Ep 44: The 1L Survival Checklist - 5 Things Every Law Student Needs
Welcome back to another episode of The Whole Lawyer. It's your boy, Akeem D. Earl, and I have my beautiful cohost here with me, Tone Earl, on the pod, and we're back to give y'all some more gems. But before we do that, please like, share, subscribe to the podcast, y'all. We on YouTube.
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Speaker 2:You know what I'm saying? Alright. So today's topic
Akeem:babe, what what's today's topic?
Tonée:Today's topic is five tips for passing your one l year. We are talking to the baby, baby, baby future lawyers.
Akeem:Yeah.
Tonée:And we took our time to really think about what we did to excel in our 1L year. Granted, our 1L year was nearly, dang, I'm like six years out.
Akeem:I don't
Tonée:remember So that would mean my 1L year is like nine years away. And yours would be like eight years away.
Akeem:2018. Yeah. Something like that.
Tonée:Yeah. That's It's crazy. It was a while ago.
Akeem:Yeah.
Tonée:But we never really left law school. All of that stuff is still great with us. Yeah. We feel like we have some hot tips for you. So I don't know if you wanna go first or do you want me to first?
Akeem:What should we do first? What should we do first? Let's start practical. The first thing I wrote down was focus and getting rid of distractions. I think that sets, like, the baseline for your one l year, and it will help you throughout your law school career.
Akeem:The better you can focus and lock in on a task, the better your whole life would be. Okay? And, obviously, that'll trickle in to law school because you're gonna be briefing cases. You're gonna be in class. The professor's gonna be throwing a lot at you.
Akeem:You're gonna be in different meetings. You're gonna be in different clubs, stuff like that. And you need to be able to focus on one thing at a time. It's gonna feel overwhelming, but I think the ability to sit down and do a task will help you translate through your exams and all those different things. And that's getting rid of social media.
Akeem:And again, I suggest get rid of it. Like this one all year, just get rid of it. Just say, I'm gonna go on like a three month social media fast, because it'll help you zone in on what you need to do. Especially because, obviously, one all semester is very, very important. It's just the tone for your grades and it's just the baseline for your grades for you in law school.
Akeem:So I would say once that first semester starts, no social media, get into the habit and and start learning the skill of briefing your cases, reading through your syllabus, outlining. There's gonna be a lot coming at you. So you really don't have time to be, like, on YouTube while you briefing cases, watching a TV show while you trying to create an outline. You wanna be able to focus. And that's gonna help you on the bar, it's gonna help you on exams.
Akeem:But yeah, make just marry that in your brain. I'm going to be I need to be able to sit down. And if I'm reading this 15 page case, that's all I'm doing right now. Then Sorry, last thing. And then, you time yourself.
Akeem:These are things we're doing right now. That's what the right thing to do. Like, these are things I'm doing right now to better my focus, is time yourself. How long does it take you to brief a case? That's what that's something you should know.
Akeem:Because if you know you have a meeting with the professor in the morning, and then you have this interview the next right after, and then you have this to do, and you also have a class tomorrow morning, if you know it takes you forty five minutes to brief a case, you know where to put that in your schedule. You now know where to apply that to your pattern. So that's helpful to do. But that all comes with focus.
Tonée:Yeah. And I would say about another part of focus is organizing yourself. Like for type B people, it would behoove you to start thinking about your future self and how your future self will thank you when you've organized yourself. Like if you're someone who is like, oh, I'll just go through the notes before finals week and start compiling an outline and all that stuff. It's like, no.
Tonée:Why would
Akeem:you do that?
Tonée:Yeah. Why would you do that? Get it done now. Allow yourself time where you're not cramming and having to kind of, you know, hurriedly get yourself together and know this information before finals because you're not gonna pass. Like, I don't know anybody who's done well on a final when they crammed the night before.
Tonée:And those who have, maybe you're special people, but like, don't cram. Like, allow your future self to thank you by reviewing your notes the weekend of the week that you took them, right? If you're somebody who, you know, records the class or, or, you're, you're someone who writes notes down, create that outline online. The process of typing your written notes up is actually really helpful to get your body in the process of memorizing these rules because rule memorization is gonna be really important when you get to finals week. So yeah, I would agree.
