Hurricane Katrina Symposium

Students at many law schools around the country have made it through week one of law school and are staring week two in the face. That's a subject rich for blog posts, but today I want to exercise a point of personal privilege and talk about another topic.

Specifically, I encourage you to check out an excellent symposium being held by Mississippi College School of Law on Tuesday, August 29, 2006, concerning the legal impact of Hurricane Katrina. The program for this law review symposium can be linked to here. Please check it out, since the symposium features an excellent line-up of speakers. This one-day event includes panels on federalism and disaster response; insurance law; and property law/land use.

Lawyers and interested scholars in the vicinity of Jackson, Mississippi should strongly consider attending the symposium, both because it has a superb line-up of national-caliber lawyers and scholars and because 6 hours of CLE credit are available. Why not fill your CLE hours by attending a program of great social and legal relevance? People not in the Jackson vicinity can check this blog again in a few days for news on how the symposium went, as well as visit the Mississippi College School of Law's main website.

In addition, you can find some stunning images of Hurricane Katrina's aftermath on one of my previous posts on this blog. Those pictures were taken five months after the storm--but I was on the Gulf coast just last month, and while progress is being made, much of it still looks like a war zone.

Articling: Watching your Classmates Succeed

I didn't really think about it much during law school, but now that it is here, I really enjoy watching my friends and classmates going through their bar call ceremonies and becoming members of the Law Society. I haven't been able to attend all of the ceremonies, but I have been able to see photos and have heard the stories. Thinking back to their scared faces in those first year classes, and thinking of all of the panic going on in the law library, I wonder if I looked equally scared and panicked. All of my friends, save one or two, have succeeded in obtaining articles, completing their articles and bar exam/CPLED requirements, and getting offers from their firms. That's pretty good, I think. Way to go guys and gals!

The bar call ceremony is different everywhere. In Calgary and Edmonton, for example, you often do the ceremony en masse with a bunch of other new lawyers. In smaller centres, you usually go alone, or with one other person. That was the case for me. I went with another fellow who had been a solicitor in the U.K. for 11 years.

Our judge, a member of the Court of Queens Bench, met with us before hand, interviewed us, shared some good inside jokes and shared a bit of sage advice. The ceremony itself was really nice. Although it had its formal moments, it was also filled with joviality, and even laughter. It was really great to have friends and family in attendance. I have some classmates who had family come from pretty far away. For many parents, it is a very proud moment.

You will have to wear robes to your bar call ceremony in most jurisdictions. Some jurisdictions (such as Saskatchewan, I believe), you just go down somewhere and sign the Law Society register. There is no real ceremony. If you do end up having to wear robes, be prepared to pay between $900 and $1000. Some firms will cover this cost. You may want to negotiate this with your firm when you negotiate your articling contract. I didn't realize they would be so much money, and it hurt my bank account at a time when I was hoping to start getting ahead on student loans.

There are a bunch of administrative hoops that you will need to go through before you get called to the bar. In Alberta, the rule is that you cannot be called to the bar until 30 days have passed beyond the end of your articles. That is also something that nobody told me about before beginning my article, or during my article. What a rip off! Another month at articling salary sucks. I was able to push my call date up one week, but apparently that is as far as it can be pushed. So, be prepared for this little technicality. You will also have to fill out a bunch of paperwork, which will include your principal. Get this done before the end of your articles, so that you can submit it the day after your articles are complete and shorten any possible delays.

Be sure to read through the archives of this blog. There are many entries about law school, articling, the LSAT, and more. Shoot me any questions you might have, and be sure to check out my book whether you are just thinking about law school, are about to write the LSAT, are applying for law school, in law school already, or about to apply for articles.

More (and Still More) Advice for New Law Students

Professor Paul Caron at the University of Cincinnati College of Law, who runs the excellent blog TaxProf Blog, has provided an admirable compendium of online advice for newbie law students. I am proud to say that one of this blog's entries is on the list. Check out his list of very useful links here.

And for those of you who may have missed some of my recent posts with advice for incoming law students, here are the links: two entries about how to brief a case (here and here); podcast advice for new law students from CALI's Pre-Law Blog (here); and advice regarding law school orientation, including what not to do, based on my own painful experience (here).

Good luck to all incoming students as they transition from the real world into the rarified atmosphere of law school! It's a transformational experience--one that shaped me enormously and that I have never regretted, despite all the hard work and stress of it all.

More Thoughts on How to Brief a Case

Yesterday I posted advice on how to brief a case (here). I've thought about the subject some more, and I think I need to emphasize the importance of not only briefing the case--understanding what happened and why--but also critiquing the case. As I said in my last post, what do you think of the court's decision? Was it right? Wrong? Partly both? And why?

