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FirmlyRefuse 11 - 18 Apr 2012 - Main.SkylarPolansky
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| | I found this campaign (http://firmlyrefuse.tumblr.com) at Harvard to get students to think about why they are choosing to work for firms to be interesting, particularly given the themes of this course and our conversation today about grades.
Grades for me have served to stand-in for concerted thought as to what I'm actually doing here. I have convinced myself that if my grades are good enough, I'll have options because a strong transcript resonates across different realms of employment (this is essentially the point Ben made today about the fear of having paths foreclosed). No matter what it is actually decide I want to do with my practice, I consoled myself that having a strong strong transcript wouldn't be a detriment. Probably that's true, at least in bureaucratic employment fields where such factors matter, but focusing on grades has meant that I've spent little time thinking about my purpose in earning this license. This makes it more likely that I'll funnel into EIP, because it's easy and because I haven't really thought about what I would do instead. Grades aren't the only reason I haven't set about designing an alternative, but they are a part of it. | | | But this may not be a bad thing. If we don't care about grades, and we have the opportunity to pick our own classes, clinics, seminars, etc, then maybe we will have the opportunity to get the experience we SHOULD be getting out of law school. Maybe we'll be able to focus on doing the work we want to do and learning the things we want to learn. That's what I'm HOPING will happen to me as a 2L and 3L, but I know that pressure to take courses like Corporations, Admin Law, Taxation, etc will crowd out a lot of room for studying what I really want to study, and I may just end up in classes that I don't care about. Hopefully we will all be able to strike a balance.
-- JasonPyke - 17 Apr 2012 | |
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> | As a child growing up in a single-mom, Jewish household, the message was loud and clear that the signaling factor grades/standardized tests provide are what matter - high school grades and SAT's will open the door to a good college, college grades and LSATs will open the door to a good law school, 1L law school grades will open the door to a good job afterwards, a good job will open all the other doors I could possibly want. But here I am, almost at the end of the hallway, and I've completely lost my steam. I constantly find myself thinking "when will it be enough? When will I walk through the last door?"
Today Ben roughly said (Ben - please correct me if I misquoted)"We keep striving for good grades so as to keep all our doors open." I realized what actually scares me is not having some of those doors start to close. I've become so focused on walking into a room full of open doors that I stopped looking for the door to my home. I've become so swept up in making sure all my options are open it's become much too long since I stopped to think about what option I want to be open. It's an injustice I've done to myself.
In the beginning I thought this class was supposed to be about looking for injustice in the rest of society, and I thought I was being selfish for concentrating so much on myself, and relating our readings to my experiences. At a point I stopped berating myself and let the class be about the injustice I feel I've experienced, how I've been complicit, and how to fix it. I am incredibly grateful because Professor Moglen has made me realize I've opened enough doors for myself at this point, and it's time to start re-focusing my attention and effort on picking the right door. Agnes I find your confidence in yourself encouraging, inspiring, and beautiful. I too entered law school after spending a number of years working at a Big Law firm - thus I entered knowing I don't want to work at a Big Law firm after school. But I still got swept up in the focus on grades and keeping my options open. I am trying now to re-focus my attention on creating a plan for myself where I can pay back my loans while simultaneously doing sidework that puts me in a good position to start the type of practice I want to start after leaving a job that pays my bills. Similarly, I am trying to approach this semester with the same mentality - I haven't totally shed my anxiety about grades and I am going to try to do well this semester, but I'm trying to focus more on learning who I need to meet and make a connection with next year so that I may sail my own ship.
-- SkylarPolansky - 17 Apr 2012
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