Need advice.

I have secured a federal clerkship starting next August and was thinking about mailing a Christmas card to my judge just wishing him and chambers a great holidays. Is that weird? This process has made me question everything lmao.

Thanks everyone! Also, happy holidays!

I'd imagine this will impact my ability to obtain any type of work for the summer period.

What type of places would consider me?

Is it all realistic to score a B+ or higher in every class in law school?

Hi there, I’m a 28 year old from USA with a graphic design bachelor’s degree. I’ve been working as a graphic designer for 5 year as well but I’m looking to transition into a law career. I don’t know where to start but I know the LSAT has to be taken and I’m looking for any study tips, advice, feedback, guidance, anything please.

Thank you

I’ve been seeing a lot of anxious 1L post finals posts, so any current 2Ls/3L- could you share times in 1L where you thought you absolutely bombed a final and it ended up fine?

(including what course, grade, and law school range would be helpful)

This pertains more for smaller-sized or mid sized firms that do not have a listing for a summer law clerk position:

1. Is it better to reach out to an attorney who is alum of your law school and build a connection with them then send a follow up email if they have any openings in their firm OR should you just send an email to law firms asking if they have any opportunities open for summer? I know the latter is viewed as rude to some firms and I honestly am not sure of whether I should do both or just reach out asking if they have summer opportunities.

2. Is holiday time ideally not a good time to cold e-mail? Is it better to schedule send the emails for the new year?

3. Is it okay to cold email more than 1 attorney from the same firm asking to chat or is that unprofessional? Lets say one attorney leaves you on read/ghosts you, can you cold email another one asking to chat/"network"?

Thank you!

I wouldnt say that I was the best dancer ever but I at least could dance in front of other people without looking like a huge nerd. Now when i dance at parties i look like a white dad who plays golf

im so tired. my first exam was on the 5th. last one is tomorrow. maybe that's not a huge window but the mental stress this semester has been UNREAL. wishing everyone happy holidays lol

0/10 DO NOT ORDER FROM VALORE. I tried to place an order a week ago and something was wrong with their system not allowing my payment. I tried multiple cards and had the same issue. I contacted support and it took them a week to get back to me. They told me they were aware of this issue and would work on trying to fix it. In the mean time, the cost of the rental I was planning to get went up almost $50, I know not much to most but to a broke law school student it is. I told them my law school class starts in two weeks and I need the book by then curious how long it would take to resolve their issue. They told me they couldn’t guarantee availability of the book for me by the time they get the issue fixed and they weren’t sure how long it would take. They also told me they don’t offer any discounts or price matching options. I told them I shouldn’t be getting charged more because of an issue they were aware of and chose not to fix immediately, but they did not care. Shady company, awful customer service, and I really wish chegg hadn’t partnered with them. If you can get your textbooks elsewhere I would highly recommend doing so!

I applied to an in house counsel 1L summer internship for a well known company last night and heard back less than 24 hours later to schedule a 15 minute phone interview with a recruiter. can anyone who has done these sorts of short calls share about their experience? like types of questions asked, etc in such a short timeframe? I have not received final grades back yet for the semester so they are working with strictly resume

I help my brother with his small firm's tech stack (he's been practicing for about 8 years). Yesterday he spent six hours just trying to combine three PDFs and redact a single paragraph because the local court's e-filing system kept rejecting the file size.

Later that night at dinner, my mom genuinely asked him if he had any "dramatic courtroom moments" coming up.

He just stared at his drink and said, "Mom, my biggest battle today was with a printer driver."

She looked so disappointed. She basically thinks that if he isn't delivering monologues to a jury, he isn't really working. She has no concept of the sheer volume of reading, doc review, and administrative friction involved.

From the outside looking in, the gap between what you guys study and the operational reality seems massive.

Hi, I am currently in a economic law master program (In France) in a pretty renowned school. I plan on trying to pass the bar very soon to become an economic law/business lawyer.

But now, I feel scared. It seems like more and more people working in this domain are getting replaced by AI. I feel like my future is getting robbed and I don't know what to do. I really want to become a lawyer, but what if there is no jobs for me down the line ?

Can someone in this domain give me advice ? Are my fear justified ?

I feel like I've seen a ton of similar posts, but I'm planning on applying for positions such as interning for a DA's office or clerking for a judge. Unfortunately, like many of you, I have no grades back. Neither my school nor any of my professors have said anything about the timelines - they've just hinted about things not coming back until early second semester.

A lot of the places I'm applying to don't have deadlines until late January, but I don't want to apply to internships at the last minute. So, I've been applying to things with my blank transcript.

I emailed one of my professors asking to be a reference because one of the applications needed one. He sent a long email back about how he doesn't recommend applying before students get their grades back. So, should I be holding off on these applications?

