EARLY STEPS: ADVICE FOR FRESHMEN, SOPHOMORES, AND JUNIORS
Prior to your junior year, what you should be doing is developing your intellectual abilities as much as possible and exploring whether your initial interest in the law is sufficient to carry you on through law school and to a law or law-related career afterwards. Do not assume that an interest in law developed while in high school or earlier will necessarily survive without change through your next few years of higher education and personal development; you owe it to yourself to be alert to significant changes in your own attitudes, interests, and understandings as well as to changes in the "market picture" in regard to law, any of which might indicate that law is not the only option you should seriously consider. In general, it is an excellent rule of thumb during your college years to maximize your options and avoid too narrow a view of your future. Life is unpredictable, and you need to prepare yourself for that hard fact.
As a student in the "prelaw" category, however, you are fortunate in that you can prepare assiduously for law school and lose nothing should you change your mind about it later on. This is because the best preparation for law school is simply to get the best liberal arts education you can. Then, if your career plans change, you will still have a broad-based, valuable intellectual foundation from which to develop other career possibilities. There is no specific major that you must choose, no specific set of courses that you must include, in order to be well prepared for law school. This leaves you a great deal of freedom-but not without any outside limits at all.
What you must do to prepare for law school, and what you should be doing in any case if you are working for a bachelor's degree, is to train your brain. More specifically, you must develop the ability to write cogently and coherently, to analyze carefully and accurately, to reason logically, and to speak effectively and articulately. These are the skills which will take you farthest in law school and in the practice of law, and these are the skills which law schools will be looking for when you knock at their doors. It doesn't matter so much whether you develop these skills in analyzing political institutions (as a political science major), metaphysical arguments (as a philosophy major), underlying syntactic structures (as a linguistics major), or molecular structures (as a chemistry major); what matters is that you learn to use your mind effectively in as broad a range of intellectual domains as possible. Thus, all things being equal, you should look for a major (a) that is not substantively overnarrow, (b) that demands a considerable amount of challenging writing, (c) that gives you some opportunities for smaller classes and seminars (in which to develop your speaking ability and in which to get to know professors better so that they can write you letters of recommendation later on), and (d) that has a goodly proportion of excellent teachers who invest time and energy into helping undergraduates do their best. The choice is yours.
While you're doing all of the above, and while you still have some time to reflect on your interest in law, you should be reading about what law school and legal practice are really like, recognizing that there is a tremendous range of working environments within the legal profession (to say nothing of the possibilities of taking your law degree and working outside of the legal profession itself), although much less of a range of pedagogical environments within the preparatory stage of legal education. The WCAS Office of Undergraduate Studies and Advising has prepared a list of suggested readings for prelaw students, and the Law School Admissions Council has a list in their law school guide. Add these books to your personal reading lists as you approach your senior year, and you will be better able to make an informed choice about (a) whether to go to law school, (b) where to go to law school, and (c) how to go to law school.
Along the same lines of becoming a more realistic potential consumer of legal education, you should plan to visit real live law school classes and to talk to real live practicing lawyers, to get a feel for the actual circumstances in which people learn and do the law. Law school is not by any means just three more years of what you will have had at Northwestern; it's a qualitatively different educational experience, and one you should be certain that you want to undertake. Luckily for us, the Northwestern Law School welcomes undergraduates from the Evanston Campus and will try to arrange for a student guide to show you around when you visit the Law School in downtown Chicago; just call the Law School Admissions Office at 312-503-8465 to schedule a visit.
Also luckily for us, the NU Externship Program (NEXT) arranges opportunities to "shadow" NU alumni at their workplace for one to three days. This is an excellent opportunity to learn first-hand about a particular profession. Go to http://www.nualumni.com/careers/next_students.html for more information. In addition there is ALUMNET, a career networking service (467-7200) at the Alumni Center which has a large data base providing names of alumni across the country--including many lawyers--who are willing to speak to interested Northwestern undergraduates about their careers. Since you may never again get the chance to speak to a lawyer without paying an astounding fee-per-minute, these are very valuable opportunities for Northwestern students to profit from. The junior year would be a good time to visit law school classes and speak to practicing lawyers, but one could also begin earlier and one could certainly continue on into one's senior year; the timing depends in part on your degree of certainty, your curiosity, and your readiness to profit from the experience in regard to making career decisions.
One other thing you should be doing before your senior year--that is, before you begin to fill out those law school applications--is making sure that at least two professors know your academic ability well enough to write a detailed and effective recommendation for you as part of your application. While students with super GPAs and LSATs will probably not need to rely on these, many others would be well advised to strengthen their applications with well-considered and well-regarded letters of recommendation. What these can do for you will be discussed later on. At this point, what you need to keep in mind is that many students reach their senior year without knowing one, much less two, professors who know their work individually; it is for this reason that you need to plan (some might even say "scheme") before your senior year. Naturally, the most obvious way to get professors to know your work specifically is to be an outstanding student in one way or another: you might take a series of courses with one professor, or you might choose a small seminar in which you can show off your speaking and writing ability to best advantage, or you might visit the professor during office hours to discuss whatever seems appropriate (e.g., course content, your career plans, relation of the professor's subject to the legal profession). Informal faculty-student contacts such as those that are common in residential colleges might also help to make you stand out from the crowd; even if you live in a dorm or a Greek house, you can still invite a professor to give a fireside or to come to lunch or dinner. The idea is not to flatter the professor by insincere attention and contrived questions; the idea is to demonstrate your academic talents and intellectual curiosity. How you manage that is up to you, but the professor must be able to say more than what appears in simple numbers on a grade sheet in order for the recommendation to carry any weight with a law school.
