The Legendary Finals of Law School

I am now approaching what is my second round of finals in law school, and the observations have been incredibly interesting in terms of what the human experience can go through. I have seen in this short time ) of studying, people break down crying, grown men look defeated,and a general sense of doom and gloom hovers throughout my school.

It only makes me wonder where this feeling of dread came from. I wonder, but I don’t believe I need to wonder too hard. Law school is a different beast. You’re told constantly that law school is unlike anything people have encountered, and it is proving to be true right in front of my eyes.

In undergrad, students would spend the entire semester sleep walking through class and eventually end up at finals cramming every bit of knowledge into their brains only to regurgitate the information on the final. If you majored in a humanities program such as I did, you would learn the more you write, the better your grade. That was the simple truth of undergrad; law school however, not so much.

So far, in my young studies of law, I have found what is most beneficial is to approach the semester from day one as if you’re studying for the final exam. Which means flash cards from the beginning, even if you only have a couple rules. It means you have to begin thinking about essay writing for each subject early. Preparing for the actual art of taking an exam is equally if not more important than memorization.

You can memorize every word of every rule, statute, Federal Rule of Civil Procedure, every Restatement; it won’t mean anything if come finals time, you can’t apply it. That’s what I see now. Students are spending countless hours memorizing. They cram every piece of information into their brain as if that will give them a good grade. I can hear it now next semester; “But I remembered every rule verbatim!”. Sadly, remembering does not get you by in law school.

No, it’s actually doing the problems that will help. So what if you don’t remember the exact rule for Conversion? If you’re professor sees you understand and say it in your own words, you’re getting points. The difference is knowing in the fact pattern what is substantial interference to mean conversion and interference to mean trespass to chattel. Lawyers are not auto-bots who spit out endless rules on any subject. That’s what books and Lexis Nexis are for. They remember the rules, you apply the rules.

If you are prospective law student, my advice is this, start studying early. Don’t wait until December to go to your professor about writing essays. Go to him week 3 of school. You’ll get ripped apart, but you’ll be far ahead of the pack who waited until the last minute. Remember your rules in November, and start practicing 2nd to last week of November. Get stuff done, the final is everything, don’t let it eat you alive. Because waiting until Dead Week is like learning every rule in baseball but never picking up a bat before the big game.

#wedding