PALS Meeting Today -- Exam Preparation

PALS is having a brown-bag lunch meeting today, Nov. 24, at 12:30 in Room 212-213. We are hoping that 2L and 3L members will come to share their study strategies with the 1Ls, who are busy preparing for their first exams. How were you able to prepare for exams and still have time to spend with your family? How much time did you spend outlining? Is it worth taking the time to do practice exams? Which commerical aids (if any) did you find helpful? Please leave some advice for 1Ls in the comments.

Parental Prejudice?

Check out: The Wall Street Journal law blog article: Women in BigLaw Pounding Against the Glass Ceiling? http://blogs.wsj.com/law/2008/11/17/women-in-biglaw-pounding-against-the-glass-ceiling/
Although I'm disturbed by the statistics (provided by the National Association of Women Lawyers surveying large corporate defense firms a.k.a "BigLaw") that "48% of first and second-year associates are women" but only "27% of non-equity partners and less than 16% of equity partners are women." And worse still: "There is also a considerable pay gap. At 99% of the firms, the top-paid partner is a man; on average, male equity partners earn more than $87,000 annually than female equity partners." I am more disturbed by the comments following the article justifying the gaps in pay and promotion by pointing to flex-time and pro-family policies. Bottom line being that some people think that parents can't cut it in "BigLaw" and that it is perceived to be acceptable to withhold promotions and pay from lawyers who take time for family.

More Onesie Designs

Rike got requests for a less serious, more kid-friendly
design.  So here are three more options. The t-romper in
purple "won" the onesie contest, and Rike will
also order some toddler tees! Yeah Rike!
Please let Rike know (by post or email, rike@)
whether you like the more serious options posted
earlier, or any of these three.

Thanks!

UWeek article on the Remote Learning Room

Photo by Kathy Sauber, University Week

The campus e-magazine UWeek has a nice article on the Remote Learning Room. Check it out here:
http://uwnews.org/uweek/article.aspx?visitsource=uwkmail&id=45183
The main page of the e-magazine is here:
http://uwnews.org/uweek/index.aspx

Very cute picture of the Harwoods! What do y'all think of the article?

(Also, as long as you're here, please leave a comment on the onesie post below...)

New Onesies, Let your voice be heard!

Hi, SBA will be ordering new onesies and Rike has asked for our input! Please take the time to look at the options and post your comments.

1) What kind of onesie-type clothing should we order?


http://www.latsportswear.com/scripts/prodView.asp?idproduct=149

http://www.latsportswear.com/scripts/prodView.asp?idproduct=116

http://www.latsportswear.com/scripts/prodView.asp?idproduct=65 (Lilac is
closest to purple for this one)

2) What color?

3) Which of the attached designs to you like, if any?  What other kind of
design might you like?

Get Ready for Fall Festival!

Fall Festival is right around the corner, October 30th 4:30-6:30! There will be food, games, and the ever-popular bounce house! This is the one big family-friendly event that SBA puts on every year (with a lot of help from PALS) and we'd like a big turnout! It is great fun for the kids and a great opportunity to show off your family to the law school community. I hope to see you there!
Costumes encouraged.

Congratulations PALS alumni!

Congratulations to all the former UW PALS who passed the Summer 2008 bar exam. I looked through the pass list and saw Lisa Kremer, Stasiu Nowak, Lisa Goldoftas, Laura Arras, Ray Liaw, Karen Horowitz, and Daniel Heu-Weller. Please let me know if I'm leaving anyone out! We're so happy for all of you.

Costumes, Costumes...

"A person should always choose a costume which is in direct contrast to her own personality.'' (It's the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown)

Every year since Nate was born I have had grand plans of sewing him a fabulous homemade Halloween costume. Lets just say that has never happened. This year I'm hoping that his over-priced store-bought spider costume (that I bought to compensate for my lack of crafting skills) will still fit him, especially since he wore it for 1 hour last year after a 30 minute struggle to get him into it. He completely refused the cute little hat part. If I can get up the energy, I plan to dress-up as his web. All I need is a white table cloth, a black marker and 30 minutes of undisturbed time. I think that the time will be the hardest to come by. I had the same costume plans last year, but never got it together.

