Subscription pricing
Hey y'all!
After meeting my second 7Sager in the wild at ASW this past weekend (forgot to get a screen name) I thought it was high time to pop back over here and see how things are going and if anyone has any UCI related questions they want to ask me or maybe even @DumbHollywoodActor if he can spare the time during 1L. I'm currently a second year JD/MBA student at UCI; I finished my 1L last May and am in my first full year of business school and have another quarter in the fall before I head back to the law school next spring. I won't go into too much more detail than that to start but I'm happy to answer anything I can about UCI, JD/MBAs, law school with kids (two boys under four), pro bono, externships, OCI, law school as an older/non-traditional student, student government and organizations, law school as a veteran, or whatever else strikes your fancy. I'll try to check in on a regular basis to see what questions y'all have.
And for all the 7Sagers heading this way I can't wait to meet y'all!
If you want to read more ramblings about law school, business school, politics and more, you can also follow me on Twitter here (my DMs are open if anyone ever wants to reach out directly and I check that much more often): https://twitter.com/PacificoSoldati
P.S. - it should go without saying but because this is law school I'll just point out that everything here is solely my opinion and I'm not here on behalf of the school in any official capacity, nor do I speak for them.
19
50 comments
@xadrianas6x881 said:
@974 I apologize for hijacking your thread
@welschmeyer300 @xadrianas6x881 @akikookmt881 I've sent you all a private message. My post had absolutely no gender bias in it. I would say the exact same thing to any parent of any sex.
Good so I should see this exact same "I'm warning you about going to law school" comment when any one whose username isnt explicitly a womxn's name, mentions having children. Make sure to spread the word to men too pal! You messaging me calling me "elementary" for saying it's counterproductive to warn moms against getting an education is weak as hell. It's great that you personally don't feel like a misogynist but generally speaking warning womxn against getting an education is problematic regardless of your personally feelings or what you truly meant to say.
@974 thank you for answering q's about law school scheduling as that was my main curiousity. If UCI offers me a bigger scholly next cycle I'm gonna strongly consider it.
Hope that 8-5 includes a lunch break..
@xadrianas6x881 said:
"If you can take a train I'd say that's 100% doable "
Ha! This is AZ. Pay little taxes, get little benefit. No such thing as trains. Or really much in the way of mass transit at all. Nearly everyone drives. To have an honest-to-god, city-hopping train would be amazing. CA folks may complain of their taxes, but you guys don't know how good you have it there.
My kiddo should be 10 by the time I leave for law school, maybe 11 if things don't work out right on schedule. We're old school parents who encourage independence and responsibility, so she has learned to do a lot for herself and around the house. The emotional toll is something I can't control, though. We talk about it often, so she knows what's going on, why it's important, how it helps her and our family, and that she'll have good support and care even if I'm not here. So far, she's handling the idea very well.
There is also the possibility of my family coming down to spend time with me during weekends as well at the school's location, maybe upwards of twice a month. So maybe something could be arranged to make it easier. In the summers, potentially for a week at a time. Definitely food for thought.
If I understand you correctly, summers are pretty mandatory for necessary internships and other credit related work? I kinda figured that might be the case for 2L, but didn't count on that for 1L.
Anyway, thanks for the responses! You rock!
As far as summers go, you just want to maximize utility for your own life, but no matter what you want to be gaining more legal experience in some form or another, at least part time. Even people who struggle to find jobs before graduation have been getting legal experience during their summers, so there aren't really many people who don't do some legal work during 1L summer. Well paid legal internships are the best possible outcome for most people, but public interest work doesn't usually pay unless you have some type of stipend or fellowship to do the work. So anyone looking into public interest has their hands tied to just endure unpaid work for the most part. As I mentioned previously, it was better for me to take 4 credits for an externship and work part time rather than taking a stipend. Maybe you would want to seek out 8 week gigs to spend more time with your family, or find something close to you for legal work. You've got to hustle one way or the other on the employment front and then still make it fit with your life.
"If you can take a train I'd say that's 100% doable "
Ha! This is AZ. Pay little taxes, get little benefit. No such thing as trains. Or really much in the way of mass transit at all. Nearly everyone drives. To have an honest-to-god, city-hopping train would be amazing. CA folks may complain of their taxes, but you guys don't know how good you have it there.
