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CarolynLawrence
Administrator
| Joined: | Sun Mar 5th, 2006 |
| Location: | USA |
| Posts: | 3191 |
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Posted: Sat Jun 9th, 2007 05:37 am |
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This is from a blurb in the Chronicle of Higher Education for anyone who has a child contemplating the LSATs. 
A glance at the current issue of Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin: The maddening effects of law school
Research suggests that law school has a corrosive effect on the well-being, values, and motivation of students, say Kennon M. Sheldon, an associate professor of psychology at the University of Missouri at Columbia, and Lawrence S. Krieger, a law professor at Florida State University. "Indeed, the emotional distress of law students appears to significantly exceed that of medical students and at times approach that of psychiatric populations," they write. Law schools can mitigate this phenomenon, they have found, by "enhancing their students' feelings of autonomy."
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Wendy (wjb)
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| Joined: | Sun Mar 5th, 2006 |
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Posted: Sat Jun 9th, 2007 01:36 pm |
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Brings back fond memories. Not. My first year of law school (back in the late 70s) was unqestionably the most stressful of my life. The Socratic method, as practiced by law school professors, is designed in part to intimidate students. Don't know why it has to be that way, but it is. The element of raw terror diminishes after the first year, when you realize that you're going to survive.
I practiced law for nearly 25 years, and can't say I ever really enjoyed it. (I did however, hammer out a great part-time position with my firm after my oldest was born, which lasted for almost 20 years, when I decided I'd had enough. For that I'm grateful.) I think my kids have imbibed the message that too many lawyers are dissatisfied with practicing law. I hope neither of them goes to law school.
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Chedva
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Posted: Sat Jun 9th, 2007 03:11 pm |
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Maybe it's because I got my master's first, so I had already been in a graduate school environment and was used to being treated professionally, but I actually enjoyed law school. My learning style is such that my brain doesn't really "turn on" until I'm asked a question and a discussion begins, so the Socratic method worked well for me. Practicing law, on the other hand -- I only practiced for 15 years.
H is also a lawyer. D, despite her analytic and debating abilities, is running away from law school as fast as she can.
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CalifCarolyn
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| Joined: | Tue Apr 4th, 2006 |
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Posted: Sat Jun 9th, 2007 03:19 pm |
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I am sending this on to D1 who is going back and forth between Law School and an MBA 
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jocelynDAD
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Posted: Sat Jun 9th, 2007 03:52 pm |
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Law School was a blast for me, but then I have always liked the Socratic approach.
Since I was already in a career and took law studies to supplement my chosen path, it was not as tramatic as for some of my classmates. I went to an evening law school (Suffolk in Boston) and the fallout from the first year to the second was significant. Many could not give the time and attention needed.
I do agree that the practice of Law can be very disappointing to many. SInce I was already implanted in a career (COnstruction and Aerospace Projects and Management) - I did not suffer the slings and arrows that plague so many beginning attorneys. 
Howsoever, knowledge of the Law and the training at Law School can be invaluable in business and other pursues - so in advising our children, don't give them too negative a slant on Law Studies.
Howqever, would I like to hang a shingle and wait for the fools and worse of the world to darken my doorstep, NO!
Would I like to start in a large law firm as an associate and struggle with 80 hour weeks for 6 or more years - NO!
Having a plan and a goal is to my mind essential to the study of law. My S1 has a law degree and a CPA and is very active in investment management,
The study of law can open many doors, not just representing clients in court or companies in clerk like positions. 
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Wendy (wjb)
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Posted: Sat Jun 9th, 2007 07:19 pm |
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I do agree that law students learn a unique approach to problem solving that helps immeasurably in almost any career and in life in general: We're trained to look at a problem from all angles before reaching a solution.
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GladHi
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| Joined: | Wed Jun 21st, 2006 |
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Posted: Sun Jun 10th, 2007 04:06 am |
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There do seem to be a lot of lawyers and ex-lawyers on this board. Personally, I loved law school, but my school (then University of Puget Sound, now Seattle U.) did not have the cutthroat competitive atmosphere of some. However, the fall of my second year, when I had to juggle classes, law review, part-time work, and interviewing for summer internships, is when I developed Type I diabetes. I definitely felt highly stressed at the time, and I had to drop a class to manage the load. I enjoyed practicing law, including my first 6 years in a large Philadelphia law firm. I was a lawyer for 18 years (in litigation), and I am still in the legal field doing a job that I love.
