Thanks for the shout out @ I would also recommend using the audio outlines from audiooutlines.com - they are free and if you listen to them and transcribe them out, you will have a good foundation of law to build from. All the best.

So I didn't use Larry's course actively in that I did not send my answers to him to evaluate... but I did use all of his methods... and I would have done MUCH worse without them than with them... I was given free access because of 7sage... and a lot of his advice makes plenty of sense... get a great idea of the law from before hand... tune it to your profs requirements and answer exams from day one... that is what it is all about... do that and you will be fine.... you will likely end up more towards the top of the pile than towards the bottom.

@ some do... some, like Chicago, if they are interested in you will offer you Skype interviews... you should definitely take these... but you can ALWAYS walk into the admissions office and not exactly ask to be interviewed but just let them know about your self through a general conversation... and once you have done that and are home, make sure to send a thank you email telling them that you enjoyed your visit and are grateful for the time they spared for you and would love to be a part of the school, given the opportunity.

The key is to do the video... that's virtually a 60 second face to face interview if you can't make the trip here to meet them.

GULC is possible... I got in with a 167 and no US gpa... and you're a vet... they have a special thing for vets... there are like 4 (that I know off) in my section alone.

Congrats @ ... I'm guessing that with that score you might also be a strong candidate at a T14 (should you want to) not just a T20 given that you're non-traditional AND have served... one of my best friends here is from the navy. Plus if the government pays for school as it does with the friends in my class... that would be a win win. Yeah @ the joint degree programs tag an extra year to law school at the masters level and at the doctoral degree level they can be 3 more years but that is STILL at a minimum a year less than it would take for you to do both programs separately so that is a win win in my book if you are thinking of doing a masters or a PhD at some point of time in your life.

Yeah I would say thinking about outlines etc before you start law school is needlessly worrying and in a sense putting the cart before the horse. About summer summer prep well there are more conflicting opinions on that issue... some people just read something like getting to maybe... some read commercial outlines and some do a 1 week prep course before law school like the one offered by barbri... I think any or all of these work... but you're in no way disadvantaged if you don't know what an outline is before you get to law school. I personally favored reading commercial outlines a week or so before class started and then doing hypos and practice exams through the sem as a method of prep... and did not outline (or brief cases) myself at all - the best I did was take notes about what the professor thought was important in the margins of my books. This might not be the best method of work for everybody and then again, it might work well for others... it all depends upon your style.

Change is inevitable... as the fall of Michigan in the rankings indicates. Yet it is also true that these rankings are somewhat of a self fulfilling prophesy. Can someone seriously say that the caliber of students in the schools at ranks 14 and 15 differs that much? Or for that matter even 10 and 16/18 whatever have you?

Worked for me in contracts and con law at least... or so it seems... one can never tell :/ the grades are good( some good-ish) but that could be due to a variety of factors including prep during the term.

Congrats man... seeing this a bit late but congrats!

@ yeah its a good supplement to class readings... you are right you don't need 30 + books a few good ones will be just fine... you won't have time to read all of them... my mainstays were the short and happy guides and for questions I used CALI and my prof's old papers. S & S are neat depending on the title Paula Franzese - Property law is pretty good. Joshua Dressler (Crim.) is superb too... their lectures will give you a good idea of black letter law. Its personal preference between those and law school legends.

Also... if you learn by listening, then looking at audio outlines is good too... there's Law School Legends and the Sum and substance series and if you're particularly cheap like me, then there is something known as audio outlines 2 - 3 hour summaries of the law (you really don't need more) available on audible... I got mine for free because you can get up to 2 audio books free with audible if you get a 30 day trial with them. http://audiooutlines.com/about/

@ if you're lookig for 0L readings then first read getting to maybe and then check out the short and happy guide series: http://shortandhappyguides.com/

@ I think far too many people get overwhelmed by the workload or course requirements or not looking like a moron in classes that are Socratic method heavy and they lose sight of what is actually important: the final exam.

Amen to this...

