Sowande, 2L

I watched the Oscars last night... well, as much of it as I could before I my mind started to wander.

[I had a Japanese-language "congratulations" but the site doesn't look like it supports the other language]. I've always been interested in foreign entities winning Oscars and Grammys, and that a Japanese film-maker won was, of course, a lot of fun. His speech was clever too. Check him out here.

The time for me to consider what my first Co-op will be is coming soon, and I am sort of spinning around on the topic. Part of me wants to go for the gold and head back to Japan, years later, to pursue an internship at a law firm there... The other part of me is thinking that perhaps a Japanese refresher course is a better approach, and maybe a co-op that will allow me to work on some entry-level translation.

We worked on client letters in my Research and Writing class last week, and as technical as they are in English, I'm curious about how exactly the game changes when it has to be in Japanese, or from Japanese into English. I'm going to tag that for later discussion and schedule an appointment with Jeffrey Smith, my Co-op Advisor. I'll check back in with an update, so y'all readers can get hint at what it's like to plan a foreign-language/international co-op.

This week is spring break--and it snowed last night. It was starting to warm up, but my Vista toolbar is telling me that it's 29º outside... delightful. The wind has been vicious too lately, but since my partner is here, we've been going to the movies, and stuffing our faces with Boston's finest delicacies. I'm just happy I don't have to trudge to class in this weather.

I'm also happy that I have a BREAK!!!

Posted by Sowande at 10:53 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

It seems a little bit "spring-ish" lately. The ice is starting to melt and we had some 40 degree weather today. The sun made a cameo ("word up!") for a bit, and it's been sprinkling here and there.

Classes have really picked up speed, and we are getting into some very complex topics. Constitutional law in particular is so history-rich, that as a non-history major (well, the more appropriate course is probably Civics since Justice Studies included a lot of discussion regarding the history of incarceration and policing), there is a lot to remember and pull up from 11th grade AP History. I met with a teaching assistant briefly yesterday and have to admit that without the quick review I had with her, I probably would not have been able to add much to today's class discussion.

This afternoon, I tagged along with two of my Law Office members on a field interview at the Massachusetts Department of Youth Services, and participated in a really enlightening discussion about how innovative they really are working to become. The names of juvenile justice "innovators" are starting to come to the surface more and more, and with greater frequency, so I'm really starting to see how small the juvenile justice community is, locally and nationally.

And now it's time for bed.

Posted by Sowande at 9:42 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Music has always been a huge part of my life. I attended a music and arts conservatory back in junior high and high school in Santa Barbara, my father is a musician (mom--not so much), and I even have the same name as one of the most prominent Nigerian composers to date. I was a radio DJ for a top-rated, large market, "top 40 urban/crossover" station (the vernacular is embedded) back in California, interned at the Grammy's for a while during my undergrad, and then at Universal Records under their Interscope/Geffen/A&M labels.

I bring this up because I was at a 1L welcome reception at a local law firm last week, and I had a very interesting conversation with an associate. The firm mainly handles commercial real estate issues, specifically corporate real estate finance and transfers. I asked her how she ended up in such a practice area, naively assuming she was an Econ or Business Administration undergraduate. I was pleasantly surprised to find out that she was a Music major at a prominent local conservatory.

After some reminiscent, ice-breaking chatter about embouchure, she mentioned that the skills she honed as a musician; e.g., ability to pick up and repeat complex time and key signatures, to think quickly and with dexterity, and how to handle nerves, all contributed to her success in law school. Music also, as she mentioned, remains a wonderful outlet for her to escape to when the demands of work seem overwhelming.

I, myself, have been escaping to the new-ish Animal Collective album, which is a welcome "desert island" since I can't seem to be able to find any of my Philip Glass albums... Spring break project...

Posted by Sowande at 10:37 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Well, I'm here in Dockser Commons (the fresh new space within the School of Law) with three other members of my law office, Matt, Marissa and James. We're talking through the final edit of our first draft of our Legal Skills in Social Context (LSSC) project, and I thought it would be a perfect time to provide some perspective on the LSSC program.

Just to give a little background, the first-year class is divvied up into law offices. There are about twelve students per law office, and each law office is assigned a very legitimate, real, project. Ours, for example, is for Massachusetts Senator Karen Spilka. We have been assigned a very weighty task--to create legislative recommendations for a restorative justice youth diversionary program for the State of Massachusetts juvenile justice system.

What we are doing is assisting in the creation of legislative history, and model legislation, that may be argued in the State Senate, and some day codified. Our client, Senator Karen Spilka has essentially hired our law office to undertake this project, and it has been no easy task.

Each member of our law office, with whom we spent the first semester getting to know (we all have the exact same class schedules), has contributed by doing extensive and substantial research into the existing juvenile justice system, youth courts, and restorative justice. We have spent hours upon hours (which we are tracking using time sheets--as "real" attorneys do, some in six minute increments) researching, drafting and interviewing, to gather the information that we will present to the Senator in April.

The LSSC program is structured in such a way that each step in our venture is planned out, by the program as well as by us, to maximize the professional potential of our end product. This is all in addition to the high demands of our other core classes: Constitutional Law, Criminal Justice/Procedure, Research and Writing, and Contracts. So, imagine if you will, every hour of each day being dedicated to law school.

It's definitely an exercise in time management, professionalism and the ability to burn the midnight oil while tackling the amalgam of LAW, theoretically and in practice. It isn't very difficult to see the applicability of such an intense program to our future legal careers.

Today was definitely symbolic in that with the completion of our first draft, each of us pushed ourselves one step closer to something tangible that just screams of our ability to get out there and do. More on this later as we continue with field interviews and the actual drafting of the model legislation. James and I interviewed Honorable Jay D. Blitzman, a local judge who sits in the Juvenile Courts, which I will share at a later point.

But for now, a hearty "Congrats" to Marissa, who found out today that will be clerking for a judge at the brand new District Court in Springfield for her first Co-op.

Posted by Sowande at 2:37 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)