Tonée:I would agree
Akeem:with And I'll definitely use, I use that tactic a lot, like rewriting, creating my outlines, especially if I got new information, I would just rewrite the whole outline because like you said, it helps you memorize. And then I input that new sub log Right. Under that thing and I keep going. Right. And if something else comes in, I rewrite it to get Exactly.
Tonée:Because it
Akeem:helps build that pattern. And Yeah. And to the last point on that point about focus, I was watching a college football player getting ready for a game today, and somebody asked him about nerves. Or do you feel pressure? And he was like, no, because I know I prepared.
Akeem:I've been prepared all off season. I don't feel that pressure. And I feel like the same thing when it comes to finals and or just being prepped for class, when you get cold called. You're obviously gonna feel nervous and pressured when you're taking an exam. But if you know you studied and you know you prepared, it's a different type of nerves and pressure.
Tonée:It is.
Akeem:You know you got it. When you know you feel prepared, you go into it with a confidence. You go into it with great confidence.
Tonée:Yeah. For sure. For sure. So definitely focus in this time. In this time, focus.
Akeem:Focus. Moving Next
Tonée:on from that, after you focus, I think this probably goes without saying, but I'm a say it anyway. Read your cases. Like, you will be so tempted to get on Quimby and to find the fast approach at doing the task at hand, which is briefing your cases so you can prepare to be cold called on in class, or at least be prepared to be interactive in class. And that's another thing, that stuff helps you. Being someone who can raise their hand and answer their question, that helps you.
Tonée:Don't worry about being a goody two shoes or anything like that, or a teacher's pet. Being able to be involved in class is the whole reason why you go to school, right? Right? Yeah. We go to school so that we can learn, and part of that process is being interactive in class and being able to answer questions.
Tonée:So whether your professor cold calls on you or not, you wanna be prepared for class. And that comes with actually reading and briefing your cases. I will say this is not something you probably have to do all three or four years that you're in law school, but it's critical in your 1L year. It is a skill you should know how to learn. Should be able to read a case, draw out the rule, draw out the reasoning, draw out the important facts, draw out the conclusionholding.
Tonée:You should be able to read a case and know how to spot all of those things in a case. And then you should be able to read the case that came after that, that either overturned or followed that case. You need to be able to get in the process of understanding why I'm briefing these cases because it gets you to what the law is today. And so when you are reading your cases, what did I write down? Oh, right, right, right.
Tonée:When you're briefing your cases, it also helps you with eye racking, which is something most professors require you to do on finals is you will have a little fact pattern and they'll want you to draw up the issue rule analysis and conclusion in your answer. And you do that by knowing the law, right? And then that skill transfers to the bar. So knowing what to do now is really, really important. And it's gonna take a lot of time.
Tonée:I lied to you now. If you are a part time student, the only way I was able to And I passed my 1L year with like flying colors. And I spent every waking moment on the weekends in the law library, just studying, creating games and mechanisms to help me learn these rules. And I guarantee you, if you spend the free time you have, I think the rule of thumb is like for every It's an hour of study time per credit. So if you have a three credit class, you should be spending three hours a week studying for that class alone.
Tonée:Right? Right? So if you're taking I can't even do math. If you take 15 credits, you got a lot of study time. Right?
Tonée:You got a lot of study time.
Akeem:You'll be in a library.
Tonée:Right, right. Exactly. Like, what was that? Fifteen hours, I guess? But, yeah.
Tonée:Yeah. So, yeah. Anything to add?
Akeem:Yeah. Our writing professor, remember she used to do oral arguments, and we had to prepare for oral argument at end of like a mid semester. And she would often bring in guests, and those guests are well accomplished lawyers in their field.
Tonée:Yeah.
Akeem:And she brought in this one attorney. Think he worked out in Baltimore, forget his name, but he was very polished, very on it. And he was a killer when he was playing a judge. Yeah. For our arguments, he's the hot bench, and they're throwing And questions at for our arguments, you have to be prepared with your cases.