My older daughter, who is at the same college I went to, majoring in English Lit as I did, and who just returned from the same study abroad program in London that I went on 27 years ago, says her greatest fear is that she will go to law school. I told her that no one is going to force her to go. I am the only one in my family of 7 siblings to have gone to law school, and I certainly don't expect either of my daughters to follow in my footsteps (H is an Econ prof., and they are even less likely to pursue that career). I hope each of them finds work they are passionate about.
Someone once told me that lawyers are "the last of the generalists." I think that's true--I have learned a lot about many different subjects during the course of my legal career.
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atlantamom
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| Joined: | Tue Mar 7th, 2006 |
| Location: | Illinois USA |
| Posts: | 112 |
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Posted: Sun Jun 10th, 2007 02:11 pm |
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I wonder about this study, about what it actually means.
Years ago I was a clinical psychology PhD student who did therapy in the school counseling center. Thinking back on that time, I remember we did see more law students than any other group.
Years later, I went to law school. I had a wonderful experience, but like some others on this board I was supplementing a career. As it turned out, I left that career to be a litigating attorney after a two-year stint in a beautiful law clerkship with a federal judge.
What I wonder about is whether the "psychological troubles" of law students should be attributed to the law school environment. I wonder if it is caused more by inadequate emotional preparation for law school and the practice of law.
With trepidation I say that I think most Americans have the wrong idea about law and lawyers. This must affect the expectations of entering law students. I think this is part of the reason so many lawyers are unhappy practicing law. I think law students are more naive about the nature and practice of law than are medical students about the practice of medicine. If people understood better what law (in its many forms) is all about, there might be better self-selection at the onset.
I also wonder if the preparation for law school is inadequate, in the sense that most of these students have not been put on the spot in the way they are put on the spot in law school. I actually believe that a law student better be comfortable being put on the spot because in the real-world practice of law, you need the emotional strength of a lion and the ability to deal with the unexpected, uncontrollable and unfair.Last edited on Sun Jun 10th, 2007 02:12 pm by atlantamom
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Chedva
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Posted: Sun Jun 10th, 2007 02:21 pm |
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All of the above are probably valid, but I also wonder about causation in this study. I think all of us who went to law school had classmates who were there not because they liked the law or wanted to practice or supplement a career, but because "they didn't know what else to do." It was their default career. That itself could be cause of their additional dissatisfaction. Add to that the pressure of the Socratic method, if one's mind doesn't work that way to begin with, and it could be a prescription for disaster.
Students are much less likely to attend medical school "by default."
So the question for me would be, are these students already distressed when they enter law school? Could it be that those with emotional problems choose law school to avoid going out into the cold cruel world, and don't know what they want to study in grad school?
Without reading the study itself, and determining when they first started looking at these students, it's impossible to say. (Can you tell my master's is in epidemiology?  )
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atlantamom
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| Joined: | Tue Mar 7th, 2006 |
| Location: | Illinois USA |
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Posted: Sun Jun 10th, 2007 02:26 pm |
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Chedva,
I agree with you completely.
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WestrnMom
Super Moderator
| Joined: | Fri May 26th, 2006 |
| Location: | West Coast, USA |
| Posts: | 1161 |
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Posted: Sun Jun 10th, 2007 11:56 pm |
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Something else to keep in mind. Students who have mild learning problems, don't read or memorize well, maybe with ADD will run into trouble, possibly for the first time, when they are faced with the reading-intensive coursework in law school. It is much more common than I realized. There are certain study skills and abilities one needs to get through the coursework and pass the bar, including excellent writing skills. The strain of trying to keep up if someone doesn't have those skills can be brutal. I know someone who works solely with law students who have various LDs that might not be apparent in students who study anything else.
Last edited on Sun Jun 10th, 2007 11:56 pm by WestrnMom
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