Overheard in Wills & Trusts

Professor: "All law school and no TV makes Jack and Jill dull people."

Ok, there you have it. I'm allowed to watch TV to better myself......

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Then, in discussing Marvin actions, and how homosexual couples can use those to get around intestacy rules:

Professor: "So they can use this to get in the back door......uh.....I mean, they can use this to get the person's assets.....um......I can't even say any of this!"

Overheard in Remedies

In discussing the popularity of replacement cost insurance, because sometimes the fair market value isn't enough to replace the item that would lost.....

Professor: "Where would you go to buy a 5-6 year old sofa? And when you get there, how much would you want it?"

Sigh......

She's gone. I woke up yesterday morning at 3:30, even though my alarm was set for 5:30. My son and I got home from taking her to the airport about 7. I just hate going into her empty room. She's not even going to come home for Thanksgiving this year. It's just too hard to spend two days traveling for a four day weekend. So, it's four months until I see her again.

For all my thinking that I'm not as emotional as most other females, I certainly don't seem to stay in that category when it involves my kids. I just can't help it. Being a mom is the only thing I really wanted to do since I was little. Yeah, I'm on my way to becoming a lawyer now, but that whole thing is just a recent idea. Nothing I had dreamed about for years. So it's just hard to have what makes you a mom being so far away, and once again, not really needing you a whole lot.

Somehow I thought that because this was her second year away it would be a little easier. Yeah, I didn't cry quite as much at the airport yesterday as I did last year, but I'm still crying today. Ok, so four months.....let the countdown begin.

One Week Down

And I'm still alive, despite having 5 classes and working 20 hours (and however many hours of commuting between 3 places, all a half hour apart). It wasn't really bad. Ok, so I'm tired and wish I could sleep for more than 6 hours at a time, but it's not as bad as I thought.

I absolutely LOVE my new internship at the US Attorney's office! It's the kind of thing that even though I'm going to be working 20 hours a week there, I feel like I could easily work 40, and still not get everything done, but still love it as much. It's hard to explain exactly WHY I like it so much. Everyone there is very nice and helpful; I am given REAL stuff to do; it is interesting; I feel like I'm learning tons of stuff; the building is beautiful.........honestly, I cannot think of any internship that I'd rather be doing this year. I feel so incredibly fortunate to have this one!

For this weekend, I need to do a little reading, and a written assignment for Advanced Research and Writing. Hopefully I will get that all wrapped up in a few hours tomorrow. Then I need to spend the rest of the weekend going over materials for my Sept. 17th trial. I'm probably going down to Bakersfield this coming week to interview and prepare my witnesses for trial, so I need to get all that stuff organized.

The sad thing for me is that my daughter is leaving to go back to school tomorrow morning. While I'm thrilled that she is well enough to go, it is still extremely hard to let her go, especially after all that she has gone through this summer. I will admit that I didn't mind having to "take care" of her this summer. I haven't felt needed by her in a long time, and as a mom, I relish playing that role and actually getting the chance to do things for her. The scan she had the other day showed that the cancer did not spread, but just keep her in your prayers that she will continue to do well. I'm not sure I'm ready to have her leave just yet. Unfortunately, I don't have any choice.

At least I'll be so busy the next 4 months that it will fly by, and hopefully before I know it, I'll be picking her up and it will be Christmas......

Overheard in Wills & Trusts

In discussing how the law should respond to changes in the population:

Professor: "......gay relationships.....there's a lot of untapped things out there......."

And then, not kidding, we read the case of "Estate of Swallow". (Note: this case was NOT about a gay couple!)

Overheard in Remedies

Professor: Now that we charge so much to go to school here, I've upgraded my vocabulary. A couple years ago I stopped using the word "model". Now I only use "paradigm".

Clueless, but happy

That is how I feel in my new internship. There's like a million and one things I'm trying to take in, and feel like I'm not catching all but a couple of them, but I totally love every second of it! In the last couple days I've met a couple of the magistrate judges and gotten to speak to them in their chambers. Both have been Moot Court judges, and it was nice to talk to them in less adversarial situations. The judge I met today has an incredible view from her chambers! She was quite pleased to be able to show it off, and really friendly to me too, so I'm hoping I might get the chance to talk with her more later.

I'm quite happy and proud to be representing our country in my new position, and honestly, when people make comments about "working for the dark side", it is disturbing to me. I'm seeking justice, and if I do my job, that will happen, regardless of whether there are convictions or not. I guess not everyone sees it the same way. Anyway, I am absolutely thrilled to have this opportunity and just am trying to take it all in and learn as much as I can, as fast as I can. The hardest part is that I want to spend more time there and less time at school. I can tell already that it will be hard to keep my motivation for school up because my heart has left and gone on.

