wow, there really are black people in Nebraska.  Well, there has to be a BLSA at your school.  Lean on them, that is one of the things they are there for.  Unless you are going to say you dont have a BLSA.  I am sorry to hear about your situation.  How bad is it?  Can you give me some examples of what is going on?

[Lawprofessor]

Join BLSA (Black Law Students Association) for starters.  Your school should have a chapter.  And even if there are not a lot of Fam at your school, BLSA is international.  You will meet a ton of Fam at the regional and National conventions.

http://www.nblsa.org

Secondly, hook up with upperclassmen. Most will take you under their wing b/c they've been thru what you are about to go thru and they can tell you which prof's to avoid and hook you up with outlines, supplimentals and all the other goodies that you are going to need.

Lastly, (although maybe this should come first) it may behoove you to look at the student body %'s of the law schools you are thinking about applying to BEFORE you apply to them.  I know for me personally, that was one of the main criteria I was looking at for law schools and I'm glad that I did because my class has been my biggest support base for going thru the law school grind.  Without them I don't know if I would be typing to you right now as a law student.

Good advice!

[CocoPuff]

Thank you professor for your answer.
Burning Sands: What school do you attend?

[Burning Sands, Esq.]

One type of racism that has ballooned lately on our college campuses is the incidences of black men having "relations" with white women between the hours of 1:00 am and 6:00 am and not speaking to said white women until the next late night encounter.  The self esteem of white women has suffered as they continue to be subjected to this discriminatory practice.  There are many questions surrounding this issue: Why are black girls allowed to eat with black guys in the dining hall and white girls cannot?  Why are black girls allowed to speak to black guys in public and white girls can't?  Why are black girls allowed to spend the night? Is this race-based discrimination? There is proposed legislation in the works to combat this growing phenomenon.  Penned by Lucious Leftfoot, the Booty-Call ACT is expected to be voted on within the next few weeks.  Write your congressman people.

I nominate this post for funniest post of 2005 to date

[Lawprofessor]

Thank you professor for your answer.
Burning Sands: What school do you attend?

You are very welcome, Christina...anytime.

[Omegaman]

Racism manifests itself in many different ways...from not giving out outlines to minorities, to keeping study techniques from minorities, to excluding minorities from get togethers, to outright hostility and being upfront about it.  Of course like most places in society it is much more subtle than it used to be.  Each individual deals with it in their own way, but one way is to have the support of minority professors, administrators and students/organizations.  If you dont feel like it is you against the school, it makes it a little easier to deal with it.  I hope that is a straight answer, but it is a hard question to answer because it is different for everyone and everyone handles it differently.

So what do you recommend for minorities going to law school this year on predominantly white campuses?  What if you don’t have many minority law professors or administrative staff to reach out to?

Wow, there really are black people in Nebraska.  Well, there has to be a BLSA at your school.  Lean on them, that is one of the things they are there for.  Unless you are going to say you dont have a BLSA.  I am sorry to hear about your situation.  How bad is it?  Can you give me some examples of what is going on?

Yeah we've all seen belly we know about Black folks in Nebraska
Peace I think one think that can help and sands can work on this is that I think Admissions Deans and such at law schools especially majority white one trying to increase diversity should all attend the NBLSA conference. I cant tell you how perceptions change about schools once you see them handle there business. I mean SMU was NBLSA chapter of the year, who would have thought that, and UVA, and I met many Ques from Oklahoma, despite haters like Sands asking folks, "There are Ques in law school? and many other school gave people a very good impression on how black folks work together in the tense environment of law school at a majority white school

[Burning Sands, Esq.]

Thank you professor for your answer.
Burning Sands: What school do you attend?

What you mean you're not going to thank me for my answer?   

[Burning Sands, Esq.]

Yeah we've all seen belly we know about Black folks in Nebraska

I take it back, this is now officially the funniest post for 2005 to date.

Yo Omega, for the last time man that wasn't me who asked about the Ques at the conference. You need to holla at ol' boy the Sigma.  Hey even you was impressed at how many Ques was in the house, so you know we was like   

But Omega makes some good points here.  When you get to your schools get them to take part in BLSA.  The conference was off the chain.

[_BP_]

Okay, I understand Sands take on this, it's definitely good to have the support of a strong black student body, no doubt.  I don't know if you want to make this a huge deciding factor though.  I can only speak for myself and on my undergrad experience.  I went to the lilliest white undergrad.  The black population was less than 3%, and the school was in a one-traffic light, hick town, so I have had my share of experiences.  This helped to prepare me for the real world though, I think.  I grew accustomed to being the only black person in 90% of my upper-level classes and having to spit real talk to students giving presentations where they quote the "President of Africa" and his take on African literacy rates...hahahah.  And now, I'm the only black in my department at work (and I had 4 years of college to prepare me for this) and I have to explain to my manager that Columbians do not cook "Mexican" food. Well to cut to the chase, the racial make up (good or bad, depending on who you ask) in law school, will likely to be a mirror of the real world and help prepare you for how things are going to be when you start firm life.  Unless ofcourse you go to an HBCU and work for a black law firm when you are finished. 

[Burning Sands, Esq.]

Yeah I went to the University of Kansas for undergrad....


...so....


...yeah. You can imagine the black % left something to be desired.  But it was definitely a dose (or overkill) of reality what lay ahead in corporate america.

So to clarify, the black % wasn't the ONLY factor of picking a law school, but you better believe it was in my top 5!!!