My kiddo should be 10 by the time I leave for law school, maybe 11 if things don't work out right on schedule. We're old school parents who encourage independence and responsibility, so she has learned to do a lot for herself and around the house. The emotional toll is something I can't control, though. We talk about it often, so she knows what's going on, why it's important, how it helps her and our family, and that she'll have good support and care even if I'm not here. So far, she's handling the idea very well.
There is also the possibility of my family coming down to spend time with me during weekends as well at the school's location, maybe upwards of twice a month. So maybe something could be arranged to make it easier. In the summers, potentially for a week at a time. Definitely food for thought.
If I understand you correctly, summers are pretty mandatory for necessary internships and other credit related work? I kinda figured that might be the case for 2L, but didn't count on that for 1L.
Anyway, thanks for the responses! You rock!
@cstrobel445 said:
UCI recently UCLA in biglaw/clerkship numbers at 41 percent. Do you think this is sustainable or its anomaly? I'm just slightly worried that the exceptionally small class played a role, whixh wont be the case when class of 2021 graduate.
The clerkship side of things is definitely sustainable given the relationships the school, faculty, and administrators have established.
On the big law side, of course it's sustainable if more people who want to do big law keep coming here. UCI's big law numbers have always been largely suppressed by people self-selecting for public interest, which has always been and continues to be the school's focus. The school has proven itself that it can produce plenty of big law attorneys who can perform at a high level, many of whom are being groomed for partnership over the next few years. We've sent transfers to Harvard, so frankly from my perspective the school has now more than shown that it provides opportunities for people who are willing to come and seize them. Will it be easier for you to get big law from the T-14? Almost invariably yes because the GPA requirements will be lower.
But again I really don't see the value in putting too much stock in numbers like this at any school because I think it is still all about individuals. UCI could randomly admit people with all sorts of career desires that all end up in public interest and the big law rate would drop to zero. Would that mean you couldn't get big law from UCI? No, of course not. You either show up ready to hustle and make things happen for yourself, or you hustled enough before to go somewhere you don't need to hustle so much.
@katrakkade441 said:
@974 said:
Hey y'all!
After meeting my second 7Sager in the wild at ASW this past weekend (forgot to get a screen name) I thought it was high time to pop back over here and see how things are going and if anyone has any UCI related questions they want to ask me or maybe even @cstrobel445 if he can spare the time during 1L. I'm currently a second year JD/MBA student at UCI; I finished my 1L last May and am in my first full year of business school and have another quarter in the fall before I head back to the law school next spring. I won't go into too much more detail than that to start but I'm happy to answer anything I can about UCI, JD/MBAs, law school with kids (two boys under four), pro bono, externships, OCI, law school as an older/non-traditional student, student government and organizations, law school as a veteran, or whatever else strikes your fancy. I'll try to check in on a regular basis to see what questions y'all have.
And for all the 7Sagers heading this way I can't wait to meet y'all!
If you want to read more ramblings about law school, business school, politics and more, you can also follow me on Twitter here (my DMs are open if anyone ever wants to reach out directly and I check that much more often): https://twitter.com/cametosayhello
P.S. - it should go without saying but because this is law school I'll just point out that everything here is solely my opinion and I'm not here on behalf of the school in any official capacity, nor do I speak for them.
Hey, UCI is one of the schools I'm most interested in. It seems like a new and exciting program and who doesn't want to be a part of something exciting, right? Could you speak on my perception of it? What kind of vibe does the campus have? How much so-cal influence makes it on campus? Are you from so-cal? What was your gpa, lsat and age coming in? Sorry if you've answered similar questions, I haven't read the entire thread yet and am gearing up to leave work soon.
With barely over 1,000 graduates it is an incredibly small and unique environment, though it is growing every year. My class was the largest in school history until last year's 1L class and this year's incoming class looks poised to beat that. If you need 200 years of storied history and prestige to carry you aloft into a lifetime of top notch careers you are barking up the wrong tree. But it sounds like you're more the innovative, entrepreneurial type who would enjoy building a school's prestige rather than trading off of it. Campus is pretty small relative to UCI overall, it's pretty chill until anxiety becomes palpable when writing assignments are due or exams are coming around, but that's true anywhere I'm sure.
