Specific Areas of Study

[justGem]

Forgive me if a similar thread has already been created in the past...

When lawyers that I know find out that I will be attending law school this fall I'm immediately asked what specific area of law I want to study (Answer: Intellectual Property, Media and Information Law). Yet, my answer is usually met with a dismissive "You'll probably change your mind when you get there," etc.

OLs: What area of law do you want to concentrate on? Are you also told that you'll change your mind?
1Ls-3Ls: Just how true have you found the aforementioned statement? Did you start law school with one specialty in mind and completely changed course?

<---0L.
The short term goal is to work in biotech/biologics development, either patent filings (USPTO) or BLA filings (CBER/FDA)...not sure yet. In either case I want to start off working for bigPharma but eventually switch sides and either have some involvement with policy change regarding biogenerics or human subjects protection.

I've never encountered the "you'll change your mind" response. But perhaps it's because my goals are not too specific at this point.

[A.]

No, it's b/c yours don't sound as naive.

Lol I thought you were a rising 2L!

[justGem]

No, it's b/c yours don't sound as naive.

Lol I thought you were a rising 2L!

Would be but I deferred last year  But it was well worth it

[cui bono?]

I changed my mind.  I thought I'd like anything to do with contracts. I thought surely that's easy stuff-  either it's a K or it isn't. But I'm really very rule oriented so I did well in courses like civ pro, crim pro, and evidence.  I hated contracts class.  I really want to be in a courtroom.      But I still don't know enough yet to truly know what it is that I want to do.  

[Young Esq.]

Mine changed.  I was a business and tech major but I really fell in love with the process and rules of litigation, so I'm focused on trial practice.

[OES_Tiff]

I went into law school wanting to go into IP and Entertainment.  Now I want to practice IP, Entertainment, and Civil Rights...oh and I'm considering Employment/Labor.  Now I'm interning in Personal Injury/Insurance and also at an Entertainment Law Firm.  I'm definitely going to pursue Entertainment.  I still don't like anything related to torts, lol.

[Statistic]

I thought I wanted to be an appellate litigator, or a trial litigator. Now I don't even wanna' take the bar let alone practice.

[SKW]

I thought I wanted to be an appellate litigator, or a trial litigator. Now I don't even wanna' take the bar let alone practice.

LMAO! That was so raw! I love it.

[Statistic]

what can I say. I keeps it hood. 

[jd06]

I'd reiterate what others have said - that law school will open up your eyes to areas of the law you might not even have thought about to this point.  I enjoyed law school - learning the law and studying the law - but really had no clue where I wanted to apply the knowledge until the very end.  I decided I didn't want to push paper at a desk, that I wanted to be in court, and that I wanted to work on compelling cases - the nitty gritty, real life stuff.  So I gravitated toward criminal and family law and now work exclusively in family law. So when people ask you, it's perfectly ok to say, "We'll see..."

And btw, every lawyer works in "constitutional law."  It permeates every area of practice.  For example, in my practice I'm concerned with the fundamental right to parent.  Bear in mind, however, that most of the constitutional issues you'll encounter have already been addressed and codified under the law, e.g. procedural due process is taken care of in the Code of Civil Procedure which provides for certain steps to ensure that opposing party is noticed and has the opportunity to be heard.  Of course, when you say "constitutional law" you probably mean "civil rights," which is simply enforcing personal rights as set forth in the Bill of Rights.