Riddle Wrapped Inside a Puzzle in an Enigma
I'm off to see the Churchill War Rooms and some other kickass W. European sites. Since Most of the action right now is with the rising 2Ls (ex 1L? Who the fu*k says that?), this is an open thread for all that's going on. CLR rejections, OCIP bids, etc.
Other classes, incoming 1Ls and 3Ls applying for clerkships or looking to explore the bay area now that you have nothing to do, are welcome to post here also to make the rising 2Ls even more miserable. Lot's of luck. I'd especially recommend reading this post by Disco Stu re OCIP.
Other classes, incoming 1Ls and 3Ls applying for clerkships or looking to explore the bay area now that you have nothing to do, are welcome to post here also to make the rising 2Ls even more miserable. Lot's of luck. I'd especially recommend reading this post by Disco Stu re OCIP.
Labels: Grades And Other Neurotic Bullshit, Kevin Smith, OCIP/Employment
posted by Armen Adzhemyan at 9:43 AM
102 Comments:
anyone know what the timeline is for CLR? still not heard anything...
haven't heard either
I'm guessing those of us who haven't heard yet might be waiting for a "we had many qualified candidates..." letter
I got the formal acceptance letter from CLR in the mail today. If you haven't heard, you probably will soon.
Best of luck!
P.S. If you didn't get accepted, take solace in the fact that you don't have to spend your last Saturday of summer holed in some room learning all the ins and outs of the CLR editing process.
This comment has been removed by the author.
Speaking of enigmas, does anyone know if there is a unofficial class enrollment webpage for Fall 2007?
This is the kind of useful information that would be...um...useful for people who are changing their classes. Or finally enrolling.
Sidebar Mike M. Or here.
BTW, has anyone else gone on an end-of-account Lexis binge? I was lonely in the lab today...
ok, i'll bite: have ANY rising 2Ls heard back yet about their application for california residency??
About residency... I never got a letter or an email, but my status changed, as did the amount that I was billed by the school. Pretty sweet surprise.
Is anyone else boycotting classes with take-home exams this semester? I had my first last semester and hated it. Nearly died!
Anybody know anything about the First Amendment class with Cole?
if you are dying on take-home exams, you are working too hard.
has anyone gotten rejections from CLR via [snail] mail?
i dont have access to my mail, so i'm wondering still what's going on...
I'm sorry to tell you, but if you have not been called re: CLR, you have not gotten on. The rejection letters have been mailed. Sorry.
Fair enough. But why not just send an e-mail? I'm sure I'm not the only one who is not near their mailbox right now. It's not like this is a letter we'll save or anything.
According to the course updates, some classes have been canceled (e.g. Fed Courts with Mishkin). I never received an email from the registrar notifying me that some of the classes I'm registered for have been canceled.
So check the course updates to make sure your classes are still being offered. And urge the registrar to add more courses to replace the ones they canceled.
"Urge the registrar to replace canceled classes"
Genius
I suppose you want Mary Keller-Jones teaching Federal Courts. I'm sure shes both qualified and scintillating to listen too
5:39 - your literal interpretation of 5:35's post is cute and frightening at the same time.
I would encourage 1Ls (and 2Ls) to make an activity log with a brief description of the assignments and work you completed over the summer.
First, it will be a useful refresher during OCIP, as you'll probably be asked about the work you did this summer. But more importantly, it will come in handy for future reference. I'm in the process of applying for various fellowships and clerkships, and my supervisor from last summer (who's providing a reference letter) asked me to draft the letter for him to sign. Well, damned if I can remember what highly important memos and briefs I drafted were about. I then remembered that I had kept an activity log and was able to write my LOR from that.
What do you do if your activity log only includes...
Watching Simpsons
Playing Beer Pong
Trying to find the Paris Hilton Sex tape for free (Failing and touching yourself to still photos of Paris Hilton totally clothed but seen through a night vision lens)
Playing more beer pong, but alone
On applying to judges for clerkships: How many is too many?
I don't get the "too many" judges thing. Everyone talks about how insanely competitive it is to get a clerkship and encourages us to "apply broadly," then all of a sudden we're supposed to apply to only 50 judges? I don't think so. You don't have any shot if you don't apply.
