| | 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. | | | I know that it can't be that simple, and I know I need to use creativity to somehow make it all work out. At the moment however, it seems a bit daunting. r4 - 17 Apr 2012 - 20:38:07 - JacquelineRios? | |
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< | Jessica- Thanks for the link. It is interesting to hear how students at other law schools are handling EIP, and that they are facing some of the same issues Columbia students are struggling with. | | | Agnes- Coming to law school, I wasn't aware of the prevalence of firms and actually thought that most students did not end up working at firms upon graduation. Although I hear your first point about people selling out at a firm for the training and then trying to transition to public interest, I question how far fetched this thinking is. Early in this course we talked about where the belief of needing to go to a firm first comes from. Some may say, the fact that students do not receive the training they need while in law school makes students take up work at a firm. Unfortunately, I do not think this idea is completely far-flung. There is the practical standpoint that many public interest employers take in regards to limited resources. To train a budding lawyer often requires time and money. Time and money are often limited resources for public interest employers. The few public interest attorneys that I have spoken with have actually suggested going to a firm first to gain experience and skills. But perhaps this is also a question of being able to cover one's nut? Similar to Jacqueline's point, perhaps it is possible to find a lesser known public interest gig that will pay less but is willing to invest in you- but I'd imagine those are hard extremely hard to come by.
Are our institutions of higher education cognizant of this disconnect? I believe they are well aware. Professor Moglen's comment today about the nonsensical structure of our curriculum perhaps gives credence to this point. By structuring the curriculum in a way in which courses build off of one another, and by providing students with opportunities to perfect the art of lawyering (rather than perfecting the arbitrary art of taking a law school exam), law schools would be producing lawyers who are better equipped to practice soon after graduation (which I assumed was what we were paying for). But by not providing or limiting these opportunities and basing the curriculum on the convenience of the faculty (ie torts in the second semester, property in the first), students continue to need to sell their time to the private sector so that law schools have a packaged product to offer firms and US World News Report- canned meat balls if you prefer. -- AbiolaFasehun - 17 Apr 2012 | |
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Jessica, I just wanted to second Agnes and say thank you for sharing the campaign - it's fantastic!
I agree with many of you that grades act as a security blanket and as Ben discussed in class today, a way to keep as many potential career options on the table as possible. But I find it interesting that there seemed to be an undertone in the conversation, in class and now, that good grades equal EIP. I think they are two separate issues, both of which are completely engrained in Columbia and obviously other law schools as well.
First, the pressure for good grades comes from all spheres of the legal world. I had just as many public interest organizations as big law firms ask for my transcript in this last set of interviews and the pressure to be on Law Review extends to students interested in a spectrum of issues ranging from human rights to corporate transactions. From the moment we start Legal Methods and hear that it only gets much, much worse to the subtle reminders about the Curve, we are inundated with the importance of getting that A, regardless of what kind of career path we have in mind. And in the event that we are fortunate enough to find a professor or some other mentor within the law school, it's a little disheartening that whatever they may say about grades, they definitely got good ones. Now there's definitely something to say for Eben's method of hiring lawyers sans transcripts but my limited experience shows that the practice doesn't extend to every non-EIP organization.
Second, while grades obviously play an important role for students participating in EIP, I think that the Early Interview Program is a separate institutionalized problem. I agree with Jacqueline that as students, we are presented with very few options for covering our student loans apart from selling our souls to law firms or finding a practice within the confines of LRAP. And I also agree with Abiola that the class structure and lack of practical experience opportunities plays a part in the mentality that we need to be trained in the law when we graduate. But this required "field training" after paying $150,000 to learn the law, seems like a disconnect. Regarding the validity of the mentality that it is a necessary fork in the road to public interest work, I have no idea but it seems suspect.
My biggest issue with the grading system is the lack of feedback and the entirety of the grade relying on a single exam. I understand needing some way to evaluate students and possibly separate them based on varying levels of effort, comprehension, and eventual performance, because in a perfect world those measurements would be part of a larger number of indicators of future success. But obviously something is wrong with our current system. Students know it, teachers know it, and practicing lawyers know it. Recent grading system experimentation even suggests that law schools know it. I mentioned in class today that I believe the general lack of feedback in this system generates fear due to uncertainty. And as Eben pointed out, if a grade doesn't accurately reflect your knowledge of the material then it isn't teaching. Thus, the system fails in attempting to distinguish those students who really get it, from the ones who happened to reread the critical footnote the night before. I guess at the end of the day, I'm finding less of an issue with having grades and the Curve, and more of an issue with the teaching (or lack thereof) that it promotes.
-- AlexandraRex - 17 Apr 2012 |
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