• What are you guys doing for Halloween? Any good costume ideas in case Nate is too big to wear last year's costume. It says 2/3T, but I haven't tried it on him to see if it fits. After last year's debacle I'm a little scared.

• Also, any ideas about what to do with all the candy that he's probably going to come home with? Last year Brent and I ate it figuring that he wouldn't notice, but since then he has figured out what candy is. I just don't want him getting sick or getting chocolate on the couch, carpet, dog, etc.

Pictures from the PALS picnic in September

Here are a few long overdue pictures from our picnic last month. I took these with my phone's camera, so they're not the best pictures. If anyone else has better pictures, please let me know!

PALS General Membership Meeting

Thursday, October 2 at 12:30, Room 212/213

Join PALS for our first general membership meeting of the year. Network with other parents (or parents-to-be) who are balancing family life and law school. We will be discussing our upcoming PALS events and swapping stories about our kids. Lunch will be provided. We hope to see everyone there!

PALS Picnic on Sunday

We're having our annual picnic to welcome the new 1L parents this Sunday, September 7, from 12:30-2:30 p.m. We'll be at Cowen Park -- you can see it from the corner of NE Ravenna Blvd. and Brooklyn Ave. It has picnic tables and a nice play area.

Bring your kids, partners, and anyone else on your support team. It would be great if you could also bring a snack for sharing. We hope to see everyone at the picnic!

Please RSVP to Christine: porterc@u.washington.edu

Summer babies

Congratulations to all who had babies this summer!
Yin Cheung's son was born two months early, on Aug. 12, but is doing well in the NICU. Here is little Ethan:

2L Tanja Douay became a mother on July 6. She says Yana Milena is an "absolute angel":




Congratulations also to Prof. Kaltsounis, who had a baby earlier this summer. Any other baby news? Email me (Lisa dot kremer at comcast dot net) or friend me on facebook. (Yes, I'll stop posting on the blog soon, I've graduated, I'm supposed to have moved on... but I haven't started work yet, so, whatever.)

Post bar life

A few photos from the last week:

Because I live in Tacoma and the bar is in Bellevue, I got a hotel room for the bar and Ray shared it with me. The week before, consumed by stress, we both decided to go a day early so we could try to have a couple of uninterrupted nights' sleep before the exam (something about 3-year-olds and sleep doesn't mix, apparently). Here's how we spent the day before the bar:



Here's a photo from Megan's facebook page -- I certainly didn't have the presence of mind to take a picture, but yes, this is the room where 800 people sweated out the bar for three days:



Afterward we had friends over to our hotel room for champagne. Ray's husband came with her daughters, wearing T-shirts her law firm had made for them:



Friday, I took the kids out for ice cream IN THE MIDDLE OF A WEEKDAY -- scandalous! -- and took this picture, which I emailed to my husband at work to make him jealous. It worked.



Ahh, post-bar life. Nothing to do but clean the house to unearth three years worth of crap, punctuated by trips to the local frozen custard stand. And beer! How I've missed you, beer. Life is good.

Barbri/Rigos/Tesdahl

How to choose a bar prep course? Here are a few thoughts on what I observed the last few weeks of Barbri v. Rigos. I hope others will add their comments and corrections, too. (I think Tesdahl is great too, by the way -- I have a neighbor who did it a few years ago -- but I don't know anyone who used it recently.)

Overall, my conclusion was that I wished I'd done Rigos. I think you can pass with either course. But the Rigos method seemed less stress inducing. I heard from both Barbri and Rigos studets who noticed the difference. Plus, Rigos sent encouraging, pump-em-up type messages in the day before the bar and held a party afterward. Not that you should base your decision on the availability of alcohol afterward, but it seems emblematic of the attitude.