I can get to the beach in about 15 minutes from the library. And by that I mean literally sitting on the beach. Definitely the best locale of any Top 25 law school in my opinion. Law school is a lot less stressful without snow pants I guess you could say. It's pretty SoCal vibe-wise as about half the student body is from here so it's generally laid back. You also have to consider it is a young law school started by a bunch of people who went to top law schools and hated many of their experiences in those institutions and they wanted to set up somewhat of an antithesis to those dynamics and I think they've largely succeeded. Now, it's still a law school and therefore subject to all the market dynamics for top law schools and the like, but I think there are a lot of people here who are very dedicated to ensuring this school is on the cutting edge for decades and centuries to come.
@doneill3389668 said:
Oi! A fellow anteater! Im going to UCI this Fall. I took a year off and this boredom and time off is just taking a huge toll on me because sitting around just SUCKS. Cant wait to get back to school.
Are you satisfied with your choice? I know UCi is a great campus, did my undergrad there, but how is the law school? Good group of people? Good prospects?
I also want to know what to expect my first year, as it's the year that apparently counts "bigly"... besides getting good grades, what do I need to do my first year in order to make sure that im on the right path to getting a job after graduating?
You answered on all of my posts when I was studying for the LSAT...you've got a pitcher waiting for you at the Pub.
Thanks
Congrats! I look forward to meeting you this fall.
I am more than satisfied with my choice and have been since I first sat down in Con Law with Dean Chemerinsky and remain even more satisfied with the selection of Dean Richardson to lead a new era of the school. I really love it here and had a really great time during 1L and definitely miss the daily camaraderie of going through that and wish I could graduate with my class but ultimately I get to have two classes and expand my circle. There's a big emphasis on civility and collegiality at the school and I've been impressed with how much we've been able to make that atmosphere endure as we've become ranked and climbed so quickly. No matter what the identity of your institution, once it is ranked it will start to draw people who come only for the ranking and not for the identity part and so it's important for the student body to continue to pass down a sense of what the community is all about. UCI is not without its flaws, like every other institution I've ever been a part of, but personally I've never had a better relationship with an administration than I have here and it has made a world of difference to me.
If you have never done anything interesting with your life, go and do something interesting so you have something to talk to people about in interviews and while networking. Start networking before you start school if you want. If you live in the area already then try to find some legal work if you want to just start meeting people. Get business cards as soon as you show up to school and go to events and speakers that interest you. Connect with people in person, but remember if you don't stand out in some way beyond grades then all of this will be largely wasted as you just fade into the background. Be appropriately memorable. Get to the point where you can get someone so excited about your future that they give you their business card with you having to ask for it.
Also, and this is very important. Figure out what you don't want to do so you don't waste too much time doing it. Some of the best classes I've taken in life were the ones I hated the most because it allowed me to knock certain pursuits off my list. Get as much experience and exposure in the first place you want to practice as you can.
If you're older and have an interesting life, you've already done the work on becoming interesting, so just keep your head and work hard and maybe you'll get by with slightly worse grades than your K-JD peers, but in the end none of this matters after day one of your first job anyways. I've met plenty of people that lateraled to two firms that would never have been hired straight out of law school.
@terrynicholasj326 said:
Hello @974
I am currently considering the J.D./MBA program at the University of British Columbia in Canada, and I am uncertain on whether the extra cost of the MBA is worth it. I don't have any specific industry experience in a field, but my undergrad was in economics and statistics, which were also my favorite subjects. I also really enjoy business, for what that's worth. I have a meeting with the school coming up but I'm trying to figure out if it's worth the extra $50,000 to get my MBA while doing my J.D.. What kind of career opportunities are available to you that might not be available to just a J.D. student and just and MBA student? Thanks a tonne!
All depends on what you do on each side really. On the business side, some people take all quant courses and position themselves nicely for future consulting work, though any MBA could do that. Most graduates I've known have gone into big law but most have some type of desire to have broader careers in adjacent spaces. You can go hardcore into finance and have a bit more street cred in that arena. Though it's not often used for this because the driving mentality is JD only, I think it is ideal for future solo practitioners because it teaches you so much about how to run a business, especially if you take electives geared towards entrepreneurship and management.
Most MBAs are self-admittedly about networking first and foremost, especially now when so many best practices are widely available on the internet. You don't need to get an MBA to learn the content just like you don't need to pursue any degree to learn content anymore, so it's really about the experience of it that you put together for yourself. I'm only like the 20th or so JD/MBA in the history of the school because the program is so new and the law school's focus on public interest didn't put a big focus on JD/MBAs. So we are really still building the prestige and identity of the type of program that this will be and the success of those of us who have come so far will lend significantly to the perception of the program in the decades ahead, which is a much cooler prospect to me than trading off of an established brand.