In case you didn't realize it already, the poster at 9:38 is crazy.
12:16: 9:38 here. I know I'm crazy, but I didn't think that it was evident from my post. I thought it was a useful tip.
Right, but people shouldn't be stressing if they aren't crazy and haven't been putting together spreadsheets about everything they've done this summer.
I applied to around 60 to 70 judges. My criterion: apply to every judge I would be willing to work for instead of working at the firm for a year. I imagined: what if I got an offer from this judge? Then, would I prefer firm work or this offer? For everyone that I imagined I would prefer, I put them on the list. That seemed like a reasonable way to make a list to me.
rising 2L here. what hoops do I need to jump through to do OCIP?
I never suggested making a spreadsheet of summer assignments. I just suggested jotting down what you've worked on this summer, because it may come up in the future.
-9:38
Speaking of OCIP, can we 3Ls out the firms who claim to have given more offers than they actually gave last year?
Yes. They need to be outed.
Mishkin's fed courts class cancelled? If you were enrolled, consider that a blessing . . . .
RE: clerkships. I agree with Tom that you should apply to as many judges as you can possibly imagine yourself working for. The amount of time to do an extra application is so much less than the time you'll spend researching judges now to find out whether you "like" them. If you're already going through the effort of learning about the application process, you might as well do as many as you can stomach. At least, that's the no regrets approach.
...Incoming student with a dumb-ass incoming student-type question. (I can't help it--I am what I am.)
What does the first year legal writing requirement entail? Is it essentially a class in which you research and prepare a paper? Is there any way to use this to do double duty with assigned work for another class?
lolol
10:24PM: Legal Research & Writing is a very brief overview of how to conduct legal research and write a legal brief . You'll go to the library and do some useless research exercises, write two very brief legal memos, and then write a brief. (I've already forgot how long it is - 10 pages? 12 pages?) It's a prepackaged writing assignment that's mostly about form and not about substance. So you won't be able to, nor will you want to use it for another class.
Don't forget that it's graded pass/fail. So while you should try to get as much possible out of the class, don't stress about it.
Generally, you won't have any writing in your 1L classes. 100% of your grade will be based on a final exam.
oops, that was addressed to 10:24*AM* not PM obviously.
thank you
Actually, in LRW you just write memos. I think the longest one is ten pages. In WOA (second semester) you write a brief for a lousy one unit of credit.
Does being in (or not being in) CLR really make a difference in OCIP?
I did not feel like I lost any opportunities during OCIP by not being on CLR.
Putting Tom's comment in context a bit, he's near the top of his class, is a very good writer, and has a tech degree (I think?). In other words, a highly desirable candidate, CLR or not.
(Sorry to out you, T-Fletch)
I agree with Tom -- I'm not on CLR (nor any other journal), and I don't think it hurt me at all. I think I was asked about it only a few times out of the many on campus interviews I did and the call-backs I attended. Overall, I felt like interviewers were more interested in talking about what was on my resume than what might have been on it.
I'm on CLR. I definitely think it helped me in OCIP, especially because I didn't go to an expensive, private school for undergrad. No offense to the many Yalies, and other Ivy league type grads whom I greatly respect. At the same time, any CLR boost was relatively superficial. Many of the firms that gave me a call back due to CLR were not the type of places I wanted to be--too status conscious, etc. I felt that immediatley during the callbacks.
Keep in mind that there are lots of other things that can help too--like grades, interesting work experience or travel, or being a cool person. So my advice is not to worry about what you cannot control. Be yourself. If they don't like who you are, trust me, you do not want to spend all summer and the first years of your legal career trying to make them like you.
Good luck! I found the process a lot of fun actually. I met a lot of new people who I didn't know my first year.
Not being on CLR isn't a huge detriment during OCIP. Unlike Tom, I had one H and the rest all Ps going into OCIP. (I did have some work experience, not IP related though) Although I had to interview more, I ended up doing well. Not only did I get multiple offers, I landed at a firm that I really liked, which is ranked in Vault's Top 15.
There's really no way of answering the CLR vs. no-CLR question. All of this is anecdotal evidence with no control group. Everyone comes to OCIP with different grades, resumes and personalities. And every interview is different. So really, there's no basis for claiming that being on CLR (or not) affected your OCIP results.
