People sometimes question what it means for Northeastern to have a focus on social justice and public interest law. When answering this question, many focus on the requirement that students complete at least one public interest co-op and the required first year course, Lawyering Skills in the Social Context (LSSC). However, every once in a while, there is a class or a professor whose approach to the subject reminds me why Northeastern is a different kind of law school (at least on its best days).

Monday was my first day of Employment Law with Professor Karl Klare, one of NUSL’s most beloved professors and also one of the field’s oft-cited practitioners, http://www.leiterrankings.com/faculty/2007faculty_impact_areas.shtml#Labor. We began the semester with a look at some statistics, specifically, the number of people in the U.S. workforce, and the number of employees who are in unions. Prof. Klare next moved on to even more sobering numbers – the disparity in pay between men and women, between white employees and minority employees. We examined the shockingly low national minimum wage (barely $10,000 a year for an individual, and just over $20,000 for a family of four) and the staggering reality that few people could afford to rent an apartment, stock their fridges, or raise a family on this pay.

To some this may seem an obvious place to start. But to others, this focus on the employee and not the employer is a radical departure from traditional law school courses on employment law. Don’t get me wrong, we focus on the employer as well, and important questions about what the government can and should be expected to provide, and what burden should fall on the employer. However, we start with looking at the millions of Americans who are employees, and what it looks like to be part of the ever-growing U.S. workforce.

Granted, this sort of focus doesn’t happen as often as many here at NUSL wish it would. And, then again, it happens more often than other students want. In my opinion, it’s a remarkable part of what is unique about NUSL and a welcome reminder of why I chose to go here. Regardless of whether you are going to work for employers or employees (or, yes, both!), I can see no benefit as a lawyer, an advocate, or a voter, in burying your head in the sand about the state of the American worker.

Posted by Sarah at 10:34 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Tomorrow is my last day of co-op! I can't believe it - three months ago I came out to Southern California for the first time, having never stepped foot in a federal courthouse, and now Pasadena and the Ninth Circuit courthouse feel so familiar. It really has been a great experience and I feel so lucky that it has been part of my law school experience. I am leaving some good weather and some great friends behind.

Today I thought I would share with you some of my favorite law-related but non-casebook reading. I find that every once in a while its great to go back to those books that inspired you to pursue the law, whether they be the classic To Kill A Mockingbird or even, admit it!, John Grisham. Here are a few of my favorites:

A Civil Action, by Jonathan Harr, is the true story of lawyers taking on corporations...and winning. Eventually. For me the combination of an ambitious, if unrealistic, young lawyer, corporate (ir)responsibility, and public health combine to make a thrilling read. Even better, some of the main characters are still practicing right here in Boston. Beyond the excitement of the story, however, the book also illuminates what a long and draining fight class action lawsuits, and litigation of all kinds, can be.

I recently read Thurgood Marshall: American Revolutionary, by Juan Williams. Prior to attending law school, and even through my first year, I didn’t understand people’s interest in Supreme Court Justices. However, after being in law school a bit longer, and reading this book, I find it fascinating how learning about individual Justices can give you a better idea of what the practice of law was like during their tenure, what the political climate was, and, most of all, remind you that law is made by real people, who are products of their place and time.

One of my favorite books of the past year or two was Arc of Justice: A Saga of Race, Civil Rights, and Murder in the Jazz Age, by Kevin Boyle. It’s one of those non-fiction history books that gives you an incredible sense of what life was like during a specific period in American history. As they write on the website for the great bookstore Powells, http://www.powells.com/:

“In 1925, Detroit was a smoky swirl of jazz and speakeasies, assembly lines and fistfights. The advent of automobiles had brought workers from around the globe to compete for manufacturing jobs, and tensions often flared with the KKK in ascendance and violence rising. Ossian Sweet, a proud Negro doctor-grandson of a slave-had made the long climb from the ghetto to a home of his own in a previously all-white neighborhood. Yet just after his arrival, a mob gathered outside his house; suddenly, shots rang out: Sweet, or one of his defenders, had accidentally killed one of the whites threatening their lives and homes.