I am not suggesting that you try to read your professor's mind. Nor am I suggesting you have to get your analysis of the case right. There will be many, many times in law school when you go to class thinking you understand the material, and leave class confused. That is not just a mean trick we play on unsuspecting students; rather, it is part of the educational process. Cases need to be unpacked and dissected, and this process often uncovers things you might not have expected or seen when you prepared your casebrief.

But you should go through the critiquing process anyway, since you are being trained in critical thinking. Sometimes you will hit the nail on the head, too--and that is a great feeling. And on a more practical note, doing so gives you something to say if your professor asks you, "So, what did you think of the decision?" Saying something that clearly shows you have prepared is a lot less embarrassing than saying, "Uh, I don't know" or something equally insightful. Plus, if your professor takes class participation into consideration when handing out final grades--as I do--you are possibly helping your grade (or at least avoiding doing damage to it).

How to Brief a Case

Right now, thousands of incoming law students across the nation are probably not sitting at home preparing for their very first classes of law school. But they should be. And if you are one of these students, when you do crack the books one of the most important things to do is learn how to brief the cases--that is, prepare written summaries of them in advance of class, so that you are familiar with each case, the issues it presents, the proposition of law it stands for, and so on.

Let me repeat that: as a new law student, you need to brief the cases. Not rely on a casebrief from a friend, or an outline from last year's class, or a commercial outline, or (heaven forbid) some casebrief you download from the web for free. (In my experience, you get what you pay for in the latter case.) You can experiment with different, and possibly faster, approaches later in law school and decide what works best for you. But right now, at the beginning of your law school career, you really, really need to learn how to brief a case.

This is because briefing a case is a good exercise for learning to differentiate among the different parts of a judicial opinion. Perhaps shockingly (or perhaps not so shockingly), judicial opinions are not always well written--including those by our esteemed Supreme Court Justices. Working to identify the specific legal issue in question, the relevant facts, the analysis and reasoning of the case, and the legal holding of a case--and writing it all out in a concise and standard format--is a good habit to get into as a new law student.

So, how do you brief a case? One method I commonly hear recommended is that students should follow the "IRAC" method, which as I understand it stands for "Issue, Rule, Analysis, Conclusion" (with the conclusion being the holding). I suppose that's fine as far as it goes, but it seems incomplete to me. What about the facts--aren't they important? Who are the parties? What is the procedural history of the case? These things make a difference. So the IRAC approach falls somewhat short, in my opinion.

Yet on the other hand, you are trying to distill the case down to its essence, and too much information can cloud the picture. What is a first-year law student to do? I suggest a compromise. It's basically the IRAC approach, but topped-and-tailed with additional information. Here is what I think you should include in a typical casebrief:

• Parties
• Relevant facts
• The legal issue(s) raised
• Summary of the relevant law
• Analysis: the application of the law to the issue(s) and facts at hand--that is, the court's reasoning
• Holding (and disposition)
• Your thoughts: was the case properly decided? What did the court get right or wrong? What do you think the implications of the case are?

Is there an acronym for this? PFILAHT? PRILAHY? I've seen worse, I suppose. Any suggestions for a good acronym would be much appreciated. "IRAC" is a great acronym--just an under-inclusive approach, in my view.

Thanks to Professor Randy Barnett of Georgetown University Law Center for sparking some of my thoughts on this issue. His Contracts casebook (3d edition), which I use in my first-year Contracts class, contains very helpful suggestions on briefing cases. My "PFILAHT" (ugh) approach is streamlined and altered from his approach--but I suppose that proves my point about ultimately using whatever method is best for you. Whatever approach you take, though, I hope you come up with a better acronym than me.

CALI Podcast Advice for New Law Students

Continuing with my thread of looking to others for pre-law advice, please check out a podcast by Hamline Professor Douglas McFarland on CALI's Pre-Law Blog, which contains about 15 minutes of advice for newbie law students. His thoughts on study aids (don't over-do it and spend too much) and taking final exams (law school exams are like junior high algebra tests--you are being tested on your method and skills, not just your answers) are good pointers for any new law student. His reflections on the Socratic method and notetaking in class are helpful too. (His tip: listen not just to what the professor says, but also to what your fellow students say when called on. It's a dialogue, after all.)

With respect to that last excellent point, I'd add that you always should be trying to answer the professor's questions in your head, as if you had been called on--realizing, of course, that this is like watching Jeopardy! at home: you always do better when you are not the contestant. You'll realize how true this is the first time you get called on in class.

Yet More Pre-Law Advice (and this time not from me)

The National Jurist publishes a magazine called preLaw which, true to its name, is all about stuff for incoming law students. The latest issue can be found here. I'd mention that my law school is featured in the article on guaranteed (frozen) tuition rates, which do not increase while a student is in law school--but that would be blatant hucksterism, so I won't.

In addition, the preLaw website has other information that newbie law students might find helpful. I'm not endorsing it, but it is there. The site has a podcast feature that is on my to-do list to check out.