I like you Anon 6:42, very insightful. It really is impossible to know since we cannot make a counterfactual world. The be-yourself advice from above is also spot on.
To the CLR-worried 1L, there's nothing you can do about it. What I should have more clearly stated was that I do not feel that the lack of CLR closed any doors for me at OCIP. I don't think any firm dinged because I lacked law review experience.
I think what matters more than whether you are in CLR is whether you can show enthusiasm about the firm/practice for which you are interviewing.
I graduated in '06 and am now on a recruiting committee. Once you show--via grade, extracurriculars, prior work experience, journal experience, etc--that you can do the work, what matters a lot is whether you would be someone with whom others would want to work with. Being enthusiastic, interested, and lively during an interview helps a lot.
And, for the record, I didn't do CLR, had only one non-P grade my first year, although I had significant tech experience.
Does anyone have a sense of how many H's one needs in order to have a decent shot at good SF firms?
No HH grades on my end ... just 3 H's and 4 P's :-(
11:05PM: You might as well ditch the law firm pipe dream right now. In fact, you should probably drop out of law school altogether, or transfer to a school that can better meet your needs (I think Concord Online Law School is still accepting transfer applications).
Re: 9:17AM. I don't see the point of mocking people who have legitimate questions. Either answer their question, or don't post at all.
9:17 - how dare you ask a reasonable question about grades and career opportunities? Don't you know that a "model" Boaltie doesn't even know grades exist, let alone that some firms might care about them?
To answer your question, it depends. 3 H's and 4 P's will not disqualify you at any "good" SF firms except for Howard Rice and Altshuler Berson.
If you are a good interviewer your grades will likely not be a barrier at any other firm. However, you might have to work a little harder at selling yourself to some of the big dogs (Latham, Gibson, and O'Melveny, etc).
Now, never ask a question about grades again. It's just braggy (especially when the blog is anonymous).
As for CLR, not being a member is unlikely to be seen as a negative.
Think of CLR as something like having an extra HH on your transcript.
Armen, how 'bout a college football post? You ready to see the VOLS kick some ass Sep. 1?
Re: 9:43am. Now if that doesn't get people posting, I don't know what will.
When does telebears reopen to let us add new classes?
vols drool. GATORS RULE! if cal ever wants to play a real football team, they should give Jeremy Foley a call.
Does anyone have reccomendations for cell phone service? I'm planning on switching service providers, probably either to AT&T or to Verizon. I'd like to go with a provider that has good service both at Boalt and more generally around Berkeley and Oakland. I'd appreciate advice or suggestions. Thanks!
2:48 - this is really the time to stick with your SEC brethren rather than disparage them, especially since these PAC-10 folks think they have real football around here. i'll give y'all credit for taking the title last year, despite having to play half a dozen top 10 teams to get there. i'll even admit to pulling for you in the title game. that still won't stop me from saying you cheated us in 2000. all that said, go vols and go anyone who's in the SEC -- the strongest, most talented conference in the nation! i appreciate your support on sept. 1.
Alright, I've had enough of this blasphemy. The Pac-10 is legitimate and a national television audience will be witness on September 1st. If you’re at the game, look for me - I’ll be the fat kid gracelessly crowd surfing after DeSean Jackson’s third touchdown.
Verizon works for me.
The PAC ten is an embarrassment to the game we know as football. For the last quarter-century the conference has been little more than USC and bunch of pee-wee teams with hideously ugly uniforms. Outside of the trojan juggernaut, is there any team that consistently has been a national contender? Closest I can think of is Oregon, and they're not very close at all.
If you want real football (i.e. teams that play both offense and defense), you should look to the SEC and Big Ten. Cal has had its fair share of ballers (Rodgers, Lynch, Jackson, etc.) but never fielded a solid team from top to bottom. Too bad. I for one would love to see someone unseat USC.
Ksusha - I respect your allegiance to the SEC. Vols get my support in Berkeley, but when they come to Gainesville it will be an ugly scene for Phil and the boys (BTW anon 2:48 was not me, so there is apparently another gator lurking on these boards. Mr. McMahon, is that you?)