And so it began-a chain of events that brought America's greatest attorney, Clarence Darrow, into the fray and transformed Sweet into a controversial symbol of equality. Historian Kevin Boyle weaves the police investigation and courtroom drama of Sweet's murder trial into an unforgettable tapestry of narrative history that documents the volatile America of the 1920s and movingly re-creates the Sweet family's journey from slavery through the Great Migration to the middle class. Ossian Sweet's story, so richly and poignantly captured here, is an epic tale of one man trapped by the battles of his era's changing times.�

This book got me really interested in Detroit, in Clarence Darrow, and in the history of the NAACP. Arc of Justice is captivating - a moving and devastating portrait of racism, American history, and one man’s story.

One final note: while not directly law related, right now I am reading The Cigarette Century: The Rise, Fall, and Deadly Persistence of the Product That Defined America, by Allan M. Brandt. The Cigarette Century was recommended to me by NUSL professor Richard Daynard, who runs the Public Health Advocacy Institute, http://www.phaionline.org/. Check out their work on Tobacco Control here: http://www.phaionline.org/projects/tobacco-control/.

Have a great holiday everyone!

Posted by Sarah at 3:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The best and most fortuitous thing that has happened to me in my journey to becoming a lawyer has been finding a mentor. Finding a mentor who can help lead you through the maze of going from pre-law to 1L, and from law student to lawyer and beyond, is more of an art than a science, but the pay-off is huge.

For me, I was lucky enough to have this happen early on in my 1L year, without much planning. At a dinner for a school related event in the fall, I schmoozed and chatted with a number of Northeastern alums and others involved in supporting the school’s public interest programs. Although we weren’t seated at the same table, my favorite person to talk with turned out to be a lawyer named Neil Leifer. Neil, a NUSL alum from the 1980's, was relaxed and welcoming, and spoke enthusiastically with me about his work as a lawyer doing toxic torts litigation and public health work.

A few days later, I emailed Neil, telling him that I had enjoyed meeting him. Neil was kind enough to write back and invite me to visit his office. As I had yet to step foot in a law firm, I took him up on the offer. Since then, Neil has played an invaluable role in my law school career, giving me his thoughts on everything from class to co-op selection, looking over writing samples, encouraging me when the sometimes harsh world of the law has got me down, and generally being a role model for me, as one of the rare and elusive brand of lawyers who actually seem...happy.

A lot of my friends tease me about having a mentor and express confusion at how I struck up this relationship and why. I tell them, talk to people that you meet, ask them questions about what they do, see if you can come by and visit where they work. Most people will welcome this sort of genuine interest in the work and ideas to which they have devoted their lives. There is only so much you can learn in school, and there is so much to be gained from talking to people who are out in the field, have decades of amazing work under their belts, and are willing to be honest with you about the trials, tribulations, and rewards of practicing the law. I can’t guarantee success (Neil’s one of a kind), but I think it’s worth a shot.

Posted by Sarah at 11:52 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

So, onto another topic which probably doesn't hold much interest to non-law students, but consumes a lot of energy for those of us in the midst of it all - the time has come again to chose and register for classes. Basically, there are two schools of thought about choosing your classes once you finish your first year of law school: Bar Prep and Interesting Classes. Some people will tell you that there are specific classes you should take in order to prepare for the Bar, while others will say, essentially, “take whatever classes you want, the Bar prep course (which you take the summer after you graduate) will prepare you for the test.�

A recent study bolstered the claims of the latter camp. The study found “[n]o statistically significant relationships. . . between bar examination subject matter courses taken and bar examination passage for graduates ranked in the first, second or fourth quartiles of their graduating class.� [See the study at http://law.bepress.com/expresso/eps/1889/ .] Various “blawgs� eagerly reported on this news, including the Freakonomics column in the New York Times, and the ever-popular Above The Law.

The informal feedback I have gathered from students and professors alike seems to support this opinion. A professor once told me that if you are someone who did well on the LSAT, you most likely don’t need to do excessive preparation for the Bar other than the prep course that has become standard. If, on the other hand, you are someone who has struggled with tests, you may want to take courses during law school that cover the topics on the Bar because, really, every little bit helps.

As for me, I’ve been trying a mix. I do want to take courses on some of the basic areas of law that lawyers are expected to know a bit about - Trusts and Estates, Tax - but I’m not going to take the courses which hold little interest to me and I am unlikely to encounter in future practice - Secure Transactions being a prime example. Everyone has their own tactics though - one alternative route is to take classes based solely on which professor is teaching them.