Akeem:You need to know them backwards and Frontwards
Tonée:and backwards, yeah.
Akeem:And he was telling the class, he was like, Yo, when I walk into these meetings in my practice, I know these cases. And I could tell opposing counsel, Here's how I'm going to win, because this case says this. Is backed by the Supreme Court. This has been followed and covered, and here's the reason. All this stuff, because he's prepared.
Akeem:He knows case after case. So, briefing these cases isn't just for you to be good at law school. It's for you to be a good lawyer, for you to be prepared for the real world. Because depending on what you practice, there might not be a lot of new law. Like, the statutes that you might use might be set in stone, so there's not much new research you have to do.
Akeem:But when something does come across the table, or a friend does come to you with a problem that you need to figure out how to handle, it will behoove you to how to brief a case, how to read through
Tonée:and take
Akeem:out what you need, and know that it's not contradicted later on, know So that it's not getting the reps in from one L year will benefit you greatly.
Tonée:Facts. And like, it's a skill that is not going anywhere in this field anytime soon. Like AI can make law school and being a lawyer really easy, but reading, you will have to read. Are gonna A 100%. Even before ChatGPT was created, when I was thinking about going to law school, people were like, oh, that's a lot of reading to write.
Tonée:It's a lot of rewrite. It's a of reading. I'm like, yeah, okay.
Akeem:Yeah.
Tonée:It is a lot of reading. You are reading a lot. Like, get out of your head that I can get by without reading. You can't. Even even in my practice, bro, I'm reading.
Tonée:I'm reading motions. I'm reading briefs. I'm reading email, long ass email. I'm reading emails, bro. Like, this field requires reading.
Tonée:Even if you put that joint in Copilot or ChatGPT or whatever and say summarizes, you're reading a summary or at least you're at least listening to it, right? Like you're having to you're having to go through and retain a lot, a lot, a lot of information. So get used to it now.
Akeem:Yep. And I agree. And this is probably gonna give hope to a lot of attorneys or future attorneys who feel like, oh, does it make sense to become a lawyer? Because no. I had a friend come to me at the gym and he owns this supplement and supply shop and he's having like this FDA legal issue about whether or not he can serve this type of supplement, yada yada yada.
Akeem:And I said, email me like what exactly you want. Like what outcome do you want for this specific product? And he sends me like a ChatGPT outline of the thing. And I was like, Oh, so you already used AI, and it's still not enough because you need somebody to read through this because you still don't understand it. So ChatGPT could break it down and outline all this stuff, but you still want a real person to say, Okay, now what does this mean?
Akeem:Unless you just want to stay on ChatGPT and say, doing it over and over and over. Right. And then you're want somebody to actually go out and execute. ChatGPT can't email that person for you, can't go to that office, can't go to that meeting, can't go to that hearing. Right.
Akeem:So, lawyers, we are still very much needed. Are still very much problem solvers, we are very well equipped to do that. And the way you become that is by implementing these things in one L year.
Tonée:Exactly. No matter how young you ask ChatGPT to break something down to you, like you say break it down like I'm five, There's certain things Yeah. You need to Like no matter how young ChattyPety is breaking that down for you, there's just certain things you need to have known or need to have learned in order for stuff to make sense. And
Akeem:And it's so- not like hearing from another human being, man. Like there's something that resonates deeply when you hear from a person's mouth to say, this is what needs to happen or this is how you should move forward. Hits different Especially,
Tonée:exactly. Especially a person who spent three to four years studying
Speaker 2:how to
Tonée:be able to explain that experience. Right. So read your cases. Read them. And the cool thing is like, when you read the cases, you get to join the field of lawyers once you become an attorney, who always talk about, Oh, you remember Paul's graph?
Tonée:You remember International Shoe? You remember Pointer? Yeah, yeah. Right? All of those cases, we all had to go through that.
Tonée:It's how we bond. It's how we bond in the It's post bar It's called Yes. Checklist.
Akeem:Yeah. The next one. So speaking of trauma, way we avoid is breathing. We gotta breathe. That's my next tip.