Boris, it appears that you missed the last time the Vols and the Golden Bears, if you can call it playing rather than killing. Mr. Lynch looked like he should have been wearing a Vandy uniform out there. (For the uninformed, that would be the SEC punching bag.) Tedford's "brilliant" offensive skills barely got him into the red zone. And those "fantastic" receivers couldn't get past our 5'9 corner. Nice.
Seriously, you would think the fact that Cal couldn't do shit till Fulmer had mercy and put in the third stringers would do something to humble a team that hasn't done anything impressive since benefitting from a USC choke a few years ago. Tedford is overrated -- Aaron who?
If the worst team in the SEC played Cal's schedule, they'd go 11-1 every year. Public service announcement: beating up on La Tech and OSU isn't impressive.
But I'll look for ya at the game. Look for me too. I'll be the one holding a sign that says "I have degrees from both schools, but prefer winning traditions."
Reid - You've got yourself a deal. And I'll pull for y'all again if you're in the hunt at the end of the season.
Ksusha - there was a slight typo in your post. You said "I'll pull for y'all again IF you're in the hunt at the end of the season." I think you meant "I'll pull for y'all again WHEN you're in the hunt at the end of the season.
Other than that, truer words have never been spoken. SEC will assert its dominance once again.
The SEC has to be the most overrated sports entity in history. They deserve football respect about as much as their alumni deserve Boalt admission. Which is to say, when thir honest-to-God numbers/LSAT are considered, they're kind of an embarrassment. That's all.
dag i got busted. thanks reid. and sorry ksusha, but although i can grudgingly respect UT sports, i lived in kentucky and florida too long to ever pull for the vols.
and 12:21, i don't think it's fair to say a conference with 160 national championships in its history is an overated sports entity. as an SEC alum, i will gladly put my numbers up against yours and we'll see who wins. but that kind of thing is for in private.
Anon 12:21 - I sense some bitterness. In fact, it's a very familiar bitterness. I have my suspicions about you...
No shame in being outed for supporting the Gates Tim (I knew no one else could zing like "Gators rule, Vols drool"). When you're two-time defending b-ball champs as well as defendant f-ball champs, these message board discussions are just too much fun.
Before extrapolating too much from the Tennessee game last year, lets remember that it was essentially Nate Longshore's first game, the first game for most of our offensive line, Syd'Quan's first game (The only real weakness that the Vols were able to exploit over and over again), DeSean Jackson's first game as a #1 WR, and an away game in a stadium with more than 100K Vols fans.
I would like to point out that the Vols sold like a dozen seat to Cal fans and refused to sell anymore. Were they afraid to play without the massive crowd disparity?
I guarantee you that Cal will have sold plenty of tickets to Tennessee fans despite the fact that the stadium could have sold out entirely to the home crowd.
Come 9/1 Tennessee is in for an ass kicking.
As far as conferences go, I will stick with Stewart Mandel, its all cyclical.
9:53 - Yes, Neyland is a large stadium and it gives the Vols a certain edge when they play there, however you can't attribute Cal's loss in major part to that factor. And as far as your claim about not having enough Cal seats, that's just patently untrue. Tennessee allocates the same amount of seats to visiting teams each game. The actual attendance depends on whether the visiting team's fans are willing to travel. Cal just wasn't, I guess.
You can say what you want about your vulnerabilities, but let me remind you that we were coming off of a 5-6 season, had a QB who was on his own for the first time, had a very young secondary (which manhandled your receivers -- allegedly the best in the nation), had a brand new center, a young offensive line, and completely untested running backs. With they hype your team, your coach, Lynch, and the program was getting, and given that the vulnerabilities were basically comparable, you guys had a huge edge going into that game. Remember, Lee Corso picked you all to win the title? Every other commentator out there was saying that not only were you going to blow out the Vols, you were also gonna hand it to USC.
I understand it's tough not living up to the hype, but let's not make excuses. Let's just see if you can live up to it this year.
Wow, Tim, 160 national championships?? That sure is a lot. . . . Of course, it's not quite as many as the 360 championships won by the Pac-10! And don't even get me started on each conference's emphasis on "student" in "student-athlete." I think Reid's freudian slip about his beloved "defendant f-ball champs" says all we need to know.