To sum up, in your first three years at Northwestern your major tasks as an undergraduate considering law school are these:
- Train your brain.
- Learn to write, analyze, reason, speak effectively.
- Read about law school and law careers.
- Visit law school classes and talk to practicing lawyers.
- Plan ahead for faculty recommendations.
GETTING IN: PERSUADING LAW SCHOOLS THAT THEY WANT YOU
Everyone will tell you that the two most important factors in gaining admission to law schools are your GPA and your score on the LSAT. This is true. Be aware, however, that the GPA is not taken as an unanalyzed datum, but is considered in the light of the school in which you earned it and the courses in which you earned it; don't try to manipulate your GPA by overusing the P/N option or by taking less demanding courses for safety's sake. Law schools have contacts among the universities, certainly at Northwestern, so they must be able to figure out which transcript really represents major academic achievement and which one represents skullduggery. Besides, if you're more of an academic lightweight than your GPA indicates, you're setting your own self up for a fall—either on the LSAT (because you won't have mastered the fundamental intellectual skills it is supposed to measure) or in law school (because you can't bluff through the kind of law school you will want to go to). In other words, you have to strike a reasoned balance between the natural desire to get the highest GPA possible, and the equally compelling need to have that GPA represent real intellectual growth. It's too expensive to become obsessed only by the former; be sure your bachelor's degree represents the latter by the time you're through.
Law schools want to learn the following from your application and your record: that you have a good mind and that it's been well trained; that you have what it takes to succeed both in law school and in the legal profession; and that you would bring something unique to your law school class--since such a large part of law school learning results from peer group interaction. You can demonstrate your value along each of these three dimensions both quantitatively and qualitatively.
Quantitatively, you demonstrate your value by means of the LSAT score and your GPA, which are given quantities by the time you apply to law school. Qualitatively, you have two means by which you can supplement the quantitative measures (although you cannot replace them or diminish their significance); these are the personal essay and the faculty recommendations. As noted earlier, the very top students will have numbers (LSAT/GPA) that may suffice to get them into the schools of their choice, but most students will not be overconfident about admissions and so will be glad to know that they can strengthen their applications by these two non-quantitative means.
Both the personal essay and the faculty recommendations should be used to persuade the law school admissions people that you are well qualified to succeed in law school, and that you do bring something unique to the mix of students in your entering class. To argue that you have what it takes to succeed, you must use these two verbal means (the essay and the letters) to bring to the readers' attention what might not jump out at them from your transcript and your other application pages. For example, you may have studied abroad during your third year; the essay is where you could elaborate on how that prepared you to succeed in law school--and law practice. Or you may be a sociology major but with the equivalent of a minor in, say, philosophy; just because there are five philosophy courses scattered throughout your transcript doesn't mean the admissions people will pick out the pattern. So do it for them, and explain how your choice of these courses was a deliberate move on your part to ____________ (then fill in the blank by explaining the value of that academic work to your preparation for law school).
Alternatively, there may be non-academic experiences that are absent from your transcript which are relevant to your future success. These could include your family background, job experiences, time spent abroad, personal crises you have overcome, or whatever. The personal essay is where you can weave together all the strongest strands of your life to demonstrate what a wonderful addition you will be to their entering law school class (keeping in mind the intellectual and personal qualities that are most relevant in this particular context). Similarly, when your professors write recommendations, you can provide them with the information they will need to make the strongest case for you. Don't let your professor be limited to just the information on the grading sheet; you should provide a resume or the equivalent, and any information you think is relevant to the law school application that the professor might conceivably (and legitimately) work into the recommendation letter. (Political science professors probably know the kinds of things that law schools are looking for, but some other professors may have less experience in writing law school recommendations; feel free to [respectfully] provide suggestions on the kinds of qualities or abilities that would be most relevant in this context, and then be sure the professor has as much background information as you can reasonably supply to speak to those issues.)
In addition to using the essay to speak to your inherent brilliance as a lawyer-to-be, you should also use it to bring out what makes you unique as a potential law student. This is significant because law schools value diversity within their student population; since students learn so much from each other in law school (in study groups, class participation, and elsewhere), having only white male political science majors from big Midwestern cities would be a real drag! (That's just an example; don't feel bad if you're in that category!) It's important for the student body to be a geographical, racial, academic, and social mixture, so you should show what you would contribute to the diversity of the student body. It could be an unusual family background, a special interest (e.g., French horn, mountain climbing, drama, volunteer work), unusual job experiences (e.g., archaeological expedition, factory work, foreign experiences, even working in a law firm!), or distinctive career objectives; whatever it is, the place to bring it out is in the personal essay--and in the faculty letters of recommendation, provided that you have given them the crucial information. (Do not forget that the personal essay also is a chance to show off your writing ability--so get some good writing advice and try out several drafts, unless you are certain that you're a superb writer.)