• Both courses consist generally of listening to lectures, outlining and taking practice exams.
• Lectures are by SU or UW professors, by local specialists or (for Barbri) a couple of people who go around the country giving specialized lectures. Hard to guess which course had better lecturers -- they both seemed to have some great ones (Rigos has Donaldson, Barbri has Calandrillo) and some not-so-great ones.
• Rigos focuses a lot on outlining. Students are recommended to spend about five hours a day outlining, and three hours taking practice exams.
• Rigos is heavy on mnemonic devices. Barbri has few mnemonics other than the ones you've heard already (OCEAN, etc).
• Barbri focuses more on taking practice exams. Barbri recommends two hours a day outlining, and then practice exams until you collapse from exhaustion. (It's only been a few days since the bar and I've already forgotten the daily study schedule, how awesome is that?)
• Rigos had 26 graded essays, Barbri had 21. Barbri's feedback was handwritten, Rigos came through email. Lots of good feedback either way.
• Both programs have practice questions that are actual bar questions released by the bar association in past years, and include a sample passing answer, also released by the bar. Barbri also includes a "model answer" for the first 4-6 essay questions of each type. Rigos does not. The model answers are a mixed blessing. They include almost every point you could think of to address in the question. This is good if you want to learn to be thorough, and we all want to pass, so we all want to be thorough, right? However, it also can be discouraging if you didn't get all the points, or drive you absolutely nuts if you're trying to drive yourself to learn everything. As an example, I took a practice question on a subject I'd studied pretty thoroughly, and compared my answer to the model answer, and felt like a complete failure because I'd missed half the points. Then I compared my answer to the sample passing answer and felt like a law savant.
• Both curricula have you turn in sample essays periodically to be graded. The schedules are different, but I couldn't say which is better.
• With either program, the real key is figuring out how you memorize the best. (Not learn. Memorize.) That might be flashcards, speaking aloud, repeated test-taking, rote repetition... you pretty much have to figure that out on your own.

What else, y'all?

Graduation photos

Hey PALS, graduation photos, finally! I don't have many pix from graduation but the few I have are posted below. If anyone has more please feel free to add them or email them to me and I'll post them.

Ray thought to bring her camera on stage, clever woman, and snapped these of her, me, Louis and Laura just as we were about to cross the stage:

Karen and Nathan after the ceremony: (I stole this off Facebook)

Laura and Allegra:

These are the professional photographer's pix of me with my daughters getting their pretend diplomas, and Louis posing on stage with his son:

The ceremony itself was great (for me, anyway -- my 3-year-old was trying my husband's patience, but I knew nothing of that, blissfully partying on stage with my buddies). At times the speeches seemed to run a tad long, but actually the ceremony ended right on time. Dean Hicks was a great emcee, I really liked him and thought, dang, I should've taken a class from that guy.

Tips for next year's 3Ls: Dress as light as you can because those robes get HOT under the lights. Carry a little passport wallet with your camera (and a snack! I would've passed out if not for Ray's Luna bar). If you're going to have your kids walk with you, when you are lining up back stage, finagle your way to the front so you can walk across early, so your kids don't have to wait around until the end of the ceremony. Mine walked the stage with me, then my husband took them straight out to the lobby to play until the ceremony was over.

And, by the way, note of appreciation for our administration -- I have a friend at Gonzaga, and there, kids aren't ALLOWED on stage at graduation. Man!

Congratulations New PALS Alumni!

Congratulations to all of our recent graduates! Making it through law school is an impressive feat and doing it with children in tow deserves an extra round of applause! If you have pictures of you and your family at graduation, please post them. We would love share in this happy moment with you. We will miss you all next year. I hope that you keep checking the blog periodically to see what PALS is up to.
Best Wishes,
Amanda

Study break: Baby pix!

Take a deep breath, lower your shoulders, exhale... Now further de-stress by checking out some of PALS' adorable kids.

Alex, Melissa and Eric's little slugger:







Vanessa Hernandez' little guy eats a monkey and shows off his abs:



Amanda Carmany-Rampey's son goes for a swim:



Charles Gust's son chills out and shows off his Popeye muscles:

Emma Kagel Berry's son Eli:







Peter Moreno's girls:

Lisa Goldoftas' sweeties:

Lisa Kremer's girls:

MAMAs meeting and a courthouse tour

A couple of items of interest from the KC - WWL newsletter:


Join MAMAS members for their monthly brown bag meeting on Wednesday, June 18th from 12-1:00 p.m. at K&L Gates (925 4th Avenue, Suite 2900). This month’s meeting features a panel discussion: Life AS Corporate Counsel. Panel members will address the ins and outs of working as in-house counsel, and the meeting will be an excellent opportunity to meet fellow MAMAS members. RSVP through BigTent if you are a MAMAS member, or by email Jami Grounds at jgrounds@susmangodfrey.com.

