grad school

by John Doe 13 Replies latest jw friends

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  eclipse

  You will blow their minds, John. Congrats
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  lonelysheep

  Congratulations, John!!
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  John Doe

  Thanks everyone! Here's a letter I wrote to a friend concerning my first day. Don't know if you'll find it interesting or not, but I sure do! ;-)

  Well, I know you're interested in law school, so I thought I'd describe what the first day was like. There were 149 expected to show up, and 147 did show up. The group was young, intelligent, and enthusiastic, and I had forgotten what the atmosphere of a good college course is like. Everyone was excited to be there, and everyone was enthusiastic.

  More than one speaker made a comment about how friendly everyone always is the first day, but that it would change next week as the Socratic method and the "drilling" begins. Students are called upon randomly in class, and everyone is expected to know the discussion and have prepared the night before. Believe it or not, we actually had a 2 1/2 legal research and writing course today, and everyone was called on specifically to participate.

  The amount of nervousness and uncertainly was unmistakable, but oddly enough, I did not feel intimidated at any time. Everyone at this point is on a level playing field, and all I have to do is work hard to keep up with my peers. I really think I'm going to enjoy the course material.

  This group is of a completely different type of group than any I've ever been associated with. Everyone acts professionally, and everyone is treated as peers. I personally spoke with the dean of admissions, and he was talking about some of their recent donations. A '97 or '98 alumni has donated $1,000,000 to the remodeling. I had the distinct impression that the dean was already recruiting for more donations by being extraordinarily friendly. The amount of money some of these guys makes boggles my mind.

  To my incredible surprise, the dean called me by name as I walked up when I've never even met the guy. The only way he would know who I was is by the required personal photo everyone sends in. I was shocked to say the least. He has been at the law school for nearly 30 years, so he was around when the Clintons were there. He is also one of Lou Hardin's classmates. Much ado was made about the current stars in politics that are alumni. I can't help but feel I'm part of something important as I look prospectively around at my student peers. I'm thinking I made the right choice in coming.

  The president of the Arkansas bar association was a speaker, hilarious and congenial. He left me with a quote that I think will be a good thing to live by: "prioritize the dreads." How true! Do what we dread doing first, and we won't be putting things off and dragging the dreading on. ;-)

  My legal research and writing professor was quirky and interesting. She was an English major/journalism minor, and I'm not quite sure what to make of her. I took one sentiment from her though that I'm sure you'll appreciate. She said that her student's best papers are the ones with the most marks on them. About all she says on the bad papers is that the student needs to spend more time, and we should take a paper that is marked all to hell as a compliment--a sign that she is taking us seriously and is devoting effort into the grading. Incidentally, in all but the writing course, the grading is done by number. No one writes their name on papers, instead we write a random number we are assigned. The professor then assigns grades to the numbers and another person matches the numbers to student names. This serves to eliminate bias.

  Another interesting feature of today's class was the weight of precedence and evidence to courts. For precedence to be binding, the precedent must have been set by an equal or higher court in the hierarchical system, holds much more weight if it's of a recent time period, has to be from a court in the same jurisdiction. In other words, Missouri common law has little bearing on Arkansas case law. Also, there is a constant power play between the judiciary and legislative functions of states, and the last one to have made holdings in a case is the one that should be used. It gets amazingly complicated.
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  Twitch

  Good luck John.

  You'll do well.