@ Its fairly standard so for me the best one that worked was the Civ Pro E & E (not strictly an outline but a supplement)... most people suggested it for contracts as well but for contracts I went and used "A Short and Happy Guide to Contracts" ... that series is pure gold: distills the law into 120 - 200 pages ... also read the "Short and Happy" series for torts and property (though the Property E & E is supposed to be good too)... for Con Law I say Emmanuel's (you can combine it with Chemerinsky... I didn't as I had taught the subject before albeit as a Pol. Sci. course) I also CALIed a lot in Contracts and bits of Civ pro. - CALI is an excellent supplement and you can get it for free at law school. It helps you learn the law well through exercises. The best supplements however were my profs old exams... While a commercial outline can give you the lay of the land for most subjects and make them easy to comprehend, every professor has their specific quirks that they like to test on say their own interpretation of the dormant commerce clause or the market participant doctrine... while you may or may not catch these through class, you will definitely catch them through question papers. This is why you should ideally go through a commercial outline a few days before the sem starts and look at question papers early on in the sem... and Do a ton of practice questions right from the beginning... because your prof may elevate the law of contracts to an art form/philosophy... mine certainly did... but you are judged on a 3 - 4 (sometimes a take home exam). And Law School exam answering is a learned skill. It gets better with practice.

The best way to get the relevant v, irrelevant thing is not to just read the cases but to use a commercial outline before the course begins! I swear those things are magic.

@ you should definitely use your time for those things then... whatever your relaxation is, you will need as much of it in 1L as you can get to ensure that you're happy and healthy. Not all activities have to be collective especially recreational ones.

@ - good guide that... essentially what I did... + a ton of practice exams... dunno my grades but I can wager that they are not at the bottom of the pile for sure.

@ actually not really... I fit in with my class and do not feel very different - there are younger and older people and they are all friendly... yeah there are some aspects I don't include myself in... for example... bar review is something do not go to but that is because I am a tea totaller and no offence or any judgement call - plenty of people love bar review everyone should go at least once, but law school is hard and if I can spare an hour, I'd rather eat and sleep then go to something that would leave me more tired. There are group projects, but law school is by and large a solo endeavor. It won't be tough for you to find project partners and you'll likely be put into groups for projects by your instructors. Hope this helps.

@ so being non traditional probably helped my application though I can't say for sure. I had a set reason for why I actually wanted to do a JD which I explained through the prompts that Georgetown had in its application but there were plenty of things I excluded because they didn't fit in my narrative... I don't even have a US gpa... my gpa is LSAC calculated as I graduated in law from India. If all the things you are working on fit seamlessly into your narrative, by all means put them in. the SOP/prompt(s) (though you should never style such documents as a case or a brief) is/are basically your chance to communicate to the admissions committee that you are an applicant they want in their school. This means using your discretion to craft your story the best way that you can... and excluding what you think needs to be excluded.

@ I'll eat them for breakfast. Nicely.

lol @ you probably will... with ease.

@ Imaging people in their early 30s sit in the same classroom with kids who are just out of college. Yes, there is a need to address or explain why professionals with 5+ work experience want to go to law school and potentially change their career path.

Actually... there is no need to explain this... I never did... I probably have double the experience of my classmates barring a few (I'm a 1L - age 32 - soon to be 33)... you just have to have a convincing story about why law school... everything else falls into place... if the explanation is supposed to be a part of your story, it will be... if not, there really is no need to address it. Remember.. admissions officers read a TON of files every year and so time is at a premium for them... do you really want to give the person who is reading your file extra info if it does not serve a purpose (and the schools are very specific in their prompts about what they want to know) ? I think not. At best, it will be deemed irrelevant and at worst the extra material may serve to annoy. While this may not do much damage if your app is a strong one... why risk it?

Yeah age is just a number and going to law school after you have some non-academic experience definitely has significant advantages. For example, your conceptual tool kit expands, you tend to handle stress better, and sometimes your real world experience comes into play in the actual curricular matter that you deal with. Also... you tend to take everything in perspective and do not let law school change you or affect you negatively... there are plenty of kids who graduate from their BA and BS programs, go to law school and lose balance... suddenly they get lost in outlines and supplements and start having an unhealthy focus on grades... all hose things are important but you have to maintain perspective. Being older and having experience really helps with this perspective.

Hey guys...sorry for not replying earlier... but @ and @ , @ is 100% right... I'm totally against briefing cases... its a HUGE time sink...

So @ and @ your softs have to be good, but the +ve here is that your LSAT score will count for much more than anything... Before applying to law school, I had 3 LL.Ms all from top schools - London, Penn, Chicago... years of practice in my home country with the best lawyers, work ex at an international intergovernmental organization, teaching experience, publication with the yale journal of international law online, half a PhD in law and courts, and had led a national and international level project for the UN Special Rapporteur on Extreme Poverty and Human Rights, which got presented as a report before the UN General Assembly... my first attempt was a 163... I didn'tget into ANY school... the ones that took me were BC, BU, and UCI... that score is par for those schools... only when I broke into T14 range with my LSAT score did I get in... concentrate on ACING the LSAT... and you'll do fine.