“Should I go to law school?,” she asked.
My response, “Girl, I don’t know.”
That’s the truth.
Though I went to law school, I’m in no position to determine for someone else if it’s right for them, too. It’s a big decision and one that every future law student needs to decide for themselves.
Conversations like these are what led me to develop a workbook to help college students, and maybe even college graduates, dream about what their future can look like and pinpoint their values and passions.
There are so many reasons someone may want to apply to law school and they can range from, “my parents want me to be a lawyer,” “I majored in Political Science so it seems that law school is the next step,” to “I want to be a politician one day and many politicians are lawyers” to “I just want to make a lot of money.” I’ve heard all of these types of responses and more from college students or college grads. Whatever motivates you to prepare your law school applications and get through law school is personal to you and only you know what that can be.
The decision to embark on a legal education is challenging for a number of reasons, especially because you simply don’t know what you don’t know and there are so many ways to make mistakes. If you didn’t grow up around lawyers, you’re left wondering what law school or law practice are really like. Whether we like it or not, TV and movies are what give most people a glimpse, as far off as it may be, into the life of a lawyer or what legal practice can be. For first generation college students, these concerns are magnified.
So how do you make an informed decision into whether law school and, thereafter, a legal career are right for you? While I don’t know what your ultimate decision should be, I do know that law school is a heavy investment.
If you’re thinking about law school, you should do your research. If you’re first gen (a first generation college student or college graduate) and want to gain exposure to law school or legal careers, I encourage you explore pre-law programs and pipelines. This way, you can learn from people who are “in the know” and can show you what’s up in real life. If you want to read more about pre-law fellowship programs, check out my blog post, Considering Law School?: The Value of Pre-Law Fellowship Programs.
I recognize that not everyone who wants to learn can be accepted into a pre-law program and may be in need of other resources to help them think about whether law school is right for you.
So, I developed a workbook to help college students or college graduates work through some exercises to figure out if law school and a career in law may be right for you: Do You Want To Be A Lawyer? Workbook.
I wish I felt confident enough to create a survey of binary questions for you to answer a simple “yes” or “no” that would then spit out a response of either: “Yes, you should go to law school” or “No, you should not go to law school.” But I don’t. Instead, I created a series of prompts and exercises to help you figure out what’s important to you and if a legal education and career in law have a place in your future life.
My hope is that, at best, a decision to attend law school and pursue a career in law aligns with your goals, values, and passions and that a legal career enables you to build the life you want in the future. I hope that a legal education and career are tools to help you lead the life you want; not that law practice becomes your entire life.
At the suggestion of someone who I talked to when he was trying to figure out if he should disrupt his successful career to go to law school, I created the workbook as a paid resource. He shared that he would have paid for my time and he thinks others would, too. It stuck with me. Then when I realized that it costs money to even host this blog site, I figured I’d give it a go and try to sell a few products a year to offset my blog-related expenses. It turns out that I’m not good at charging people because I often give the workbooks away for free to people who reach out to me. Oh, well.
My goal, ultimately, is to help people learn from my mistakes and my successes by offering the guidance or tips I wish I would have received when I was back in their shoes: thinking about applying to law school, figuring out internships, applying to scholarships, navigating student loans, and figuring out job applications and job offers.
Over the next few months, I’m going to take portions of those workbooks and publish them on the blog for free (yes, again).
If you can’t wait and want to go through the exercises, you can check out my online shop for my workbooks:
- Do You Want To Be A Lawyer? Workbook
- Financial Planning for Aspiring & New Lawyers (Workbook)
- Financial Planning for Future Lawyers: Law School Application Costs (Workbook)
- Financial Planning for Law Students: Managing Law School Expenses and Scholarships
- Financial Planning for New Lawyers: A Guide to Understanding Student Loan Repayment & Easy Budgeting
As always, if there are questions or issues popping off that you’d like to take a look at and possibly address through the blog, feel free to comment on this blog post. And if you know someone who is thinking about law school, whether now or in the distant future, encourage them to subscribe to the blog or follow me on LinkedIn to check out what I share.
To bright new beginnings …
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