Akeem:Yes. Is to breathe, relax, implement whatever practices you need to calm down. For me, my foundation was God. I would make sure I was in church, was serving, I was making sure I had that foundation. I was praying in my word, making sure, because that's the only reason why I was in this position in the first place.
Akeem:Because God has blessed me with the path to be here. So making sure that was important. Because also, when law school does get stressful, you feel like quitting and you feel like in the midnight hour when nobody else, everybody's sleeping. You go, Lord, just help me get to this next thing. Yeah.
Akeem:And that means the world to everything. We're implementing these healthy practices from now. A healthy body, a healthy mind for you to take on this task, this grueling process of law school. And again, these are things that I'm implementing now. I wish I ate better during law school.
Akeem:Same thing. I'll definitely work it out more, but it was always the food that was the thing. And obviously, you're going to happy hours with your classmates, you're going out to dinner, you're whatever's You're the bars. You're the bars. Yeah.
Akeem:You're going to different law school events that have different type of food. So obviously, Yeah. Balance, you But I think being able to have a healthy body and making sure you're mobile and stretch, that matters. And then you're at your computer a lot. You're staring at screens a lot.
Akeem:Your wrist placement, your aerodynamics, your chair, all that matters. When you get after law school and you're in an office job, depending on what type of law you practice, it's gonna be the same thing. So you wanna be able to have practice where you can move your body throughout the day. You already have a routine of how to move your body throughout the day. Yeah.
Akeem:So you're not having shoulder pains, you're not having back pains, your knees, all that stuff. We don't want arthritis at 45.
Tonée:We don't want ortho.
Akeem:We really want that ortho.
Tonée:We don't want that ortho. I would definitely say breathing is very useful and helpful if you have midterms, but during midterms and finals week, because when I would take a test before I would read or even get started, I breathe in and breathe out three times just to kind of center myself, just to know like, one, this is not the end of the world. Okay? Like this is a big deal for myself, but I'm not gonna make it the biggest deal for myself, I wanna pass, but I put in the work to pass. And so I'm not gonna overstress.
Tonée:I'm not gonna overstress because I know what I can control on this test and it's what I've prepared for. So breathing before you take a test can be really helpful to center yourself, especially for anybody who's getting ready to take the bar in like February or anything Breathing like before you start your exam, just a quick breath three times.
Akeem:Let's do three right now. So whoever's watching, everybody just stop what you're doing.
Tonée:Stop what you're doing.
Akeem:Breathe in. Breathe
Tonée:Breathe in.
Akeem:Breathe in.
Tonée:Out.
Akeem:Breathe in. Breathe
Tonée:I already feel
Speaker 2:so I feel out bad. This about to be the rest
Akeem:of the episode's about to be a breeze. I feel better already.
Tonée:I feel calm. Exactly. The art practice of actually, honestly, when you're doing anything, when you're getting ready to start anything that requires focus, that breathing really allows you to kind of just get rid of everything that doesn't matter in this moment. And I always tell my bar students when they're studying for the bar, you know, that one SpongeBob episode where he becomes a waiter for Squidward and Squidward's like, you just need to get rid of everything except for fine dining and breathing. And he and like, he goes in his head and he dumps everything except for out of out of fine dining and breathing.
Tonée:And I said, that's what you need to do for the bar. You need to get rid of everything except for the bar exam study stuff and breathing. You gotta remember how to breathe. That is a very important skill.
Akeem:Yeah. That's real.
Speaker 2:Yeah. And you do and think about it. Fine dining. You could throw in some fine dining in there in law school too. Like, take yourself out for
Akeem:a nice meal. Do nice things Like, for actually get that massage, go to the movies. Treat yourself. Yeah, you gotta treat yourself. Within all that, within all the stress, treat yourself.
Akeem:Do something for
Tonée:If you watch Artem Rec, you know exactly how to treat yourself. Treat yourself. If you Always find a buddy. People who just are lone wolves in law school, I don't know how y'all
Akeem:do it.
Tonée:I need at least, I had two people, but I need at least one person who will hype me up, hold me accountable, engage in the treat yourselves, right? Yeah. Yeah. Me and Nancy, we was like, we're going to Miami. We're going to Miami during, right before finals week or right after.