Every year the SEC gets its panties in a bunch about how great they all are, and about how they are punished by having to play each other. Please, what a bunch of crap. The SEC always has a couple good teams, a bunch of mediocre ones, and some crap underneath the other schools' shoes, same as any other conference. Last year Arkasas was the second best team in the SEC and how did they do against USC??? Oh right, lost at home 50-14.
And don't even get me started on the Big 10, which consistently is propped up by teams like UW with high win totals and no quality opponents.
Now, Cal got their ass kicked last year by UT, there is no way around that. Every year the past 3 years Cal has been the "it" team, ready for a breakthrough, but each time they've had a big game to get them over the hump, they've lost. Hopefully they finally get it done on Sept. 1, and again on Nov. 10. If they lose to UT, no excuses. But if they win, I expect some pleas for forgiveness from Ksusha et al.
Dear dear Max. How did a conversation about college football devolve into a question of overall conference titles or academic prowess?
Undeniably, the academic institutions of the PAC-10 are superior in reputation to those of the SEC. The PAC-10 has also proven dominant in a wide variety of sports. In fact, Stanford and UCLA are quite possibly the best all-around sports schools in the nation (both schools excel in women's water polo - seriously).
How this bears on football, I have no idea. You cannot possibly believe that the PAC-10 is on par with the SEC simply because USC killed an Arkansas team missing its quarterback and running back.
As 9:53 noted, conference strengths may be somewhat cyclical, but it's tough to argue with what the SEC has done over the past decade or so. I believe we have three different national champions (UF-2007, LSU-2003, and UT-1998), a runner-up finish (AU-2004) and a number three finish (UG-2002). I would also note UF's runner-up finish in 95 and national championship in 96, but that would just be braggy.
In the same time frame, other than USC (which is clearly the biggest dog on any block right now), what has the PAC-10 done? Oregon runner-up in 2001; anything else?
Point being, the SEC consistently produces elite teams that win big games. Meanwhile, every team in the PAC-10 waves the USC flag every time someone bashes PAC-10 football.
YEAH! what reid said! also, i had suspicions about 12:21 too.
One point Max is trying to make I think is that pac 10 football gets bashed all the time. While it is true we have lacked a bunch of dominant teams at the top, the Pac 10 is one of the toughest conferences top to bottom. Any team in the pac 10, with the exception of maybe Stanford can win any given Saturday, which is not something that the SEC or any other conference can claim.
I believe that at one point last year 6 of the 10 pac 10 teams were in the top 25.
That means that to be good in the Pac 10 you need to play your heart out every week, unlike say Notre Dame who has 1 marquee game a year interspersed with Army, Navy, Airforce, Vanderbelt, etc.
And sure, the SEC has a handfull of very good teams, but after the top few, the SEC is actually pretty weak. A conference full of giants and punching bags. This makes it easy for the good SEC teams to amass an 8-2 record.
This comment has been removed by the author.
This comment has been removed by the author.
"Any team in the pac 10, with the exception of maybe Stanford can win any given Saturday, which is not something that the SEC or any other conference can claim."
"And sure, the SEC has a handfull of very good teams, but after the top few, the SEC is actually pretty weak."
Are you serious?! We must not be watching the same game, buddy.
Last year the SEC had more bowl-eligible teams than the PAC 10. This is also true practically every other year. That is in addition to the fact that most of the SEC bowl-eligible teams had a better SOS than their PAC-10 counterparts.
Which SEC punching bags are you referring to, exactly? Georgia? Tennessee? Peraps Auburn? LSU? Alabama? In reality, there are at most three punching bag teams in the SEC -- Miss, Miss St. and Vandy. Any reasonable person knows that there are far more candidates for that title in the PAC-10. I should also remind you that when you take into account their superior SOS, no SEC team has gone 1-11 in quite some time. So three bad teams in the SEC makes it pretty weak?
"I believe that at one point last year 6 of the 10 pac 10 teams were in the top 25."
You thought wrong.