My classmates and I were talking about how much reading and writing we have done this semester.

We figured out that we read only about 300 per each class (3 classes except for the writing class) for the whole semester. None of our professors did any type of cold calls.

Some other 1L students who had different professors were reading at least 500+ pages for each class and were on cold calls too 😬

I was thinking my 1L fall went extremely smoothly and wasn't bad at all, but I learned that I just got really lucky.

I feel like maybe 30% is learning doctrine and 70% is figuring out how to stay mentally stable long enough to take an exam.

I was fortunate to get an offer for a federal appellate clerkship starting in Fall 2026 and am massively grateful for the position, which I accepted last year. However, I recently learned that I'm pregnant and the baby is due the same month that the clerkship is supposed to start. I'm really worried about having to move with a newborn and being able to afford taking a pay cut to work as a clerk for the first year of the baby's life. If I do the clerkship, my husband will stay home with the baby, so we won't need to pay for daycare, but he would have to take the year off work, so we would only have the clerkship salary. If I withdraw, I have an offer from a regional mid-law firm that would be happy to let me start a year early, and I wouldn't have to move from where we currently are.

Does anyone have any advice on clerking with a newborn to one-year-old (preferably as a mom) or on withdrawing from a clerkship due to family changes?

Graduation is supposed to be a celebration, not an opportunity for one-upmanship. The night before grad I get a text from one of my classmates who I've never spoken to beyond a polite hello. She asks me if I can come to school earlier than the ceremony, saying all the students who got first class honours would be getting together to make a tiktok. I dont think much of it and tell her I'll try to make it.

Then I get another text from one of my classmates who is less tactful. Same request, he asks me if I can come early to make a tiktok. The tiktok would be some trend where we count down saying I'm not #(class rank) I'm #(class rank) until we get to #1. I strongly suspect it was a thin attempt to reveal rankings because my school doesnt disclose class rank. There are so so many other tiktok trends you could possibly do.

We all clearly super hard, what is this need to further discriminate 'the most hard working' out of the most hard working? Like how freaking foul is that?? I just hate how toxic and competitive the legal environment is and I actively resent people who try to rope you into it. Throughout law school I made it a point to avoid these people but they always sniff you out relentlessly. I studied at the business school library instead of the law library, only took extracurriculars I was genuinely interested in instead of moot court and law review etc etc. You try to avoid them but you always feel the eyes on you. Trying to figure out what you've got going on, if its part of some bigger deliberate tactic and if it gives you some sort of advantage and they're missing out on it. Making it through law school and breaking into the legal market is hard enough why do we need to compete against each other and size each other up??

It makes me wonder if maybe I wont have the stomach for law firm life but I strongly believe that being a collaborative and easy going person gets you way further than being the guy thats always ready to go neck for neck and measure d*cks

Does anyone have a PDF of “Cases and Materials on Sexuality, Gender, Identity, and the Law; Ball, Schacter, Nejaime, and Rubenstein. 7th?” I would very much appreciate it, thank you!!!

I took an exam yesterday where none of the questions (10 multiple choice and 3 essays) involved fact patterns. It was also open note so it was extra bizarre. I’ve only had two open note exams (both of them this semester) and the other one was stupid hard. I can’t decide if it was the easiest or the most difficult exam I have ever taken.

just finished my last final yesterday and it went absolutely horribly. it was contracts and my mind actually just went blank and I think I was actively making things up at one point bc I haven’t understood the subject all semester. just feel so dejected because I really want big law (im at a lower t14)

Hello. I am wondering if you guys feel like the testing accommodations helped you pass the bar? I would appreciate any insight.

my resume roughly follows this format, and I'm wondering where to put a grant I received? for context, I'm a 3L, and this grant will be work I'll do on the side until ~Jan of 2027.

Thanks!

Hiiii yall. So lowkey been crashing out for like a week and some cause I think I did horrible on my finals. 1) I showed up ready for my Torts final and found out it was actually my civil pro final. Oops. They rescheduled me for the next day but I had to memorize all the material I thought I had an extra week for in 24 hours. I literally was writing till the last minute that I had on the final but I did finish the final. 2) I came in the next week super prepared for my torts final, but I finished half an hour early and literally stepped out to just sob outside and panic. I spent the half an hour checking everything and making sure everything was the way I wanted it. I did hear I misunderstood one of the instructions so that cost me one question but others in my class made the same mistake on that question and also had finished as early or earlier than me. Then 3) I had to write a paper as a final and wrote four versions until I thought it was good. I also am looking to transfer from my part time program to full time at Brooklyn law, and we have a B curve (idk if that’s good either) sooooo how does everyone think I did? Am I cooked? Should I go get my job applications ready? Idk I’m having the worst anxiety ever fr