My classes so far are ok. My Remedies professor was my Contracts professor in first year, and he is always entertaining, even though he never lets us out early and always shows up exactly 7 minutes late for class (which makes me wonder, why, if he can be so consistent, can't he reset his clocks, body, or whatever, and show up on time????). My Advanced Research and Writing class only meets 6 times, and I like the professor, so that shouldn't be too bad. (At least it won't take me as much time or effort as writing a Law Review article!) I had Evidence this afternoon and was glad to see more people I knew in there than I thought I would. I think that will be a good class, though I'm nervous about having to miss a couple classes for my trial and trial prep next month.

Tomorrow is my long day- working in the morning and 2 classes later, both Community Property and Wills & Trusts. I know the CP professor, though I have heard this class is surprisingly difficult. I have no clue about the W&T professor. Of course, by 6:30pm on Thursday night, I doubt anyone could interest me in much of anything. Since I have absolutely no interest in ever drafting a will or trust for anyone, this professor has quite a challenge if he expects me to have an interest in this topic.

Thursdays will be long and tough, so it is nice that on Fridays I'm only working the mornings with the afternoons free for errands and appointments. Because my daughter is flying back to MIT early Saturday, I'm not attending the Back to School dinner on Friday night. There is just no one at school I'd rather spend that time with than her. (Sorry!) I won't see her for 4 months, and I'll see everyone else all semester long, so she wins, hands down!

Anyway, I am definitely not into the new routine yet. I think it will take a few weeks, but I'm already enjoying it, even if I don't know why....

Second Year Recap

This is not going to be as extensive as my thoughts on the first year of law school, but I figured the second year did warrant some comments. First of all, just be prepared for lots of work. If you make it to second year, you know the drill. So it's not really a surprise, but the different classes and professors mean a slight adjustment to figure out what they want. But other than that, it is mostly just a ton of work.

I know I said before that I was told about law school-- "The first year they scare you to death, the second year they work you to death, and the third year they bore you to death." That has been entirely too true in my experience. (And in reading for Wills and Trusts, I see that the third year prediction seems to be right on as well!)

During the second year, I was not as idealistic as in my first year. Meaning this- I did not read every assignment (oh, shocking!). And I did not do a written brief for ANY case I read. Of course, I did make notes in my text books IF I knew there was any possibility I would be called on (you figure out really quickly each professor's system and don't bother wasting time reading if you know there is no chance you will be called on).

Study groups took on much less priority as well. My study group was reduced to a single study partner, and we really only got together to study a few times during the year. I think we were really more emotional support for each other. Our schedules didn't really allow for weekly study times (as my first year group had), so you just do what you can.

Because there were clinical units to be done in the second year, and the extra classes, time is really at a premium. It's not how I like to work, but really, you have to figure out what you MUST read, what you WANT to read, and what you can afford not to read. For me, I would read Con Law and Bus. Org. if I knew I was going to be called on that week. For Con. Law, the professor was kind enough to warn us the week before. For Bus. Org, you had to keep track where in the alphabetical listing the professor was and hope too many people ahead of you didn't "pass". That means you end up having to read for more weeks than you would like, but he likes to embarrass students, so better to spend the extra time reading than be publicly humiliated. I read Property every week just because I liked it and I admired the professor, so I didn't want to ever be unprepared in her class. For Crim. Law and Procedure, I started out reading every week, but the assignments were SO long that I ended up only reading when I had the time or knew I would be called on (again, with a week's notice!). For Tax, I read the first week and realized I had wasted hours doing so because after reading it I had no idea what I had just read. So I didn't read another assignment the entire semester and yet got the highest grade of my year in there! Seriously, do NOT waste your time reading tax. Email me for the class notes, and just follow along when you are in there. The final is open book, and you can write all your notes in the book and be done with it! I always read for Crim. Trial Practice and always spent lots of time preparing for that class because, even though it was only pass/fail, I wanted to actually learn this, and I found it very interesting. None of that was a waste as I'm actually going to use all of it during this year's internship at the US Attorney's office.