The first semester of my 2L year, Summer 2007, I took Labor Law (due to my interest in the subject), Evidence (which is considered practically required), Problems in Public Health Law (an area of interest to me), and Advanced Legal Writing (see my aforementioned struggle with the subject). All of the classes turned out to be both interesting and useful.

This fall I have once again signed up for a mix of classes: (1) Federal Courts (which has become practically a standard class for law students. Besides which I’m working in a federal court right now and working at the Federal Defenders this spring so...seems like I should learn the courts); (2) Employment Law (an area of interest to me, and one which is practiced at the firm I will be at in the summer); (3) Law and Economic Development (a course recommended to me by a number of alums); and finally, (4) an independent study with a professor whose work interests me.

So, in closing, I would encourage 1Ls to look at the planned course offerings for the coming years and think about what topics they might be interested in. I would also strongly encourage students to look into doing independent studies with professors or help them out with research. Professors at Northeastern are generally incredibly welcoming of student involvement and excited to hear about your ideas. And really, if you don’t take advantage of such opportunities, you have little room to complain if the curriculum doesn’t suit your interests.

Posted by Sarah at 2:57 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

So, I made the decision to switch rotations.

To someone outside of the NUSL-bubble, this probably sounds like a foreign language - switching rotations? What is a rotation and who cares if you switch it?

Well, it’s a NUSL thing and it is, to some people, sort of a big deal. After a first year of standard law school classes ends in May, the 1L class splits in half. Half of the class heads out on their first co-op and the other half heads into the first three months of their 2L classes. Although not etched in stone, over the last few decades each rotation has developed its own “character.� Those who head out on co-op right away, the “Winter/Summer� rotation, are assumed to be more “traditional� law students. This is based on the fact that all other law schools besides NUSL send their students out looking for jobs in the summer months and therefore firms and certain governmental programs and scholarships have established programs for law students during the summers. Those who go on the “Fall/Spring� rotation are generally the more “public interest� minded students, thought to be so because they hold little interest in firm summers. Of course, like a lot of broad caricatures, these ideas have an inkling of truth and a lot of exceptions.

That said, I choose the Fall/Spring rotation for the same reasons a lot of people do - I didn’t want to compete with a huge group of law students from other schools, I wanted to be part of the “public interest� group of students, most of my friends were Fall/Spring, and I didn’t have an interest in working at a firm. So why am I, to the dismay of some friends and confusion of others, crossing over to the “other� rotation?

For me, it came down to choosing to be a summer associate at a firm. While I knew I could get co-op experience at a firm during another time in the year, I believed that “summering� at a firm held two unique advantages: first, most firms hire permanently from their pool of summer associates. While being hired is definitely not guaranteed (especially at a small or medium firm), being a summer associate increases your chances. Second, I have been told by many people and have seen in my own experience, that having a summer associate position on your resume greatly increases your likelihood of obtaining a clerkship.

Of course none of this would have had any bearing on me if I hadn’t found a firm that I felt was right for me and that, amazingly enough, thought I was a good fit, too. I interviewed with one firm, developed a firm crush on that firm, and was offered a summer associate position with that firm - so I was lucky. It’s a medium-sized Boston firm, with a high number of female lawyers, both a criminal and civil practice, a good reputation amongst the lawyers I talked to, and an amazing commitment to pro bono and public interest work.

Despite my enthusiasm about the job, it's not an easy switch. Honestly, some people see it as a betrayal to work at a firm - any firm - when you claim to be committed to social justice. (I have lots more to say about this). On a day-to-day basis, its hard to think about being in classes with people I haven’t seen for a year or two, and hard to think of all my friends, clubs and groups continuing without me there.

But I know why I came to law school and what keeps me going - the chance to get the best legal education possible and become the most well-rounded lawyer I can, in order to serve my clients to the greatest extent. I came to Northeastern because I knew it would give me the chance to learn all aspects of the law, if I could just seize the opportunity. So I am.

So. After three months of class this winter, and another co-op in the spring (at the Federal Defenders office in Puerto Rico, where I plan on eating pastelitos and café until I can no longer stand), I will return and begin the last part of my law school career as a member of the Winter/Spring rotation. Wish me luck.

Posted by Sarah at 1:55 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)