@xadrianas6x881 said:
Anyway... I wanted to know if the schedule can be worked to try and get maximum time to make it easier for family.
Also, what are summers like schedule-wise?
1L you have zero say at virtually every law school in terms of schedule. Others please correct me if I'm wrong but I don't know anyone who got to choose their 1L schedule. 2L/3L you have more leeway here at UCI but I couldn't speak for other schools that might place different restrictions on people.
Summers are whatever you make of them. You could work part time or full time, paid or unpaid. Generally 1L summers are unpaid and more 2L summers are paid. Unless you have a stipend or fellowship or something all the public interest jobs are unpaid. Credit is way more valuable to me though so I would always take credit over money because it frees up your upper level education. I did a part time externship and worked part time. If you have the right part time work in literally anything you can make more than the stipends pretty easily.
@jkatz1488955 said:
Hello .. for someone considering doing a JD/MBA what advice you give them or what question would u ask them to consider before they undertake such a program ?
Why do you want to do it?
What skills and knowledge do you hope to get out of it?
What kind of career are you interested in?
The other thing I'll just generally say on the remote parenting stuff is that it really matters what age the kids are. If they are under six then those abnormal routines will have much different ramifications than with older children to whom you can more fully explain what is happening. And then once they're teenagers they're likely going to prefer you're out of the house, but then of course you'll be needing money to send them to school, so you won't necessarily want to still be in law school at that point.
On another point I've really loved having kids while going through law school and it's made it so much more entertaining. My kids are almost four and about two and a half and they love the law school and the business school and the schools have been super supportive and they love having kids at all the different events so it's definitely been awesome to see how family friendly UCI is. All that is to say that if anyone is avoiding it because of kids or trying to shield their family from law school it's really helpful to be a part of a community that embraces families and they do exist in law schools.
@akikookmt881 said:
@xadrianas6x881 said:
@welschmeyer300 beat me to it. I was curious about how 1L and 2L schedules work. I am married and have a child, and if when I go to law school, I will have to be away from them during the week (4+ hour drive away). How reasonable is the idea of coming home on the weekends going to be? What do summers look like for you?
Thanks for this!
Thank you for posting this question. I have a similar situation. I have a 7 and 4 year-old and the closest law school is an hour away - actually all of the them are about an hour away from me. Travelling two hours a day seems like a bad idea to me, specially for the first year. So, I've been thinking of staying on campus Mon - Thus/Fri and coming home on the weekends. I'm hoping since most law schools have clinicals and electives in the second and third years that this arrangement would only be for the first year of school. Your thoughts would be greatly appreciatd.
I have friends that live as far away as Encinitas and the San Fernando Valley and they commute over an hour everyday, the latter through LA traffic. Personally I think that's some nonsense but everyone does their own thing so ultimately you have to know if you're up for that kind of life. If trains are in the mix, it's too easy. Otherwise it's all on your tolerance for traffic. If you came home every night I'd say treat it like a full time job and just do 8-6 or whatever and don't bring it home so you can just relax on the drive with a podcast or some music or whatever and just leave law school at law school. If that sounds terrible then daily commuting is probably not a great idea.
As a 2L/3L you definitely have a lot more latitude and could set yourself up to only be on campus a couple days a week or maybe find legal work closer to your home, but that's the kind of question it is worth diving deep on during a visit or in communications with admissions personnel.
@xadrianas6x881 said:
@welschmeyer300 beat me to it. I was curious about how 1L and 2L schedules work. I am married and have a child, and if when I go to law school, I will have to be away from them during the week (4+ hour drive away). How reasonable is the idea of coming home on the weekends going to be? What do summers look like for you?
Thanks for this!
If you've never been away from your child before I'd highly recommend testing that out a bit. If you can take a train I'd say that's 100% doable if you can cope with being away that much (people do it all the time, but it's not for everyone, so don't listen to people who will come at you with some absolutist BS one way or the other). If you have to drive you are talking about taking ~160 hours away from yourself per semester which I can tell you is what's really going to hurt you. I did over 50 hours of pro bono as a second semester 1L and I know that my grades suffered for it but I'd never trade that for the actual experience I got and the benefit I delivered to my clients. I'd say you're talking like a .3-.5 handicap at least, and probably on the higher side given the added stress of just being on the road for two long drives every weekend.