Tonée:We had to have those types of people where it's like, we don't really got that much money in the bank account right now, but we're going to Miami. We're gonna figure it out. Because it works out, okay? It's gonna work out.
Akeem:Yep. Yep. Perfect. Was just Mine happy was happy hours.
Tonée:Happy hours?
Speaker 2:I had a
Akeem:raise in DC with my guys from
Tonée:Yeah.
Akeem:Yeah. Everything's fine. And that's what I say, we're kinda blessed to go to law school in DC DC because there was so much to do. So there's a lot of different ways to treat Right. To get good food and go out and stuff like Yeah.
Tonée:So But
Akeem:there Yeah.
Tonée:I'm learning that like most law schools have like a vibe nearby. Like, I don't know. I'm sure there are probably a few law schools that's just out in the middle of nowhere and there's not much to do but what's on campus. But most law schools I'm learning have a vibe. Yeah.
Tonée:Like they got that,
Speaker 2:they bought the
Tonée:bars, the sports bars. Got the little, nowadays, you see, like, pickleball scores. You you see more opportunity to really move your body around, like, fun things to do.
Akeem:I'll just tell you about Nick the Lawyer. Shout out to our last guest on The Whole Lawyer Podcast. Nick the Lawyer, go check that out. He went to law school at Pepperdine Law School near the beach. You know I'm saying?
Tonée:Just You got a break in between lunch, and you just gonna go go for a surf or go for a swim?
Akeem:Bro, talk about breathe. I would say I wanna see the stress levels of people who went to law school near
Tonée:the Exactly.
Akeem:It has to be lower than like the national average or whatever. Exactly. Y'all can let us know if that's true or not.
Tonée:Right.
Akeem:What's the next one?
Tonée:The next one is use your resources. And I have to be very specific when I'm talking about the type of resources that I think you should use. The resources I'm talking about, the librarian,
Akeem:right? Yeah.
Tonée:The librarian is a great, your law librarians, great resources for helping you with study tips, helping you find materials and things like that. Know your law librarian, okay? Your TAs. If you don't have TAs, I'm just so sorry for you. But if you have TAs, use your TAs.
Tonée:They are paying, they are getting paid, they are getting paid. They are paid employees and you should use them. Figure out their office hours, their contact information, reach out to them, ask them if they have any outlines they'd be willing to share with you, or at least go over with you. If they've held onto any tests from the class, any practice tests you could potentially take, use your TAs and same with your professors. Go to their office hours.
Tonée:If they're giving you a time outside of class where you can come and commune, do that. Professor Cohen, I never really wanted much from her, but homegirl had Krispies, Rice Krispie Treats. She had that's what a professor's have snacks and they will come. Okay? Easy.
Tonée:If you have
Akeem:snacks Easily.
Tonée:They will come.
Akeem:That's easy. And
Tonée:most of the time, I ain't really want for nothing, but she will always follow-up, how was class? Did did I did this come out right? Did you understand this? And I'll be like, actually, no, let's walk through that real quick. Because I didn't understand it.
Tonée:So commune with your professors, your TAs, and the resources that I would say that I'll caution you on that you probably had access to in your 1L year only, I'm talking about your 1L year is AI resources. Things like Quimby, things like Copilot, Protege. Those types of resources, very, very good. I mean, oh my gosh, the things they can do. And I'm not saying don't use Westlaw or LexisNexis because those types of softwares have outlines, themed outlines, class prep materials, all of that stuff.
Tonée:I'm saying be mindful if you decide to use the AI components of
Akeem:You those
Tonée:do not know what you do not know yet. Right? So if you're using AI softwares and engines to get you to the end, you have no clue what that journey actually looks like. You have no clue how to get there. So use your resources, you're paying for them, right?
Tonée:The tuition that you pay pays for your Lexis account, your Westlaw account, the law librarians, all that other stuff. If you're using something like Quimby or something like that, I say use Quimby sparingly. If you had to review like five cases for a class, you got through three, you don't really have time to go through the last two, that's when I would go to Quimby and say, let me just get this done real quick. I briefed three cases. I just need to quickly learn the last two.