As a second year, you do seem to have a bit more credibility though. Some professors won't even talk to first years, since so many don't make it. So, if you can make it to second year, you have proved yourself. It's kind of strange too because at the beginning of the year the school has sign ups for on campus interviews. You're used to being an almost "non-person" as a first year, and then you're getting emails saying you should sign up. I ignored the first ones, thinking they weren't for me until I spoke to someone in administration and realized that since I hadn't interviewed for a job in about 15 years, just going through that process would be a good exercise for me. Getting my resume updated (um, I mean, constructing a brand new one) was good to do, and I did get picked to interview with 2 of the companies I submitted resumes to. I didn't make it past the first interviews, but that was all fine with me because I didn't want to practice that kind of law anyway, and with the other things that happened this summer, it would have been a disaster if I had gotten one of those jobs. So, if you are in your second year, DO consider participating in the on campus interviews. If nothing else, it will motivate you to update your resume and get some practice interviewing. If you're lucky, you may end up with a summer internship! (If you don't, don't worry, because there will be tons of opportunities for other ones later.)

It also seemed to me that most people who had no idea what kind of law they wanted to practice as a first year, had gotten some inspiration and now have direction. Not everyone, mind you, but in general, people seem to know where they are headed by the end of the second year. Try to take some electives to either help you make up your mind, or expose yourself to areas you may be considering if you're in your second year. Taking Crim. Trial Practice sealed the deal for me. There was no way after taking that class that I would consider being anything OTHER than a prosecutor.

Well, that's probably not everything, but it's all I can think of right now. BTW, I did finish my reading for the first 2 weeks of classes. : ) Tomorrow I start at the US Attorney's office. I'm so excited! I'm sure the first day will be lots of the normal first day stuff, but I actually have tons of things I need to work on for my trial next month, so I'm very anxious to get started on all of that.

I can't remember if I posted my schedule before or not (and I'm too lazy to go back and check). I will have classes Tues. afternoon and evening, Wednesday afternoon, and Thursday afternoon and evening. I'm also working 20 hours a week. So yeah, I'm going to be busy and not home a whole lot. I anticipate I'll be doing most of my reading on weekends. Oh well, a semester goes by quickly!

Good luck to everyone this year! Looking forward to seeing all my classmates again....

Always a Mother

Ah, the last weekend before my final year of law school begins. Of course, not like I have anything planned, other than hoping to read 100 pages of Evidence, Wills & Trusts, and Community Property, which would then put me 2 weeks ahead of my reading. (You KNOW how much I love to be ahead!) Not sure it will happen though.

This summer hasn't exactly been what I hoped it would be. I knew it would be busy, with 3 summer school classes and the internship at the DA's office. But all the stuff with my daughter has really trumped all of that- in my time, my emotions, my thoughts.

I thought I'd have time to do fun things with her, go out of town together, and just enjoy having the time to talk and hang out. That didn't happen. She's basically been in bed for the last month in recovery. And now, assuming she gets her strength back, she's leaving in a week to go back to school. It about rips my heart out to even think about it.

But if a child of mine needs me, there is nothing on earth I'd rather do than be there and do anything and everything they want me to. And in that way, I'm glad that I was the one to be here for my daughter and take care of her. I guess that's how it is. No matter what else I do, being a mother will always be my most important job.

Bit by Bit

I read my Remedies assignment yesterday, and finished Wills and Trusts today. I had already done Community Property a couple weeks ago, and there is no first assignment for Advanced Research and Writing, so all I have left is to finish Evidence. I admit I "saved" it for last because I was liking it and wanted to get all the yucky ones out of the way before I finished it. The 70 pages of it that I've read already were like a review of my Criminal Trial Practice class, which was my favorite class in law school so far.

Of course, then we have Will and Trusts. I'm only 34 pages into that book and already I can barely take it. I think this class will be on the same level as Tax. How I will ever survive a whole year of that is beyond me! To make matters worse, the class is Thursday nights from 6:30-9:30pm, the absolute worst time slot available! I can only hope the professor has some magical way of making this class interesting.

BTW, I realized I never did a "second year reflection" type of post. I'll either do that in the next week before my third year classes start, or I'll just forget it. We'll see how ambitious I am.

Ok, so THAT'S over...

and I don't need to think about the MPRE for 5 weeks, which is when we will get our scores. I honestly have NO idea if I did well enough to pass. I'm not too worried. If I didn't, I'll just go up to SF for the Nov. 3 test and maybe make a weekend out of it.

I'm giving myself the rest of the day off, but I do want to get a lot of my reading done over the weekend. I've got some medical stuff I will need to deal with next week, so better to not count on that time. I also really need to reread my trial book and class notes to make sure I remember everything because my trial is just over a month away now. How cool is that!