King County Superior Court invites clerks and young lawyers to observe the operations of the downtown Seattle King County Courthouse and the Regional Justice Center in Kent on Wednesday, June 25th from 8:30 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. For further information on this great opportunity, please call Bailiff Lee Walters (downtown) at 206.296.9096 or Sandy Ogilvie (Kent) at 206.205.2588.

3L class gift: We rock

Randomly and oddly, my 1L small group, Group 6, has eight student-parents in it. Plus, we've had more students drop out or transfer than anyone else (though none of those were student-parents). We're down to 23 members -- and yes, more than a third of them are parents. There are, of course, parents in other sections, but ours seems to be particularly weighted.

Want to know how having a lot of family types in your group affects things? I don't know if there's a straight-line correlation, of course, but check out the placard in the hallway showing how groups have contributed to the 3L graduation gift to the LRAP. Or follow this link: http://www.law.washington.edu/Students/3LGift/ Yeah, that's right. We're the big dog.

If there are any 3Ls reading this, here are some things you should know:
* You only have to give $1 to increase the percentage of students giving, which is helpful for the school's rank.
* Pledges count toward the total raised by your group.
* The state will match any gifts received by the end of June. Double your dollars for the LRAP.
* PILA will match both gifts and pledges up to $10,000. Double your dollars again.

You can contribute by credit card by following the link above, or take cash to Yoshiko on the third floor. Pledge forms are available at the link above, plus there are some in the mail room.

Kids at commencement

By my count there could be as many as 25 -- or more! -- children of students at commencement this year. Dean Madrid's office is planning to have certificates for each child. They are non-personalized, so don't worry about getting the Dean your children's names.

In case you haven't gotten the word, the instructions are thus:
If you plan to have your child/children walk the stage with you when you receive your diploma, make a plan with a responsible adult (RA). The child/ren should sit in the audience until the speeches are through and the degrees are about to be handed out. Then RA brings the child/ren to the front and hand them, carefully, to the student on the stage.
*This is very important: student on stage keeps a firm grip on child/ren during the walk across the stage. The orchestra pit is open and unfenced. And verrry deep.
RA needs to walk across to the other side of the stage and take child/ren back after the walk.

By the way check out the new banner across the top of this blog: http://lagliv.blogspot.com/ Warning: it'll probably make you queasy. Sorry about that.

At right: Karen Alexander Horowitz's son finds out what's going to be eating mommy alive the next couple of months.

Law layoff controversy

A San Francisco attorney at the firm Paul Hastings recently made waves when she publicized that she was laid off from her firm less than a week after a procedure following a miscarriage. It's an ugly dustup. The attorney declined the firm's offer of three month's salary in return for a non-disclosure agreement. Instead her open letter to the firm has been widely circulated, and now her glowing past performance evaluations are out on the net as well.

Read about it in The Juggle, the Wall Street Journal's excellent blog about work-life balance issues:
http://blogs.wsj.com/juggle/page/3/
(more lighthearted topics on The Juggle range from high heels to work-provided backup childcare (oo!) to whether it's worth it to go to a school event if you can only be there for 20 minutes.

PALS group photo

Last week Shari Ireton took a group photo of PALS to commemorate our being student organization of the year. Not everyone could make it, but we got a pretty good turnout. We took one picture of the group holding photos of our children, and one just standard photo. You can tell which one I like best because I'm posting it first:



Charles and Kevin are cracking me up. And check out Tami -- so adorable.



Our kids can beat up your kids. rrgh!

What do you think? Also, let me know if you want a copy -- I have both high- and low-res versions.

Email love

Hey PALS members! Keep posted on current events by joining our yahoo group:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/uwpals/
We use the email to announce things going on at the law school that day, such as the PALS group photo today (Tuesday, 12:30, lobby) and the work-life balance session on Wednesday (see announcement below). Members can also use it to pose questions to other members. We try to keep the quantity of messages down to a reasonable level.

Work/Life Balance Panel May 14

Do you ever feel that school work is taking over your personal life and things have gotten out of balance? You are not alone and this issue does not disappear after graduation. PALS and the Law Women's Caucus are here to help. We are co-hosting a Work-Life Balance Panel on Wednesday, May 14 at 12:30 in room 127. Several attorneys will speak and answer questions about how they manage to balance successful legal careers with other commitments, including family life. The panelists either work or have worked in large law firms, mid-sized firms, government and as in-house counsel, so there will be a good mix of experiences.
Lunch will be provided.
This will be a moderated discussion, so please suggest topics/questions that you would like to be addressed.

