First Year of Law School
There's not much I'd change about my first year of law school.
It was, I think, the best year of education for me.
I loved every second, well, except for contracts.
If you want to love your first year, here's what I recommend:
⭐ Set a schedule and stick to it. Treat law school like a job, put in the hours, and then go home. If you finish early one day, great, go for a walk, run errands, take a nap. If you have to stay late one day, great, do it--with the confidence that other slower days will come and you'll get a break then.
⭐ Take breaks--have fun, even. I was a very serious student--from a very early age through undergrad. Then I taught 5th grade, in rural Arizona, and my perspective on a lot of things really shifted. When I returned to school--to law school--I had a new appreciation for being a student and the freedom of being a student. I relished in the learning. I relished even more in the time I had. You will not get this time back, so use it. Use it like I describe above, but also use it to have fun--whatever that is for you. You deserve it.
⭐ Make friends. My law school friends are my best friends in life. I still keep up with many of them--some of them daily (hey Will Egen--although he keeps up with all of us, I think). I struggled with balancing school and friendships in undergrad. I learned from that and relied on these relationships to get through what is otherwise a pretty intense experience.
⭐ Remember: a bad grade isn't the end of anything. First-semester contracts was my worst grade in law school (by a lot). Yet, today, I basically litigate contracts for a living. I was lucky to have been knocked down a peg in undergrad (two pretty horrible grades (calculus and economics)), so I'd been through this before. But, there's something to be said for teaching styles and how our minds work. Not every class, not every professor will click for you. That's okay. Learn from the bumps and press on.
Now, having said all that, I have a caveat:
⭐ Do you. Experiment. Figure out what works for you and what doesn't. Try to avoid mimicking what others do. Instead, focus on you, trust your gut, and push forward, making adjustments as needed. No one knows what you need and what works for your more than you do.
What other advice would you give to first-year law students?
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