One of the major advantages to the personal essay and the faculty recommendations is that, to different degrees, they are more in your control than either your GPA or your LSAT score. So even though the qualitative components of your application will not replace the quantitative ones, the former do provide you with two more chances to strengthen your application and make the strongest case possible for your admission to the school(s) of your choice. All but the most sanguine of law school applicants should put a lot of effort into preparing the personal essay, and a lot of thought ahead of time into making sure they have two faculty members who know their work and view it very positively by the beginning of their senior year. Both the prelaw adviser in the WCAS Office of Undergraduate Studies and Advising and the prelaw adviser in Career Services will be glad to speak to you in more detail about preparing your personal essay, and about choosing which professors to ask for recommendations.
IMPROVING YOUR WRITING
In regard to the all-important skill of writing, if your major does not oblige you to do a lot of serious writing (or does not give you lots of useful feedback) and you want to improve your writing ability (remember: the LSAT includes a writing sample), consider taking English 205, Intermediate Composition.
Many professors do not provide enough feedback on student papers to help students really improve their writing; this course does just that. It is one of the best ways students can invest their time in preparation for all their remaining courses in which they have to write, to say nothing of law school itself. Professor Robert Gundlach, Director of the Writing Program, is always available to talk with students individually about how to improve their writing, whether this ultimately involves taking English 205, using the Writing Place, or other strategies. Both Professor Gundlach and the Writing Place are available to students at all levels of writing ability, from the most despairing to relatively accomplished writers. (His office is at 1902 Sheridan Road; you can call 491-7414 for an appointment.)
RESOURCES AT NORTHWESTERN FOR PRELAW STUDENTS
There is no reason why individual students should have to discover all there is to know about applying to law schools and preparing for a legal career by themselves. There are numerous resource places and resource people on campus for the express purpose of advising and assisting prelaw students. Learn where these are!
To begin with, the Weinberg College Office of Undergraduate Studies and Advising always has a faculty member assigned to do prelaw advising during his or her time each week as a College Adviser. Call 491-7560 to make an appointment. This adviser is available at any stage of the prelaw process to discuss your questions with you, whether you're ambivalent about law school or have just discovered its attractions and are all gung-ho, or you've already applied and now must sort out realistic options--whatever. Please feel free to make use of that person's experience and expertise--and of his or her contacts with the faculty, which can be very helpful as well. This office also maintains a collection of law school catalogs. (Note: all prelaw students at Northwestern can make use of these services; they are not just for WCAS students.)
Second, University Career Services (UCS), 620 Lincoln St. (491-3700) has a staff member who is an adviser to prelaw students, and who helps with the details of dealing with the law school application process. The office administers the LSAT several times a year. In addition, they have a large collection of materials relevant to prelaw students, including law school catalogs, books, and articles on law school and legal careers. They will also prepare an ongoing file of letters of recommendation from professors that you can use for all your law school applications. (That way each professor does not have to write twelve different letters if you apply to twelve different schools.) Prelaw students would be wise to consult the advisers in both WCAS and Career Services, since each one may have specialized knowledge, particular experience, or even useful printed materials that the other one doesn't. Advisors in both WCAS and UCS have current statistics about recent Northwestern graduates and their fortunes in applying to law schools (i.e., their GPAs and LSATs combined with where they applied and who accepted them); the latter are of course extremely helpful in estimating your chances at a specific school. Career Services offers advice on "Applying to Graduate or Professional School" at its website, and prelaw information from WCAS is also available online.
A third resource for prelaw students is of course the University Library and its reference librarians. Many books are in either the Core or the Main collections, while some are available only at the Law Library downtown (which students should be able to borrow through the Interlibrary Loan Department of our library). In addition, reference librarians can help you locate more specialized information that you may want, whether this is relevant statistical material, journal articles, government publications concerning legal careers, or any other useful items.
The NU Alumni Network can put you in touch with professional advice on legal careers, and the NU Externship Program (NEXT) sets up opportunities to "shadow" alumni in their workplace.
QUICK GUIDE TO RESOURCES FOR PRE-LAW STUDENTS
WCAS Office of Undergraduate Studies and Advising (491-7560): advisers, law school catalogs, brochures, readings, web resources.
University Career Services, 620 Lincoln (491-3700): advisers, LSAT, prelaw library (catalogs, information on legal careers, statistics), letters of recommendation.
University Library: See a reference librarian.
NEXT Program: "Shadow" a lawyer alum.
Law School Admission Council Online
Mock Trial Team: email afisz@gcd.com
Phi Alpha Delta Prelaw Fraternity (co-ed)
Black Undergraduate Law and Business Society: 467-1836
MAKE AN APPOINTMENT WITH THE WEINBERG COLLEGE PRE-LAW ADVISER:
Contact the Office of Undergraduate Studies and Advising, 1922 Sheridan Road, 491-7560
