Law School Zone

Finding An ABA Approved Law School

admin — Mon, 25 Apr 2011 00:00:00 +0000

With over 200 institutions approved by the American Bar Association (ABA), finding an ABA approved law school can be an overwhelming task when considering public or private law schools. Here are some tips in making a life decision to obtaining a “Juris Doctor” (JD) degree.

As the cost of education continues to rise, finding an ABA approved law school in some geographic locations will have some effect on the educational costs. So will the legacy of schools in both the private and public sectors of educational law. Admissions into ABA approved law schools have specific requirements for completion, before the student pursues a post JD and non JD programs.

Students considering a career in law need to plan and prepared in finding an ABA approved law school. ABA accredited law schools require a bachelor’s degree, a satisfactory score on the Law School Admission Test (LSAT) and many require three years of legal study to complete a JD degree.

The school’s assessment of the student’s academic and personal motivation can impact the decision process. The student should research the selected school and compile an accurate breakdown of the school’s admission requirements. In some cases the school may request the student submit as essay to justify the application, welcome to the law.

You’ve Chosen To Study Law, Now Which School Will You Choose?

admin — Mon, 11 Apr 2011 00:00:00 +0000

The decision to become a lawyer is a great one. This is a profession that is expected to have many job opportunities available and is also very lucrative. In order for a person to get the most out of his or her law career, he or she will have attend a great law school. Some of the key things to look at when choosing a law school include: rankings, bar exam pass rate and tuition.

It is important to employers that prospective employees graduate from a notable law school. That is why it is best, if possible, to choose a law school that has a high ranking. This will ensure that a person gets a top flight education and is prepared to practice law upon graduation. Another important thing to look at when choosing a law school is the bar exam pass rate. The bar exam is a test that everyone must take before being allowed to practice law. The bar exam pass rate is a good indication of how well the faculty and staff prepare their students.

There is no such thing as a cheap law school, but some are more expensive than others. For that reason, tuition should be looked at before choosing a school.

Preparing Yourself To Take The LSAT

admin — Wed, 30 Mar 2011 00:00:00 +0000

When preparing yourself to take the LSAT, the first step is to get a quality study book from one of the major publishers. You should take the pre-test before you delve into the subject matter in order to see where your weaknesses and strengths are. There are three primary sections to the test: logical games, logical reasoning and reading comprehension. Make sure that you focus on which area you are having the most trouble with, but leave enough time to practice on your strengths as well.

Establish a set time to study for the test each day and work slowly through the sections. When you come to the point where you can take one of the practice tests, analyze it afterwards to see where you can improve. Taking as many practice tests as possible before the real thing will help you to know how to pace your work and attack the problems. If you are able, signing up for an LSAT training course can be extremely useful. These classes will give you test taking strategies, ways to solve the problems and help you to focus your study. The last consideration is to give yourself plenty of lead time to prepare.

Law School Lifestyle Practical Tips

www.lawschoolzone.com — Sun, 30 Jan 2011 00:00:00 +0000

Law school may still be considered college, but it’s far from your average undergrad experience. In order to succeed in law school, most aspiring legal eagles will have change the habits they’ve built over the past 4 years. Though it obviously takes a track record of success to gain admission into law school, sustaining this unique environment of law school requires a skill set and self-discipline to match the standard class structure. In law school, exams count for significantly more than you’re the average course, with few, if any, other assignments to balance out the grade book. As a result, this places a significant amount of stress on students during the weeks approaching mid-terms and finals, particularly brutal for those who have not stuck to their preparation schedule and kept up with readings throughout the year. In many cases, such holes are too deep for even intelligent minds to climb out of. Here are a few practical suggestions to alter your day-to-day non-school related activities to better cater to a law school lifestyle:Center Entertainment around Coursework As an undergrad, many students try to fit school work into a busy social calendar. In law school, students should try to fit leisure in around the syllabus and study time. It is probably best to limit “going out” to strictly weekends, and not every weekend, while also no longer catering to weekly TV lineups. Of course, all work all the time will drive even the driven into a dark state of mind. It’s recommended to continue low-involvement diversion such as TV viewing (in moderation, mind you), but only when the time permits. DVR recorders can be of great aide to law students, offered for free with most DIRECT TV and DISH plans, or Netflix is always an option for movie buffs as well.Wake Up Early On Weekends It may seem self-loathing to suggest, considering law students work all week and study late into the night, one might surmise the weekend is a time for rest in a literal sense. It is far better to build habits of waking early, even if you don’t hit the books first thing Saturday morning. Conditioning your body to be less sleep dependent will help to fit more productive in the hours you are awake, not to mention early-risers operate on an extended time frame with more hours in the day.Live with Fellow Law Students or Live Alone Often times, no matter how well current roommates get along, a change in academic setting should coincide with a change in residence. In fact, getting along can be part of the problem. Watching one roommate continue to go out and live a laidback life by comparison can siphon motivation and/or serve as a distraction, as there will be temptation to pal around at times a law student should still be burning the oil. Remember, it’s not as if you are moving away and saying goodbye to a friend, merely relocating down the street or across town at the furthest.