In the preseason poll, there were 6 SEC teams in the top 25, with 2 ranked inside the top 10. That's as compared with 2 PAC-10 teams in the top 25, 2 in the top 10. By the first week's poll, the PAC 10 still had only two teams, one of which plummeted to 22, and the SEC had 5 teams in the top 15.
The SEC had no less than 5 teams in the weekly polls for the remainder of the season, with 4 top 15 teams at the season's end. The most PAC-10 teams in the polls on on any given week last season? 4. The number of times it happened? 3.
There are two things you should know about SEC football fans before challenging them in an argument. One: football is our religion. Two: we use real numbers to back up our claims.
(That's about all the math I am capable of, since I went to an SEC school for undergrad.)
Okay, Ksusha, you want to look at the numbers? Your arbitrary sample of subjective polls is nice and all, but why don't we look a little deeper?
Instead of polls, I'm going to use RPI, which is a way better indicator of how good a team is than a poll. RPI basically looks at who you beat, and who those teams beat, and then gives you a rating. A higher rating is better.
Looking at the past 4 years of overall conference RPI, the SEC has an average ranking of 32.80. In that same time period, the Pac-10's average ranking is 34.38. (Remember, higher is better).
Now, in 2 of those 4 years, the SEC was the toughest overall conference. But in the other 2 years it was 5th and 6th toughest. The Pac-10, on the other hand, has never been lower than the third toughest conference.
Now, for the argument that the SEC has many great teams, while the Pac-10 has only 1 (USC). Let's define greatness by saying that a team finishes in the top 10 of the RPI for that year. Over the past 4 years, the SEC has had 8 (I generously included Arkansas, who finished 11th last year, but was NOT a good team, as shown by the USC game and their bowl game). In the past 4 years, the Pac-10 has had...wait for it...8 top-10 teams! What a shock!
The SEC does demolish the Pac-10 in a different category: having terrible teams (ranked 80th or below). The SEC takes the Pac-10 in this category by a whopping score of 9-2. It could be pointed out that the SEC has 2 more teams than the Pac-10, so this result might be expected. But then why don't they have more top-10 teams also?
Considering further that each Pac-10 team plays all other Pac-10 teams, every year, while an SEC team plays only about 3/4 of the other SEC teams (and thus can avoid great teams), it seems that getting through the Pac-10 is harder on a week-to-week basis.
So there are some numbers that even an SEC grad can understand.....
What Max said, but twice!!!
I hope you are all summer associates and a good indicator of how much screw off time I will have next summer...
Game. Set. Match. To Mr. Power. It's easy to jack up an 8-3 record in the SEC when 4 of your wins are gimmes, which is the SEC specialty.
Meanwhile, 7 of the 10 teams in the Pac-10 have played in the Rose Bowl in the last decade, the eight (Cal) got screwed out of it, the ninth (Oregon State) was on national TV beating the shit out of Notre Dame in the Fiesta Bowl a few years back, and the 10th, Arizona, well, they're OK but not horrendous. That gives you an idea of conference parity. Any team can get hot, any team can win, any team can make a run.
Meanwhile, um, when was the last time Kentucky, Vanderbilt, Miss, or Miss St won more than 5 games in their conference? It must be nice for big-name programs in the SEC to take, effectively, a month's worth of games off during a three-month season.
Re: The e-mail many of us received from the financial aid office entitled 'Boalt Hall Grant - Summer Earnings Statement.' While I acknowledge the importance of allocating scarce financial aid resources to those most in need, I can't help but get the impression that students choosing private sector jobs are being unfairly singled out by the school. This is just my opinion - any thoughts?
i'll freely admit that i'm no expert, but a little research shows that only a few years ago (2003), Ole Miss was 7-1 in conference, with their only loss to LSU, who was nat'l champs that year. and hell, UK was 4-4 in conference last year, which is pretty good for a school that funnels all its money into the only sport that matters (that would be basketball, fools)
9:14, when you make about $26,000 in 10 weeks, its only fair that you be asked to pay a bit more into your education. Saying finaid is singling you out is like saying the undergraduate fafsa unfairly singles out students with rich parents. You won't get as much money because you shouldn't need it. There's no punishment or "singling out" involved.
