This quarter has finally come to an end. I am exhausted – partially because law school is challenging but also because I may have over-extended myself just a bit. Law students often have opinions one way or the other about whether 1L or 2L year is more difficult. Having completed ½ of the academic portion of my 2L year, my vote is that they are equally difficult, but for different reasons. 1L year is challenging because of the distinctive learning method and environment, coupled with the sheer volume of material one must master. Both of those challenges are still present in your 2L year but you have learned to cope or even thrive on them. By your 2L year, the clean-cut structure and the predetermined schedule are gone. All of the sudden, your time is not taken up with classes and your LSSC project. Instead, you must make good judgment calls on what classes to take, what extracurriculars to participate in, and most significantly, what you should be doing for your career. I think making good decisions is a life, not school, skill. So for those of us who have not had the benefit of a lot of life experience, 2L year involved growing pains. For example, I just came back from the national round of the moot court competition that my partner and I have been participating in this quarter. The national competition unfortunately was during the same week of my exam week at the law school. Inexperienced and always overly ambitious, I decided that I could prepare for moot court and my four exams at the same time. To make a long story short, I ended up working on my take home exam on the plane ride to and from the competition, making myself completely nauseous the whole time. Lesson learned – know your limits and don’t be afraid to ask for help. I should have rescheduled one of my exams after the moot court instead of moving all of them up and taking them early.

Speaking of moot court, what an incredible experience it has been. The national competition was completely different from the regional, both in terms of competitors and judges. You definitely feel like you are competing on a different level there. 16 teams from around the country each competed in 2 preliminary rounds arguing both on brief (your own side) and off brief (your opponent's side). Then 4 finalists competed in the semi-finals and from that 2 finalists argued in the Supreme Court of Nevada in front of real federal and state judges. While we did not bring home any trophies, Team Northeastern was excited to make our first appearance at the nationals. Personally, my partner and I were pleased with our performance, and we’re definitely looking forward to passing on everything we’ve learned to next year’s team for an even better performance. I don’t know how moot court works at other schools, but the faculty at Northeastern has been amazingly supportive of us. Our coach traveled with us all the way to Nevada for the national competition while another professor came to support us at the regional in DC. All in all, more than half dozen professors at the school have mooted us in practice oral arguments. While I’ve never gone to another law school, from what I hear of other law schools, this kind of individualized attention really sets our school apart.

As you can tell, I am having another I-love-NUSL moment. Although I don’t always feel this way and like everyone else get upset about the malfunctioning heating/cooling system in the building, this has definitely been a quarter in which I really got to appreciate the incredible support network this school has built for its students from financial aid to co-op to career services to the faculty. Well, happy turkey day everyone! I’m off packing for my San Francisco co-op!

Posted by Wen at 3:28 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

It's exam week for the upper levels at NUSL. Check back next week for stories of my law school exams, moot court competition in NV, and getting ready for coop in SF.

Posted by Wen at 3:12 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I recently read this American Lawyer article about the up and coming generation of law students. According to the article, we are a serious bunch – not only in terms about the work we want to pursue but also the life/work balance we strike to achieve. I tend to agree. That brings me to my next thought – it’s time this generation of law students break down the barriers between public interest and business law.

As many of you may already know, Northeastern is a premier public interest law school. That may be because the professors and students here will push you to analyze issues from different perspectives. Or because we have built very close relationships with judges and government agencies over the years, they love to hire Northeastern students. Or maybe simply because you will never feel alone or “crazy� if you came to law school to stop global warming, fix the broken criminal “justice� system, or to achieve world peace for that matter.

But what should all that mean to you? Does that mean you should not come here if you have not chosen to accept some noble mission as your life purpose? Or does that mean if you are contemplating about world peace, you are locked in public interest if you choose Northeastern? I asked myself those same questions when I was applying to law schools. My experience here so far says “no� to both questions.