A Look Ahead: What to Expect Semester 1

www.lawschoolzone.com — Mon, 13 Dec 2010 00:00:00 +0000

You’re finally starting your first day of law school. You’ve been accepted to the school of your choice and are on the fast track to a happy, successful career. About time all that nerve-wracking hard work is over. If your thought process resembles anything close to the previous statement it’s time you go ahead and tuck your undergraduate diploma between your legs and go back to the open job market from whence you came. Law school is a arduously tough and competitive process, the first semester of which is designed to hit you like a brick. What can you do to ease the pain? (Because yes, there will be pain)Allot time nightly You aren’t an undergraduate anymore. This means you can’t simply skate by and expect to catch up on your reading and memorize a few key facts the night before, heck, even the month before test time. In order to succeed you will need to get in the habit of disciplined study. As many law schools determine grades solely on end of semester exams, the temptation to procrastinate may be great, which is why strong-willed students fair best.Prepare to be called on Skipping class, even larger lectures simply won’t pass the muster like it did in say, Intro to Macro Economics. Furthermore, law classes often operate under the Socratic method, emphasizing student participation and response. This means you will be called out in front of the class, without raising your hand, and be expended to answer the question with a reasonable, well thought out response. Meet people Law school is a place of hard work, but also a place to get to know likeminded, driven individuals who can be valuable connections not only in setting the course for your career, but getting through a hectic academic calendar and developing lifelong friendships. After all, law school is an awful lot of work, but in addition to the tools it takes to become a great legal mind, you can hopefully walk out with esteemed personal relationships as well.

Online Law Schools: Real or Racket?

www.lawschoolzone.com — Wed, 04 Aug 2010 19:41:46 +0000

Just type in “law school” in any search engine and you are sure to be swarmed with sponsored links offering you the opportunity to earn your law degree “100 Online,” through a process described as “Fast & Easy!” Compared with the horror stories of full nights spent wired on caffeine in law libraries and teachers publicly embarrassing ill prepared students, earning a law degree from the comfort of your own home seems like the perfect solution to sidestep the stresses plaguing most traditional law students across the country. But bear in mind, picking a law school is an important life decision that will play a major role in your future prospects, much like picking a long term significant other. As some of you may have found out through failed relationships, picking the fastest and the easiest option might be fun for the short term, but has serious drawbacks not too far down the line. After all, practicing law is a particularly time consuming and tedious endeavor, it’s highly unlikely taking exams in your pajamas could adequately prepare you for the strenuous nature of the profession, or even to pass the bar for that matter.Whether an online degree would even qualify you sit for the bar is an entirely different question. 49 of 50 states will not allow online law school graduates to take the test, with California serving as the sole exception. You cannot become a practicing lawyer without passing the bar, so for prospective students outside of California and unwilling to relocate after graduation, online law school is not a realistic option. One option is to practice law in California for 5 to 7 years, as some states will allow online law grads to take the bar in their state after gaining adequate real world lawyer experience. Still, online law degrees offer very limited options, as employers will know your degree is not accredited by the American Bar Association (no online law degrees are), so you shouldn’t expect to be seriously considered for competitive higher-paying positions.

Are Law School Students in Trouble?

www.lawschoolzone.com — Tue, 13 Jul 2010 15:58:25 +0000

With the suffering job market a byproduct of the economic recession, law schools across the country are seeing more and more applications flooding their admissions offices. For many college graduates, impending unemployment or the dire prospect of living at home is enough to at least thinking get them thinking about spending a few more years in post-graduate education. Law school, though not easy to get in to by any means, is more open to applicants of any educational background as opposed to say medical school, generally only admitting students with science heavy course history. Prospective law school students are judged primarily by their LSAT scores, many believing the test constitutes approximately 75 of an acceptance decision. Certainly at Ivy Leagues and other top flight law schools this is less the case, as they can afford to be more selective, but the general perception is that if you do well on your LSAT you can go to law school. It might not be Harvard, but it’s still a Juris Doctor degree, which will give you employment options.This perception, whether correct or not, is sending an unprecedented number of incoming first year law students to campuses across the country at a time when the legal service sector of the economy is in less demand. In three years, when these law students hit the job market again, there is a very good chance there will be a surplus of would-be lawyers, leaving many graduates jobless and in several thousand dollars worth of debt. Furthermore, the job dearth that currently exists for grads entering the workforce is sending many kids to law school for the wrong reasons. Law school is a tough racket. For those who enter with a lack of dedication or even a sense of apathy towards their chosen course of study, chances of success are low, potentially wasting a semester or two (and the according tuition) before deciding to call it quits. Surely though, students who work hard and have both natural aptitude and a genuine interest in the law will always have a place in the law profession.