They want the info to figure out our "need-based grant eligibility." The grant isn't like a prize we won--it was given to us based on NEED. Considering private sector people made, in a week and a half, the entire amount of a pro bono person's summer grant, it seems like we might NEED financial aid grants a little less. Anyway, it doesn't go into effect until next fall anyway. So the giant piles of money we made for doing the same (or less) work than our pro bono friends won't affect our need-based grants this year.
RE: the fin aid office email
Accounting for how much a person is in "need" is one thing. However, the FAFSA already accounts for the total earnings. All one has to do is look at the financial aid office's form to see it's bias. They stretch to make it fill up the page, but it's only worried about where you worked. Why should it matter where you worked, firm or otherwise? The FAFSA determines need already and it shouldn't be up to the Boalt Financial Aid office to make the qualitative judgments they're going to be making...
Can we just complain about the Registrar's office? Has anyone considered speaking to Dean Edley, or Dean Ortiz, about how seriously unhappy they make us? I feel like every time I call the Office for an important task, they either shout at me or punt me to another aspect of the school, and I eventually end up at the Registrar's office anyway.
verizon reception on boalt campus is not great. it seemed fine on the rest of berkeley campus. however, there is a couple holes in coverage south of campus. i'd wait and figure out where you're going to live and test out the territory with a friends phone. i lived in a verizon vortex for a year and it sucked.
on a totally unrelated note, do not take PMBR when studying for the bar unless the firm is paying for it. it is a waste of money.
I really cannot figure out what 7:05 is so upset about. Is it because the FAO is using an ENTIRE piece of paper to ask the question "how much did you make this summer?" I guess they don't need the firm name. They know anyone who lists $25,000-$30,000 obviously worked at a firm and anyone who lists $4,000-$5,000 obviously worked at a non-profit. But what is the big deal about listing the name of your firm? You have to tell the career office before you can take part in OCIP. And what "qualitative judgments?" They figured out our "need" based on the FAFSA. But remember how we went out and started those lucrative, high-paying jobs while our classmates slaved away for like $10-$15 an hour? At that point, our "need" CHANGED--when it was too late for the FAFSA to take it into accout. And we can use that money to help pay for school when 1Ls who work for free cannot. The financial aid department noticed that people who get firm jobs their 1L summer get TWO chance to repay or not take out as many loans. FAFSAs would only be able to account for ONE of those opportunities because of when taxes are filed. The financial aid office is just shifting their equation to take into account the giant financial boon 1Ls who work in firms get. FAFSA assets + income for the summer before the grant aid is given = a pretty realistic portrait of financial NEED.
I'm not entirely following what's going on, but one thing to ponder is how such a rule affects students' ex ante planning. In undergrad, we were told that any new scholarships we received would first reduce the grants we were given. This completely destroyed the incentive to apply for scholarships over the summer before school started, since we'd need to win a number of scholarships to make any dent in the amount we paid for school.
Why should people who choose to work for non-profits be subsidized by people who choose to work in Big-Law?
There are many non-financial perks to working in a non-profit/public interest environment including better hours/respect for personal life and the feeling of accomplishment/fulfillment that you can get from helping others.
On the other hand people working in big-law are sacraficing a great deal so that they can make ungodly sums of money for a few years before beginning to enjoy their lives.
It shouldn't be the FAO's place to say which decision has more value, or who's free will should be interferred with.
Fuck public interest hippy kids. Go take a shower and stay away from my bling.
11:18 - your comment that the financial aid office interfering with people's "free will" seems a little off base. The financial aid office gives out money based on need. That need is affected both by what resources people come into school with and what resources people gather while they're here. If giving more financial aid to people who make less in the summer makes the financial advantage of working at a big firm smaller, so be it. It's the same thing with working in a higher paying job before law school. If someone makes a lot of money before law school and gets smaller financial aid as a result, no one is interfering with their "free will" to have taken that job. And I guess you could argue that that person is "subsidizing" someone who worked at a non-profit before law school, but that seems to be missing the point. The point of financial aid is to make it possible for people in different financial situations to attend law school. If the life in a non-profit (hours, fulfillment, the possibility of more financial aid, and all the other things you cite) is so great, you should exercise your free will and take such a public interest job. In the meantime, it seems reasonable for the financial aid office to continue giving out money based on need.