Like many law school applicants, my exposure to law prior to law school was very much focused on public interest. This is at least partially because the opportunity to volunteer at a legal aid clinic is much more readily available to college students than say a Fortune 100 law firm. Whatever the reason, because of that exposure, I know for a fact that public interest law will always be part of my life/work balance. However, it’s absolutely archaic to insist that you are either a “public interest lawyer� or a “business lawyer� and that you have to choose by the time you enter law school. I came to law school because I believe lawyers are change agents – whether they change their client’s situation by helping her seek political asylum or by restructuring business deals to minimize tax exposure. Knowing I have the knowledge and skills to change any situation for the better is what I hope to achieve in obtaining a legal education. The designation of “public interest� or “business law� is merely what a lawyer chooses professionally not who she/he is personally. Of course, I’m not denying the huge lifestyle differences between someone who professionally chooses the 80 hr work week and someone who chooses the 40 hr week for half of the pay. That’s a personal decision. In my book, every lawyer, possessed with the tools for change, should be a public interest lawyer – whether they choose to do it as their day job or as a passion in life. So I hope the article is right. I hope the new generation of law students realizes that they are more than what their business cards say about them.

Posted by Wen at 2:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In my undergraduate years, I was all about the extracurricular – student-faculty committee, peer leading, student government, volunteering. But, no doubt you’ve heard, scarcity of time is something law students have in common. I often feel like I’m racing against the clock, persistently ticking away. This problem is made worse by the fact that there are always so many enticing events going on at the law school. All this meant I had to make some hard decisions about how to allocate my precious “spare time�. One student group I have committed myself to since my 1L year is APALSA – Asian Pacific American Law Student Association. Last year, APALSA organized some pretty neat events like the potluck fundraiser for Greater Boston Legal Service – Asian Outreach Unit, the dinner event at an Asian American professor’s house, inter-APALSA cruise around Boston harbor where we mingled with APALSA kids from other Boston law schools, community service at Boston Living Center – the list goes on.

APALSA only got better this year. We sent two teams (yours truly included) to the Thomas Tang National Moot Court Competition. Moot court, as you will find out, is the law school equivalent of mock trial. It is an old-fashioned but invaluable part of the law school experience that allows you to hone in on both of your brief writing and oral presentation skills.

A fellow law student and good friend of mine told me about the competition over the summer and we decided to enter the competition together as a team. By the time fall quarter started, we had sent in the application, received the fact pattern for the competition, found a professor to coach us, and dedicated Fridays as “moot court day�. What followed was a pretty demanding experience of weekly researching, brainstorming, writing, citation checking, and oral advocacy. This was on top of my classes and the fall recruiting. I’d be lying if I told you that there weren’t days when my partner and I wished we had never heard of moot court and could enjoy Boston’s postcard-perfect autumn Fridays like everyone else. But as I often say to myself – no pain no gain. And what a tremendous gain it was.

Participating in the regional competition was one of the most rewarding experiences of my law school career thus far. I had very few expectations going in as everything is brand new to me. After submitting our written brief 2 weeks prior, my partner and I arrived at American University, the host of the Northeast regional competition, bright and early on competition day. We first argued “on-brief� on behalf of the respondent in the case in the preliminary round. This meant we argued the position we took in our brief. We argued off-brief next, which meant we switched from the last session and argued the exact opposite position on behalf of the petitioner. A panel of 3 “judges� (litigators and lawyers from the DC bar) asked my partner and I some good questions, and I thought we did well answering them in both sessions. It was a huge relief to me that we survived by the time lunch time came around.

We rendezvoused with the other team from Northeastern and their coach who was traveling with us and exchanged stories from the preliminary round. It was really great to have the moral support of your fellow teammates and professor there. By that time, none of us wanted to set our hopes too high so we all thought we were not going to advance to the semi-finals in the afternoon. When the competition official announced that team 8 was one of the four teams advancing to the semi-final competition, I looked around the room waiting for team 8 to reveal themselves. No one moved. In retrospect, I must have forgotten my team number in all the excitement. So just like that my partner and I defeated 14 other teams from the region to compete in the semi-final round in front of six real judges from the Maryland trial court and court of appeals. To make a long story short, my partner and I are going to Las Vegas in two weeks for the final national competition!

Posted by Wen at 4:52 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)