Last summer I did a part time externship at a legal services organization that helps low income veterans. I also drove for Lyft and started a project to help feed the homeless in Orange County, so I kept pretty busy. My kids are in year round daycare so they have the same schedule regardless of what we're doing. Next summer I'll be at a law firm in Los Angeles.
@xlvovska162 said:
Thank you for sharing your story. I am also a parent of two kids, and I am juggling working full-time, LSAT, and earning my HR Management Certificate. I have really thought about pursuing a JD/MBA route at some point down the road. How are you balancing this all? I am eager to hear from others with families :)
Compartmentalization. Don't let your stress compound, let the different types balance each other out. Keeping a human alive and growing and learning is a much different type of stress than reading a casebook or writing a memo. So use them to balance each other out. The less you can bring law school home with you, both physically (in the form of work, books, etc.) and mentally (in the form of stress, anxiety, etc.) the happier you will be and the more you will enjoy the experience. In the end, being a parent turns the volume down on law school and keeps you focused because you have so much more perspective not to mention something outside of yourself to work for. Find other parents and bond over a shared experience most of your classmates won't understand for another 5-10 years.
@welschmeyer300 said:
General scheduling question --
How many days do you have class and for how many hours?
How much time is spent on externships/clinics?
Are externships/clinics more or less like a student-job as in you work your hours during the day and don't have work to do at home? Or, are they like actual attorney jobs where a lot of times you do have to work overtime and might still have work to take home and work on weekends?
As a 1L we had class Monday-Friday. We take 16.5 credits so it's roughly 16 hours of class per week and then four 90 minute classes of legal research that makes up the .5 credits. The 1L school day was 8:15 - 5:00 second semester though we only went till 4:10/4:20 first semester. My year we had basically three and a half days of class so we'd have say Tuesday morning off, plus Wednesday and Friday afternoons off. The Tuesday mornings off is fairly standard for second semester 1Ls because UCI requires every 1L to go out and do a client interviewing project of some type so that everyone gets face time with a client early on. That's only one of the Tuesdays and then a lot of people do their pro bono in that time slot on the remaining Tuesdays. My upperclassmen friends mostly have three or four day weeks for class and then work outside on pro bono or other projects.
Everyone at UCI is required to do a clinic or equivalent alternative field placement. We have eight different core clinics to choose from as well as various elective clinics. Our core clinics are six credits so I think that's somewhere around 240-250 hours of work or so. For clinics people do the work whenever they can. People that prefer freedom on nights and weekends seem to do it during the day if they have time but people do it whenever they can in the end and you work in various size groups in our clinics so that dynamic can definitely affect the times people are getting the work done.
Externships are totally different because you're usually either working for a judge or public interest law office or organization of some type. In those cases you're generally just doing the 9-5 or whatever hours you work there and don't take it home, though I'm sure some people vary in that experience. I did a part time externship over the summer at the same place I had done pro bono so it was a seamless transition for me and I was working about 15 hours per week there on average.
Ultimately, because clinics are school run they invariably take on more of a school work schedule even though you are running your own case(s) and doing legal work. Of course, theoretically if you just ran into the wrong type of management in a public interest setting it could take on various types of dynamics but if things go south you can always tell the school and get out of there.
UCI recently UCLA in biglaw/clerkship numbers at 41 percent. Do you think this is sustainable or its anomaly? I'm just slightly worried that the exceptionally small class played a role, whixh wont be the case when class of 2021 graduate.
@974 said:
Hey y'all!
After meeting my second 7Sager in the wild at ASW this past weekend (forgot to get a screen name) I thought it was high time to pop back over here and see how things are going and if anyone has any UCI related questions they want to ask me or maybe even @cstrobel445 if he can spare the time during 1L. I'm currently a second year JD/MBA student at UCI; I finished my 1L last May and am in my first full year of business school and have another quarter in the fall before I head back to the law school next spring. I won't go into too much more detail than that to start but I'm happy to answer anything I can about UCI, JD/MBAs, law school with kids (two boys under four), pro bono, externships, OCI, law school as an older/non-traditional student, student government and organizations, law school as a veteran, or whatever else strikes your fancy. I'll try to check in on a regular basis to see what questions y'all have.
And for all the 7Sagers heading this way I can't wait to meet y'all!