Tonée:That's when I would use Quimby. But other than that, I would say be mindful about using resources that are meant to cut out work for you in your 1L year. That work that you're cutting out is really important to know. It's really important to learn. So make sure you're doing it.
Akeem:Yeah. And to piggyback off the TA point, how you could also do that is make your TA fall in love with you. That's a tactic that's that's a tactic I used.
Tonée:He got he got no advantage. You got no advantage by me being a TA. Still called you on your BS.
Akeem:If you spanked AT and and make her fall in love with you, that also helps you. You know I'm
Tonée:The only advantage you got was you would be first to know if I was gonna like host a study group at the library or something like that.
Akeem:Nah, it wasn't there's there's no advantage.
Tonée:There's no advantage. Absolutely not. Not at all. Not at all.
Akeem:There was none of that. Yeah, there's no advantage.
Tonée:You're not go seducing your TAs,
Akeem:Because we literally had classes together, so there was no
Tonée:Exactly. To
Akeem:that part.
Tonée:We used to compete. We used to compete for
Akeem:Yeah, for real.
Tonée:Who got the better grade in the class. I mean, I will always win. But that's the advantage, is you can have an accountability partner building a friendship with your TA, because we didn't really start dating until much later.
Akeem:But also, you also have to hope to be blessed with a good TA. Tone was an amazing TA. So, Thank outside of her drooling over me, just obsessing over me, she would actually I give me great would go to her because I know that if I go to her with this question, there's gonna be a block cleared in my mind for this specific problem. Because she was actually good at what she did. So you have to hope that your professor actually chooses the TAs.
Akeem:And sometimes they choose two. So if your TA doesn't work, or if you feel like, my TA doesn't really know what they're talking about, or they're not really good at teaching, because the TA's are actually probably good in their classes. There's a reason why they're a TA. They probably got good grades, but they might not be a great teacher or know how to
Tonée:explain things
Akeem:well. So, make sure you have a good TA. Or to know how to spot a good TA.
Tonée:Yep. Absolutely. And
Akeem:so, to piggyback on a pretty piggyback, a great connector to our last point is to use your people or to build connections.
Tonée:I had a mentee reach out to me as she was going through her 1L year, and she was asking about studying if she should find a study group. I told her, I didn't do study groups, right? Like I might do, I'm hosting a Jeopardy night for civil procedure, bring food, we're gonna do that. But up until that Jeopardy night, I was by myself. Okay.
Tonée:Was by myself. Any questions I had, the likelihood of me asking somebody else in the same class as me for the answer and them getting it right was slim to none. Saved my question for my TAs and my professors. Right?
Akeem:Right.
Tonée:And that's not to knock study groups. Some study groups are really good. I know some people who will do study groups where it's like, we're not actually studying together. We're just
Akeem:We're doing work.
Tonée:It's just nice to have people in the room.
Akeem:For work space,
Tonée:Every now and then I might ask somebody for their thought on something, but I'm not focused on leading a study group, right? And I'm not focused on being a part of a study that's being led, right? So be mindful of the connections you make. I do think it's important to have friends or at least a friend in law school. Law school is so daunting.
Tonée:Like law school can be super hard, especially in your 1L year, especially after that first semester when you get your grades back and they're not what you had hoped or thought they would be, having someone who you can lean on, who is going to support you, who knows what you've been through. Of course you could talk to your family and friends outside of law school, but they don't know what you just went. They don't know the trauma you just went through to then get the grades that you were not hoping for. Right? Yeah.
Tonée:So definitely have somebody to lean on. And then I wanna point out with the connections and the network as well, on top of TAs and professors, baby, if you do not go and make friends with the financial aid office, the admissions office, man, being a part of the admissions committee and help choosing the next batch of 1Ls that were coming in, it was really important, right? And maybe it's because we went to a smaller school, but being able to know the faculty and staff at your university can get you so many things, especially in your 1L If you're someone who has, what's it called? Accommodations. If you're someone who has accommodations, being able to know the on-site faculty, like the IT people and classroom people, that's really important for you.