Getting the Best Value out of a Law School

www.lawschoolzone.com — Tue, 13 Jul 2010 15:57:07 +0000

Law school can be a pricey endeavor, though the cost of post graduate education does not always match the reward reaped. There are quite simply a lot of different law school options out there, with many topping the 40,000 dollar a year tuition mark. Tuition typically varies depending on the overall prestige of the law school itself. Whether or not the institution is public or private might also have a large bearing over its cost to attend, with public schools generally providing cheaper alternatives. Due to the high costs, it might be best for some prospective students who already know what field of law they want to practice to seek out programs at universities that aren’t as highly ranked on the whole. Here is a look at some of the elite law specialties housed less expensive, albeit less renowned schools.Stetson University in Florida offers the best Trial Advocacy law school in the country, while sporting just a whopping 102^nd overall ranking from U.S. News and World Report in 2009. Only slightly out done, the school’s legal writing program is ranked 6^th. Despite its low cumulative ranking, specialty students graduating from Stetson in these two fields are very competitive with bigger name law school grads and in significantly less debt. Full year tuition to Stetson is currently just over 31,000 in debt, a bargain among law schools, albeit still a lot of money.The University of Missouri ranked 2^nd overall in Dispute Resolution in 2009, well ahead of its recently dropped overall rank, tying in that distinction with a little place called Harvard Law you might have heard of it. On the downside, while a Mizzou law degree is highly regarded inside the Show-Me State, it will lose a little traction once you travel beyond Kansas City and St. Louis. Still, for around 15,000 in-state or just over 28,000 out-of-state, it’s a great buy for those looking to stay around the area.The University of Florida boasted the 2 Tax Law program in the country as compared to its 48^th overall ranking. Like the University of Missouri, Florida offers a high end education within its specialty field at a public school discount. For in-state students annual tuition is barely over 14,000, though it jumps to almost 35,000 for out-of-state students.

Breaking down the LSAT

admin — Tue, 13 Jul 2010 15:56:33 +0000

The Law School Admissions Test is administered 4 times a year at designated test sites worldwide. The standardized test is highly regarded by a consensus of legal professionals and law school admissions offices, believed to be the most accurate quantifiable assessment solution for predicting a student’s success both in Law School and later on the bar exam. Unlike GPAs, which can be inflated or deflated depending on the quality of undergraduate institution attended and the course of study completed, the LSAT presents every test taker with the same types of challenging questions, derived from the natural skill set necessary to make an effective attorney.The test is comprised of five 35-minute multiple choice section, 25 questions each. Only four of the total five completed sections actually go towards the final score, with the remaining section, commonly referred to as the “variable section,” being used for analytical and pretesting purposes by test officials. The test concludes with an additional 35 minute writing section, which also remains ungraded, however writing samples will be included when scores are sent out to schools the student has applied to. The graded portion of the test features three different types of multiple choice questions, each assessing different qualities believed to precede a promising legal career.The Reading Comprehension questions require test takers to review long, complex materials and insightfully pick out the most important points and answer follow-up questions accordingly. This indicates a potential law student’s ability to accurately interpret the large amounts of tedious legal documents they will encounter in law school.The Analytical Reasoning questions feature sets of statements, rules and principles with from which relationships much be accurately deduced between relevant people, places and things. This section serves as a window into a law student’s legal problem solving ability.The Logical Reasoning questions focus on a prospective students thought process. Through a series of “ordinary language” readings each presenting different arguments, test takers show off their ability to critically evaluate points, support conclusions and make balanced comparative judgments.

Tips to Approaching the LSAT

admin — Tue, 13 Jul 2010 15:55:39 +0000

For prospective law school students, the LSAT, or Law School Admission Test, is the most important assessment they will come across in their educational careers, perhaps only rivaled by the bar exam upon completion of their education. An extremely high LSAT score can erase slightly low GPA’s, underwhelming extracurricular activities and even mild character issues in one fell swoop, in some cases giving mildly lackluster students second life. Even undergraduates at the top of their class should be intimidated by the influence the LSAT has over their post-graduate options. Just as easily as it can make a decent application into a great one, a poor score can turn excellent into mediocre as well. Keep these tips in mind as you approach the big test date because you can never be too prepared for such an important crossroads.Study Hard the First Time Though you can retake the LSAT, approach the test as if there were no tomorrow. Students who play it by ear, looking at their first LSAT as a practice run, often either do not score well and get discouraged, or score higher than expected and do not take the test again. For students with unexpectedly high scores, they are limiting their long term potential by selling themselves short, thus settling for less in terms of the quality law of school they might attend.Sign Up for a Prep Class A lot of students think they can do their own preparation work with just a book and a desk. Unless you are very naturally gifted and disciplined, budgeting time consistently in the months leading up to the exam, many test takers are disappointed with their self-tutored results. A class allows you to stick to a set out plan, proven to work by years of legal minds before you, without having to interpret your own strategies for a test you’ve never personally taken.Cramming Does Not Work No matter what kind of questionable study habits may have served you well in your undergraduate studies, waiting until the last minute before the LSAT is the kiss of death. The test is not built around memorization or formulas; it requires you to learn how to think in a way that may seem unnatural, which cannot be accomplished overnight.