If you want to read more ramblings about law school, business school, politics and more, you can also follow me on Twitter here (my DMs are open if anyone ever wants to reach out directly and I check that much more often): https://twitter.com/cametosayhello
P.S. - it should go without saying but because this is law school I'll just point out that everything here is solely my opinion and I'm not here on behalf of the school in any official capacity, nor do I speak for them.
Hey, UCI is one of the schools I'm most interested in. It seems like a new and exciting program and who doesn't want to be a part of something exciting, right? Could you speak on my perception of it? What kind of vibe does the campus have? How much so-cal influence makes it on campus? Are you from so-cal? What was your gpa, lsat and age coming in? Sorry if you've answered similar questions, I haven't read the entire thread yet and am gearing up to leave work soon.
Oi! A fellow anteater! Im going to UCI this Fall. I took a year off and this boredom and time off is just taking a huge toll on me because sitting around just SUCKS. Cant wait to get back to school.
Are you satisfied with your choice? I know UCi is a great campus, did my undergrad there, but how is the law school? Good group of people? Good prospects?
I also want to know what to expect my first year, as it's the year that apparently counts "bigly"... besides getting good grades, what do I need to do my first year in order to make sure that im on the right path to getting a job after graduating?
You answered on all of my posts when I was studying for the LSAT...you've got a pitcher waiting for you at the Pub.
Thanks
Hello @974
I am currently considering the J.D./MBA program at the University of British Columbia in Canada, and I am uncertain on whether the extra cost of the MBA is worth it. I don't have any specific industry experience in a field, but my undergrad was in economics and statistics, which were also my favorite subjects. I also really enjoy business, for what that's worth. I have a meeting with the school coming up but I'm trying to figure out if it's worth the extra $50,000 to get my MBA while doing my J.D.. What kind of career opportunities are available to you that might not be available to just a J.D. student and just and MBA student? Thanks a tonne!
@974 I apologize for hijacking your thread
@welschmeyer300 @xadrianas6x881 @akikookmt881 I've sent you all a private message. My post had absolutely no gender bias in it. I would say the exact same thing to any parent of any sex.
@welschmeyer300 said:
You can’t stop your life for 18 years. I know many people, specifically womxn, who are absolutely miserable bc they chose to put off their education when they had kids (even though they had the financial means to do things like hire a babysitter etc). They stayed at home w kids for a couple years and then moved on to work dead end jobs which made them miserable and depressed and that in turn had an effect on their relationship with their kids and their spouses. I know womxn who in middle age with kids all grown up, continue working dead end jobs, who even have masters degrees (but from foreign institutions), and they feel dejected and like it’s too late and they’re too old to finally start their career. Bc they felt too guilty to do the right thing for themselves. I really don’t appreciate people trying to project guilt into womxn when more often than not it’s the father who is absent both physically and emotionally. Maybe for once womxn can be empowered to educate themselves even though they have kids and maybe the other parent can put in some work taking care of the kids.
This part of your post brought a big smile to my face. Why? Because this is me. I quit school while I was pregnant, and I didn't go back after. I just figured, that was life now, being a stay at home mom. During a family dinner where my kid was asking about how to get to different careers, she looked at me all hopeful and said "And what degree does mommy have?". Gut. Punch. I remember being the same age, asking my mother the same question, and then had to give the same answer as the mother in this scenario. I was perpetuating a generational tradition of what the women in my family always do. How many generations of sacrifice and pervasive poverty does any one family need? It stops here.
I've seen what happens when you stay a housewife for life, and the husband's retirement gets eaten in a stock market crash, and because you never went back to school, you have no marketable skills. I know what wage discrimination looks like because you're desperate to help make the household budget work, and all you can get is crap work. I know what that sigh sounds like when a woman in your family tells you about dreams they gave up on once they had a kid. You want to see long term resentment and anger and depression? That'll do it.
And as much as it hurts in the short run, in the long run, this is so much larger in importance. My partner and his parents get it. They are behind me on this, and are willing to help. We're preparing our kid with lots of talks, easing her into habits that will help when I'm not there. She has lots of friends and close neighbors and some family here to all help support her. She has good roots here. I'm aiming to stay in-state as much as possible, but the nearest schools -- at all-- are 4+ hours away. It's still going to hurt. Very badly. We're all very aware of it. If the stakes weren't so damn high to achieve, maybe my doubts of "Is the trouble really worth it?" would have gotten the best of me. But they are. This is not a decision we've come to lightly.