Tonée:There are no small people, right? Only small roles. So it's really important for you to figure out your connections and your network at the school. Say hi to your janitors, right? Say hi to your janitors.
Tonée:Chat with them because at some point you go and drop you a drink in a classroom and not know how to clean it up, right? And you don't wanna be that person.
Akeem:Oh, you're forget something.
Tonée:You're forget, you're need to find a lost and found, right? Something's gonna be wrong with your email ID, your key badge, and you're gonna be running around the chicken with your head cut off, where I could just be like, Mr. Perry, help me out, please. Me out. Mr.
Tonée:Perry. Shout out
Akeem:Go ahead, ID stopped working randomly. Bro. I think it's just from small, intentional acts. It's just saying hi, like you said. It don't gotta be like, Let me sit down and get the financial aid admissions director's whole life story in one sitting.
Akeem:No, it's saying hi. How's your day? Stopping by. Just stopping by and say, what's up? How's your day going?
Akeem:And then you have a fifteen minute conversation. And then you stack that over a whole semester for one O year.
Speaker 2:By the end of your one O year, you're gonna be best buddies with so and so and best buddies.
Akeem:And now we locked in for the next two, three
Tonée:years. Exactly. Exactly. For
Akeem:sure. Then, so along with that, I guess you made me think of a friend that's currently going through something, be mindful of the mentors you choose in law school as well. Mhmm. And you can even vet your mentor. If somebody you you wanna reach out to and say, like, this is somebody I really wanna connect with, make sure you understand their character.
Akeem:Make sure is this a person? Do you like their character over their role? Just because they're in a high position, doesn't mean that they have good character and that's somebody you would want to learn under. Because a lot of people in high positions have terrible character and get themselves in some sticky situations. And if this is the person that you're training and learning under, you might also find yourself in sticky situations.
Akeem:Exactly. Wanna tell me who you are, tell me who your friends are, tell me who your closest circles are. So be mindful to know this person spoke at this event or such and such told me about this director of this law firm, whatever. Who are they? Where they from?
Akeem:Like, what what stuff are they into? You can have a coffee with them, get but get to know their character first before I wanna attach my wagon to this person.
Tonée:Right. And do a Google search. Google will review a lot of information about someone. Search their name on their, the jurisdiction in which they're barred in, that website. Some states will show you if they've had any conduct or if they've had any complaint, bar complaints mentioned against them.
Tonée:So just be mindful of, you know, in this professional space, it may feel like, oh, I made it to law school, but I don't yet have the ability to pick and choose who I wanna associate myself with. You absolutely do. Because you're creating your own reputation at this time. When you get to the end of law school, you have a character and fitness application that's 60 pages long that you're going to have to fill out and they're going to comb through your life for the last ten to sixteen year, I don't remember, ten to sixteen years. And they're gonna wanna know every person you've worked for, every school you've gone to, every little job, everything, they're gonna wanna know.
Tonée:And so it's really important to be mindful of your reputation in this time. Be mindful the counter to that point of like being careful about your mentors, be careful how you show up in your network, right? You're someone who constantly is complaining and is a gimme, gimme, gimme, gimme, gimme person, nobody's gonna wanna work for you. If you're someone who's always combative with administration, with war. Deans,
Akeem:A lot of warin'.
Tonée:War. If you're that type of person, one, all of the deans at that school have to agree that they wanna sign off on your character and fitness, on you being barred, right? You might think that the exam itself is the big monster you have to fight in order to get your licensure. No. Your own reputation, your attitude is the thing you're also going to have to fight and make sure is in tip top shape because that is a big deal.
Tonée:In some States, they interview you and they're gonna look at what your references said and they're gonna ask you about it. You're start sweating. You're not gonna know what to say you showed up at your school and you were somebody that people just couldn't, people said, I don't know that I actually wanna practice alongside this person. You're somebody who wants to become a judge, reputation. Yeah.