I can't even tell you how excited I am that I'm going to be working at the federal courthouse. The building is just two years old now and it is completely gorgeous! This photo doesn't do it justice at all. And the inside, well, they just really did a nice job on it. It is especially gratifying to see a building in downtown that doesn't look like it came out of the 60s! I know it will be quite hard to leave it next year and end up in the pathetic building that houses the Superior Court, but I'll deal with that later. I guess I should run. I still need to do all those mundane chores around here before I can enjoy some relaxation.

How Many Do I Need To Answer Correctly to Pass the MPRE?

I had to post a quick comment because I just looked and saw a TON of hits today from people who found my blog using this type of question. The easy answer is NO ONE KNOWS! Only 50 of the 60 questions will count for your score. Normally, that would mean of those 50, you'd need to get 40 right for an 80% (no way to get a 79% exactly with 50 questions). However, as I explained in my post earlier today, the graders can decide to add or subtract from all test takers scores if as a whole the scores are better or worse than "normal". Add to that the fact that there are those 10 uncounted questions in there, and there is no definite answer.

My best guess is that if you have 50 of the 60 right, you'll be ok. Even if you got all the uncounted ones right, and missed 10 of the actual questions, you'd have an 80%, so chances are you'd be ok. It is highly unlikely that you would have gotten all 10 of the ones you missed in the uncounted group AND at the same time, have the test judged "too easy" and everyone's score docked by 2 or more points. Yeah, so that's my best advice- get at least 50 right!

I think Barbri HATES me!

I have been using Barbri's Professional Responsibility book to prepare for tomorrow's MPRE. In addition to both detailed and mini outlines, it contains 4 practice tests. I did all 4 and got scores of: 70%, 66%, 60% and 68%. So how is it possible when I took the sample test actually provided by NCBE tonight I got an 87%??? I have no idea, other than I hated the Barbri versions! Too many questions had more than one correct answer, and I often picked a correct one, but not the "best" one, according to Barbri. That really sucks. I'm hoping the real test is more like the last one I took tonight. Anyway, I have 60 more questions I'm saving to do in the morning before I head over to take the test at noon.

All the rest of the assignments for my classes have been posted, so this weekend I will continue working on that reading. I was pleasantly surprised to see that my Advanced Research and Writing class only meets 6 times and only has 5 graded assignments. I also got preliminary approval from my supervising attorney at the US Attorney's office to work the hours I requested. I know this fall will be extremely busy, but I'm excited and can't wait to get started!

No Offense.....

but I hope everyone who is taking the MPRE with me on Friday is stupid and/or didn't study and/or doesn't do well. Let me explain....

Here's the official statement of how the tests are scored: "Your scaled score is a standard score. The standard score scale ranges from 50 (low) to 150 (high). The mean (average) scaled score was established at 100, based upon the performance of the examinees who took the MPRE in March 1999.

The conversion of raw scores to scaled scores involves a statistical process that adjusts for variations in the difficulty of different forms of the examination so that any particular scaled score will represent the same level of knowledge from test to test. For instance, if a test were more difficult than previous tests, then the scaled scores on that test would be adjusted upward to account for this difference. If a test were easier than previous tests, then the scaled scores on the test would be adjusted downward to account for this difference. The purpose of these adjustments is to help ensure that no examinee is unfairly penalized (or rewarded) for taking a more (or less) difficult form of the test."

A brilliant friend of mine explained that to me, since I had no idea what it was trying to say. Basically, if as a whole, the test takers do better than the "average" spread, they will lower ALL of our scores. (They assume we did better because the test was "easier", not because we were smarter or better prepared, as a group.) If as a whole the test takers do worse, they will raise all of our scores, assuming the test was harder (and not that we are dumber than average).

Now if you don't understand that, I can only hope that you ARE taking the test on Friday!

Ugh! I Hate Practice Tests!

I've taken 3 practice tests today- 2 full length (60 questions) ones and the 25 question one that is at the end of the MPRE info booklet. I've gotten from 60-70% on them. It's SO frustrating because I feel like I know the rules but the questions are so twisted. There will be 2 answers basically saying "yes" and 2 saying "no", BUT, then each goes on to say something like, "UNLESS blah blah blah" or "BECAUSE blah blah blah". After a while, your mind gets so confused you can hardly figure out what the answer means, much less what the correct one is.

You need to get a 79 to pass, and at this rate, I don't have a lot of confidence that I will. I can take it again (as many times as I need to), and there is another time in November, though I'd have to travel to Sacramento, San Francisco, LA or San Diego to do so. Of course, if I fail both of those times, I would then need an 86 to pass, as they are changing the minimum scores required to pass as of January.

I have 3 more practice tests I can take and 2 full days with no obligations. I hope I start to figure this out....