Anyway... I wanted to know if the schedule can be worked to try and get maximum time to make it easier for family.
Also, what are summers like schedule-wise?
Hello .. for someone considering doing a JD/MBA what advice you give them or what question would u ask them to consider before they undertake such a program ?
To all you parents in law school, i have nothing but respect. Having the motivation to push through studying and take care of kids is very notable. I hope to approach law school with a similar sense of purpose and vigor
@xadrianas6x881 said:
Thread hijack, I apologize. I have to jump in and give my personal opinion (and that's all it is, my opinion, take it for what its worth).
@xadrianas6x881 @akikookmt881 Being away from your kids is a whole lot tougher than you think. I unfortunately made the decision to live apart from my elementary aged daughter for 2 years (accepted unaccompanied military orders [Me - Japan, Family - USA] to take a "career enhancing" job). Worst decision ever and ended with me deciding to retire because of its impacts. It was one of those things that sounded great at the time, but in execution was absolutely stupid. You can't ever get that missed time back, no matter how hard you try. It had a huge negative impact on me and my daughter that 2 years later I'm still working to recover from. And that's not even addressing the impact it had on my relationship with my spouse.
I have no idea concerning the particulars of each of your specific circumstances; however, just realize that the absence of a parent hurts in a real way (from both sides of the absence). ETA: Law school is going to difficult enough as it is, adding additional parental guilt into the equation is not ideal.
Really love this comment bc a lot of parents won’t admit to the possibly negative impact they had on their relationship w their child. But, what is the difference bn someone working full time with an hour commute, vs commuting to law school? I think your comment is only adding on to “parental guilt.” I think it’s shitty to say this to people who are already set on going to law school and obviously care about trying to manage time with their children as well.
Especially to say this to womxn. I haven’t seen you make these comments to any men posting about their kids. It’s odd that you choose to pop in here to say this. A lot of people on here have kids.
You can’t stop your life for 18 years. I know many people, specifically womxn, who are absolutely miserable bc they chose to put off their education when they had kids (even though they had the financial means to do things like hire a babysitter etc). They stayed at home w kids for a couple years and then moved on to work dead end jobs which made them miserable and depressed and that in turn had an effect on their relationship with their kids and their spouses. I know womxn who in middle age with kids all grown up, continue working dead end jobs, who even have masters degrees (but from foreign institutions), and they feel dejected and like it’s too late and they’re too old to finally start their career. Bc they felt too guilty to do the right thing for themselves. I really don’t appreciate people trying to project guilt into womxn when more often than not it’s the father who is absent both physically and emotionally. Maybe for once womxn can be empowered to educate themselves even though they have kids and maybe the other parent can put in some work taking care of the kids.
.
Thread hijack, I apologize. I have to jump in and give my personal opinion (and that's all it is, my opinion, take it for what its worth).
@xadrianas6x881 @akikookmt881 Being away from your kids is a whole lot tougher than you think. I unfortunately made the decision to live apart from my elementary aged daughter for 2 years (accepted unaccompanied military orders [Me - Japan, Family - USA] to take a "career enhancing" job). Worst decision ever and ended with me deciding to retire because of its impacts. It was one of those things that sounded great at the time, but in execution was absolutely stupid. You can't ever get that missed time back, no matter how hard you try. It had a huge negative impact on me and my daughter that 2 years later I'm still working to recover from. And that's not even addressing the impact it had on my relationship with my spouse.
I have no idea concerning the particulars of each of your specific circumstances; however, just realize that the absence of a parent hurts in a real way (from both sides of the absence). ETA: Law school is going to difficult enough as it is, adding additional parental guilt into the equation is not ideal.
@xadrianas6x881 said:
@welschmeyer300 beat me to it. I was curious about how 1L and 2L schedules work. I am married and have a child, and if when I go to law school, I will have to be away from them during the week (4+ hour drive away). How reasonable is the idea of coming home on the weekends going to be? What do summers look like for you?
Thanks for this!
Thank you for posting this question. I have a similar situation. I have a 7 and 4 year-old and the closest law school is an hour away - actually all of the them are about an hour away from me. Travelling two hours a day seems like a bad idea to me, specially for the first year. So, I've been thinking of staying on campus Mon - Thus/Fri and coming home on the weekends. I'm hoping since most law schools have clinicals and electives in the second and third years that this arrangement would only be for the first year of school. Your thoughts would be greatly appreciatd.