I like the college football debate much better than this crap.
Agreed, I hadn't heard that one before, and definitely not 9,000 times.
WTF? Someone is pissed about financial aid taking into account financial need? Talk about idiotic.
Why not make financial aid at Boalt merit based. Each 10 Percentile Bracket,or perhaps 20 percentile bracket would receive a certain percentage of the available financial aid.
The people at the bottom of the class are taking up space that other more deserving people should have access to, so as punishment (Or gentle encouragement to leave) the people at the bottom should subsidize the people at the top.
If the bottom of the class leaves, then more space for transfer students, who as a group are pretty sharp, if totally devoid of personality.
This comment has been removed by the author.
To rekindle the college football debate....
ESPN.com is actually doing a feature this week on the best conference. They are doing it as a bracket-style tournament. Your finalists, according to ESPN.com's experts? The SEC and the Pac-10. Your winner is the SEC. See http://tinyurl.com/2wsz7v.
A couple interesting things. First, in addition to the experts' bracket, there was also a fan voting bracket. In this bracket, the Big-10 beat the Pac-10 in the semifinals, by a score of 63-37! Typical.
The other interesting thing is the reasoning of the "experts" in choosing the SEC over the Pac-10. Instead of focusing on, for example, playing football, the basis for the decision is that Southern fans are more passionate about football than West Coast fans. I won't argue with that, but what the hell does that have to do with being the best conference?
I think Joe Morgan is now rating the quality of teams and players in all sports over there at ESPN. Apparently qualities like "heart" and "passion" are way more important than...oh, i don't know...maybe on-field performance?
It wouldn't have been difficult to crunch some numbers like I did above. Hell, it wouldn't have been difficult to find numbers showing the SEC's better, if that's the conclusion they really wanted to reach. But to focus on so-called "passion" while ignoring football is just bad sports journalism, and lazier than a SEC undergrad studying for a math test. Unfortunately, it is not much of a surprise coming from ESPN, given the downhill plunge they've taken the past few years.
I'll definitely concede that when it comes to who packs 100,000 drunk, loud-mouth cousin-fucking rednecks into the stadium, the SEC wins no contest. In fact, that seems to be a point of pride for them. No arguments here! It just doesn't seem to translate into up-and-down conference strength. As for the Pac-10, I've often chalked up our lack of "insane" fans to the fact that, if you live in, say, Berkeley, Los Angeles, Eugene, Seattle, or Phoenix, there's 1001 things to do on any given Saturday that are not college football. If you live in Knoxville, Tuscaloosa, or Athens -- and the thunderstorms have knocked out the TV antenna and the hogs are tired -- what is there to do but get loaded and watch a helluva 10-7 game?
Anyway, Max, shouldn't you be in Europe or the Caribbean or something right now? Sheesh, if everyone is still in town, we might have to get a poker game jump-started...
I've noticed on the CDO website that a lot of firms will be having hospitality suites during OCIP. What exactly goes on in these suites and are they worth attending?
Hey 2:45,
The hospitality suites typically contain a recruiting coordinator, a spread of fruit and muffins, some promotional materials for the firm, and an occasional attorney in between interviews.
They're not that exciting, but I found them to be decent places to hang out when I arrived early or had a short break in between interviews.
Hospitality suites are a good place to go (esp. early in the day) if you didn't get an interview (in OCIP) with a firm you were interested in. You can shmooze with the recruiter and probably get an interview.
I found that if you know the secret handshake in the hopsitality rooms, there is usually something special waiting for you there.
Typical examples include free 60 minute massage w/ optional "Happy Ending", Bottle of Charles Krug, 1 secret government document (I chose from the JFK pile and all I got was a photo of an alien smoking a J with Jack Ruby), or a mini-keychain flashlight.
what about the firm receptions? did people find those worthwhile??
If your goal is to schedule an interview, hospitality suites are more helpful. If your goal is to get information about the firm, etc., then the hospitality suite is probably equally useful to the reception (unless the suite is semi-abandoned).
Food and drink is way better at receptions, though I think that goes without saying.
Last year, a sizeable group of students all got food poisoning from the hospitality room. Stay away!!!
Post a Comment
<< Home