PALS meeting today

Don't forget: PALS general membership meeting Tuesday April 29th at 12:30 in room 118. Food will be provided. Come find out the super-secret scoop on what classes to take next year. Should be helpful for both 1Ls and 2Ls. (3Ls, at least show up for the food, c'mon! and spill the beans on your most parent-friendly courses, of course.)

MAMAS family event Saturday

MAMAS is Mother Attorneys Mentoring Association of Seattle, a great group of lawyers trying to share ideas and network with an emphasis on work-life balance issues. The group has brown bag sessions and that sort of thing, but also gathers monthly with the kids to play and network. (Unfortunately, yes, it's for moms, not dads. Apparently. I could be wrong.) The next one is this coming Saturday:

MAMAS Moms and Kids Networking Event
When: Sat, May 3, 9am – 12pm
Where: The Children's Center at Burke Gilman Gardens, 5251 Sand Point Way NE, Building 5, Seattle, WA
Description: We invite you to attend MAMAS' next monthly mother attorney networking event. Mothers, children, and partners/helpers welcome. Admission is free, and food and beverages will be provided, thanks to our sponsor Williams Kastner.

Go play! If anyone decides to go, let me know how it went.

PALS Meeting April 29th

Hi, we've scheduled a PALS general membership meeting Tuesday April 29th at 12:30 in room 118. Food will be provided. We plan to talk briefly about our upcoming events, including the Work/Life balance panel that we are hosting in combination with Law Women's Caucus on May 14th. Once we get the business out of the way (as quickly as possible), we will be turning the discussion to course selection. 2Ls and 3Ls please come and share your experiences. This will be a good opportunity to get information about which professors pod cast, understand childcare emergencies, or otherwise have child-friendly policies. We hope to see everyone there.
Best Wishes,
Amanda and Christine
(Please note that we will provide more notice and try to avoid Social Justice Tuesdays when scheduling future meetings. Unfortunately, we were bumped from the one other free day that we could find in the next couple of weeks when Academic services decided to reschedule one of their endless (oops, I mean highly useful) academic advising sessions.)

Sack lunch tyranny

Every morning I pack four lunches. Yes I do. I tell you, it's a glamorous life I lead. But here's the thing. After making approximately 1,000 lunches in the last year and a half (yes really), surprisingly enough, it's getting a little old. And not just for me. At first the kids liked PB&Js, and they liked chicken nuggets, and really, they'd eat pretty much anything. I'd slip little notes in there, draw pictures on their lunch bags, yada yada. But now they're surly, jaded 5- and 3-year-olds and they won't eat just any (well-rounded, nutritionally complete, homemade daily) meal. Nuggets, formerly the haute of cuisine, now are gross. Yogurt gives the little one a rash. Perfectly good fruit comes home uneaten.

Here's what I made the last two days, just to make PB&J more attractive:

Yes, these are numerous teeny tiny heart-shaped peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. All part of the scheme to convince my 5-year-old to eat her lunch.

The scheme worked. But here's perhaps a more accurate picture:

Heart-shaped PB&J project aided by Fat Tire; note messy kitchen in background. Not pictured: Unread Torts 2 casebook.

In short, I need ideas. Anybody have sack lunch suggestions? What do you pack in your kids' lunches? Even if you don't pack lunches, got any ideas?

Summer job prep

The law librarians are hosting a program called "Bridging the Legal Research Gap." It's a four-hour program intended to help law students succeed at their summer jobs. I attended after 1L year and found it helpful. Some things I knew, but some I didn't, and there were some practical ideas I found really useful. There are sessions at SU and UW. They are free, though you need to register. If it's after your job starts, some employers will happily give you the afternoon off so you can attend.
The UW session is:
Tuesday, June 24, 200812:45 - 5pm,University of Washington School of Law
For more info and to register:
http://lib.law.washington.edu/btg/2008/register.htm
Oh, um, snacks are provided. Not that that should influence you.