MPRE

I spent today studying for the MPRE. At least when I read through the Barbri outline, it all seemed familiar. ; ) I have that feeling that, like most of the exams I take, I'm not going to have enough time to prepare for this as much as I would like. But, you know, life just intrudes on your plans sometimes. Well, most of the times. At least in my life.

At least the only real thing I have to do this week is take my son for his senior pictures tomorrow. And supervise the photographer who is coming to take pictures of the house afterwards. And cook my daughter special low iodine meals for the diet she is on until August 17. Yeah, no distractions here.

I guess I should get back to some practice tests. I am getting more right than I get wrong, but still not a high enough percentage to make me happy. That's where the practice helps, I hope.

It's Official!

Yes, I'm officially in my final year of law school now. The designation becomes official (according to me) once the school moves your student mailbox over into the next section, advancing you up a year. My new box is in the 4th Year/Graduating Students section. (My school offers 3, 4 and 5 year programs, unlike most law schools that offer the standard 3 year plan.)

It also appears that I have finished my internship at the DA's office. I went in this morning and tied up all loose ends and after an hour, had nothing to do. They had nothing for me to work on and were all going to court. I ended up coming home at lunch time and it doesn't look like I'm going in tomorrow, as it takes them time to think of a project for me to do, especially one I'll only be able to work on for a few hours. I've loved working there and hope I'll see everyone next year after graduating.

Anyway, I have an appointment with a federal agent later this afternoon. According to him, he has been "tasked with interviewing [me] for your background check" for the US Attorney's office. When the DA did this, the investigator talked to me on the phone for about 5 minutes. This interview is supposed to take 2 hours! I have no idea what he's going to ask me about. I filled out all the forms so long ago (May??), I can't even remember what I said on any of them. I turned in all my forms, did the drug test, the agent has quizzed my neighbors. I'm hoping they are almost done. I want to be able to start August 20 and not have to wait for approval or anything.

Looks like I have 2 weeks off until classes start.

Moot Court Feedback

I found out the score sheets were in our mailboxes at school, so I made a quick trip over there to pick mine up. What fun! Since I argued in 4 separate sessions, I had 12 judges make evaluations of my performances. I went through and labeled each one, so I could remember which session each was from.

While I received high scores in all categories, all around, I will comment on a few. The score guide says:
70 = acceptable/ professional quality
80= very good
90= outstanding or superior
100= maximum possible

Judge O'Neill, the chief justice for the semi-final round and a federal court judge here in town, was the hardest of any of the judges, in my opinion. He gave me an 88 in "general appearance" (which includes poise, self confidence, professional demeanor, good eye contact, and good posture), and 85 in everything else (handling of the facts, handling of the law, analytical/conceptual ability, responses to questions, and overall argument). Hard not to be happy with that.

But it gets better! Judge Ishii, who is another federal court judge here, was the chief justice for the final round. He gave me a 90 for analytical/conceptual ability and handling of the law, a 95 for general appearance, handling of the facts, and overall argument, and a PERFECT 100 on responses to questions! WOW! Considering that Moot Court is all about your ability to respond to questions, that I got a 100 on that from the chief justice in the final round is about as much as I could have asked for! Yeah!!!

Jail House Blues

I spent about 12 hours over the last 2 days listening to recordings of jail telephone conversations and correcting transcripts of them, and then getting them all indexed, organized, and into one document. The more I listened, the more I hated the defendant, and the more I wanted to help the person he was talking to. It's hard not to sit there and wonder about things- how did this person end up this way? How can he treat her that way and not even care what happens to her? How can she keep taking it?

Anyway, despite that, I was pretty proud of how nicely I organized it all. It was a complete mess when I got it- 2 binders of transcripts, more than a dozen CDs of recordings, some duplicates. Each transcript had quite a number of errors and omissions in it. Certain things were noted as "inaudible", but I could make some of them out. After making all those corrections, I then had to do so on the electronic versions, and merge those 2 differently styled documents into one cohesive one. I had to then get all the CDs organized so they made sense- got them all labeled and indexed. Now, no matter WHO does this trial and WHEN they do it, all of the transcripts and recordings will make sense and be easy to locate. Gosh, I love a good project!

The rest of summer school grades (for my classes, at least) were posted yesterday. Got fantastic grades in Moot Court (well, duh!) and Family Law Mediation! I need to email the school and find out about our score sheets from Moot Court. I am anxious to see the comments on mine, so am wondering if we can get those yet.

I should run. Another doctor's appointment this morning, and then working this afternoon.