Blog-o-rama, or, we all need distractions

One of my favorite bloggers is on a road trip around the country, visiting her readers and fellow bloggers, so I stopped by to have coffee with her on Tuesday when she was in Seattle. It was fun to meet her and a couple of other bloggers in person.

I tend to read parenting blogs (sometimes called "mommy blogs") because reading other parents' stories about dealing with kid and family problems sometimes helps me with my own, or at least puts a little perspective on mine. Then there are the humor blogs, the catty fashion blogs, the (gasp) legal blogs... Do you read any blogs, and if so, which ones?

Here are a few that I visit occasionally:

Humor/parenting blogs
dooce
thepioneerwoman
whoopee
iambossy
the bloggess
othejoys

finslippy

alladither

snarky blogs
mamapop -- pop culture from a mom's perspective!
gofugyourself
I used to read more of these -- what's good?

law blogs
trialadnotes -- holla, mary!
Decision of the day

What else? What great blogs did I leave out?

Lisa and Bossy of iambossy

I like this better than my pix from prom this weekend, sigh

PALS is student org of the year!

At the law school gala on Saturday night, Megan Vogel of the SBA announced that we won student organization of the year! Megan cited our leadership on Fall Festival, our support of the Athay scholarship, and... well it was hard to hear, but it was a very nice speech, thanks Megan! I'd be happy to provide a copy of our nomination letter to anyone who wants it. It's a little long to post here. We also talked about the blog, the Childhaven drive, and our efforts to raise awareness of work/life balance issues.

Congrats everyone!

Legislative update

Well, Gov. Gregoire cut the increased funding for student-parents that we were so excited about. Thanks again to Dave, Laura and Michael who worked so hard on it. 2Ls and 1Ls, think about testifying in Olympia next year and the year after in support of increased funding for children of students!

Bar exam info

Just a reminder for 3Ls: Bar exam applications must be postmarked by April 23. The application and other info are here: http://www.wsba.org/lawyers/licensing/bar_exam_app_info.htm

Hello prospective students

Hey prospective students!
We get a lot of the same type of questions from students who are considering going to law school, whether they’ve already been admitted or are thinking of applying. I’ve written up the same kind of note several times so I thought I’d just post it here for folks who come wandering by.

The questions:

- How many hours a week can I expect class and homework to fill?
- Is it possible to take summer classes to lighten the load from the school year?
- Should my husband and I try to have our second child before fall 2009? Or wait til during law school? Am I crazy to even be contemplating this?

The answers: And remember, this is only my perspective on these things, but formed on the basis of talking to lots of people over the nearly 3 years I’ve been here.

hours per week:
The Bar and professors expect that your study time should be about two hours for every hour you’re in class. You’ll average 15 hours of class time per quarter, so another 30 hours of study time per week. I have found that unlike undergrad, this is real study time. Just to keep up. Your young, beer-drinking, childless classmates (I love them!) have vast expanses of time in which to study, and they will. It’s ALWAYS possible to study more, and the people who do are the ones with the great grades. However, 30 is enough. Unfortunately, 30 is a lot. It’s hard to find study time during the school day – if you have an hour between classes, it’s nice to study, but often you just want to zone out for a minute. Then there’s commuting, life, etc. My 1L year I did the bulk of my studying on weekends: eight hours on Saturdays and 4-8 on Sundays. (This is largely because I commute 3-4 hours a day, which hopefully most people don't.). Some weeks were lighter. If a paper was due, it was worse, but that only happens a couple times in the first year.

The second year seems a lot easier, though the work load isn’t lighter. There’s more of a variety of things you get into, and you can choose what you get into, so it seems more fun (or less painful), but there’s still a lot of work. People often try to time having their babies between first year and second year, or after second year. It’s still hard, but you have more choices about what to do, and you know better what level of work you want to put into it. First year really is boot camp, and you need all the focus you can get (within reason).

summer classes:
You can take summer classes. There is a full slate offered. There are two aspects of your question. One is, yes, you can take summer classes and lighten the load. An alternative would be to do an externship for credit (you can, for example, earn 15 credits – a full quarter’s worth – over the summer by working for a judge, and it looks awesome on your resume too). The downside of both the classes and the externship is that you have to pay full tuition for the summer. If you use your credits to lighten the load, you’ll have to still pay full tuition for the rest of school as well, because there’s no discount until you get to a really low credit load. So you’d be out another $5K and whatever else. That’s not actually a huge amount in the perspective of law school debts, but something to keep in mind.

The other aspect is that summer is such a great time to go out and exercise your legal skills. Pretty much everyone finishes their first year and thinks, great, I feel like I’ve learned a lot but what use is it? Your summer job or externship is incredibly helpful in making you realize you do have marketable skills, are good at this, and there is a point to going to law school. It’s really good for staving off a, for lack of a better term, crisis of faith. If you start wondering why the heck you’re doing this.

In addition, and this is where the law school voodoo kicks in, the first summer job is a great thing to have on your resume to land your second-summer job. The second-summer job is crucial because for a lot of people, at the end of their second-summer job, they get a job offer for after graduation. Not everyone. But a lot of people. That’s the, hmmm, track. The road that people try to get onto. So, the first summer, you want to have something on your resume that makes it look like you did something somewhat ambitious. A paying legal job would be great, but exceedingly rare. An externship is fantastic. A non-paying legal job is good. Somewhere after those is taking classes – it’s good, it’s legal, but it’s less of an effort to apply your skills and see how you do.

If you were to have a baby, most employers understand about that – they have babies too. So, say you had a baby your 1L summer, you could pretty much take the summer off and get a job as a research assistant for a professor, and find a professor that’s understanding about your schedule. Something where you could do a pretty minimal amount of work, but you still kept your toe in the pool. That would look great on an application for a 2L summer job. One of my friends did exactly that and got her first-choice 2L summer job.

(Just to finish off the train of thought, the only thing you don’t want to do your 1L summer is 1. nothing at all (although even that is ok if there’s a baby involved) or 2. go back to your old job because it looks like you’re not really interested in the law.)

timing of second child:
I started with a 9-month-old (and a 3-year-old) and that was doable. There are a couple of 1Ls this year who started with even younger babies. I wouldn’t recommend that though. I think you want your child to be old enough that you’re comfortable with having them in day care, and you’re familiar with the day care routine. A friend started at the same time as me with 8-month-old twins and that was fine – she had been accepted the year before, but deferred a year when she found out she was pregnant.

Older would be ok too, but I have found that this year, my 5-year-old is more interfering with my studies than in past years. I’m glad I didn’t wait until she was much older than 3 when I started.

One caveat. First year is tough, stressful, sometimes emotional. Having a baby your 1L summer is ideal, but it means spending most of your 1L year pregnant. Which can add to the stress and emotion. Shouldn't stop you, but something to consider.

(I don't really expect any current students to have read this far, but if you have, feel free to add your perspective in the comments!)

Legislative success

Thanks to Laura Arras and Michael Sterner who helped out with the lobbying effort in Olympia this year, and especially Dave Brown, 3L and GPSS president. They got us more money! Here's Dave's description:

GPSS Wins Major Victory for Student Parents; Securing One Million Dollars for Childcare
GPSS and the Washington Student Lobby secured a one million dollar increase in childcare grants for student parents statewide, and the passage of legislation to make the allocation of those grants more predictable and equitable. Grants will now be allocated on a basis proportionate to the contribution made by student governments at each of Washington’s four-year schools. Because over $800,000 of our student dollars are dedicated to childcare grants annually, this increase means that next year over one million dollars will go to UW student parents. This increased funding will allow graduate and professional student parents greater access to quality childcare and ensures that childcare is and remains affordable to our student community.

Missing tree

I just noticed that the Ben tree is missing from its spot. Wha? Perhaps you noticed this long before me. Rike reassured me: "A water pipe underneath it broke, and it is safe in the nursery. it will be put back soon--I hope!"

Another article on work-life balance

This time in the LA Times.
http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-lawstudents18mar18,1,1509837.story

New babies!

Congratulations to Vanessa, who had her son earlier this week. To help y'all have a moment to de-stress before finals, here are some photos of a few of the law school babies who were born this year. There are more new babies out there -- send me photos!

Carlos Manuel "Manny", Vanessa's son

Nathan, Karen Horowitz's son

Alexander, Eric and Melissa's son

Eli, Emma Kagel Berry's son




Corinne, Peter Moreno's daughter, born Feb. 29