Tonée:They comb how you, if you are a current lawyer, they're going to ask people, your opposing counsels, what type of lawyer are you like, right? Are you a sleazeball who just yells and never meets deadlines and things like that? Or are you someone who's cooperative, who's nice to work with? All of that stuff matters and you build that reputation now. Love when people call me and be like, Hey, I thought of you for this, or I thought of you for this.
Tonée:It makes me feel so special to know that people have had good experiences with me, that I'm somebody who comes to mind when they think of introducing me to somebody important in their life. That's really important to be able to have. Be mindful So of your own reputation.
Akeem:And when I was on 1L, people would tell me, Hey, the law is a very small circle. Like, the legal space is small. There's a very few degrees of separation. And here, that was the one I was like, Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Until you practice in DC, and then this person knows that person, that person said your name here, and yada yada And then we moved to Tucson.
Akeem:Me and Tone, we're fairly new out here. And we already have different attorneys. I talked to somebody that Tone worked with, and that
Tonée:person I know at Tone's wife.
Akeem:Yep. Already. It's very We've
Tonée:out here two years. It's very
Akeem:Two years. Yeah. Like, is
Speaker 2:it your wife who does this? Did I see her in that magazine?
Akeem:Already because yeah. It's already like that. So, yes, the the legal field is very small. Your reputation matters, and it will travel. So make sure you know how to talk.
Akeem:Just be nice, man. Just be kind, bro. That's gonna be hard so hard to understand why people be like, Oh, this person is so hard to work. Just be a kind person, bro. Everything One of my mentors said, every There's a time for to be adversarial.
Akeem:A time to be adversarial. And you only whip it out in case of emergencies. Don't gotta be at people's neck every single time you get it. That's not a good strategy.
Tonée:Right.
Akeem:There's gonna be a time for that, for use you your powers that It you're learning in law school ain't on a Tuesday against your professor at that time. Exactly.
Tonée:Okay? Exactly. All right. So just a quick recap of the five tips for passing one O year. Number one, focus.
Tonée:Get in that mode. Know, cut out distractions, focus on the task at hand, create baby on your way to your big task. So if you have to cut out social media just for the semester, and then you get to enjoy it during the break- Cut
Akeem:it out.
Tonée:Get it back out. Just cut your
Akeem:mouth Get rid of it.
Tonée:Number two, read your cases. Gain the skill of case briefing now. That's it. That's I'm saying. Three, breathe.
Tonée:We practice breathing, incorporate that in one of your daily activities and just breathe. Nothing is too big, okay? Come down to where your feet are in the present moment and focus on what's in front of you and breathe. Number four, use your resources. Use your good resources for one L year.
Tonée:Once you pass one L year and things in the know, you're like, I've been here, done that. Then you can kind of use AI a little bit more to kind of help get through that semester. Because it does ramp up a bit in two and three L year. I would not heavily rely on it a lot, but that's when I would say you could start creating your shortcuts because you've taken the long route already. And then number five, build your network and reputation.
Tonée:Be mindful who you connect with, but do connect with people. Be mindful how you show up in this space because nobody forgets. Nobody forgets the crazy little things we do in the day to day. And so you wanna be somebody who, yeah, you'll make mistakes. You'll do things that are kind of awkward, but don't be that person that constantly does that stuff.
Tonée:Right?
Akeem:And and the ABA not gonna forget, your bar associate not gonna forget, because your name gonna be written in the bar's book of Yes, exactly. It shall be written, and right under it. Not barred, not permitted to practice. You don't want
Tonée:Exactly. You don't want that.
Akeem:You don't want that.
Tonée:Don't forget to like, subscribe, follow, all the things you heard at the beginning of the video. Check out our website. Soon, we'll be having some merch. Yeah.
Speaker 2:We got merch, guys.
Tonée:That's exciting. We got some merch coming up. Yeah.
Speaker 2:So be
Tonée:on the lookout for that. We are always looking for host to host or not host, but co hosts, guests. Mhmm. We're all always looking for guests guests Yeah. To be on The Whole Lawyer.
Tonée:So if you or somebody you know would be interesting in parting wisdom on law school students or baby lawyers, please feel free to hit us up at evenaftermedia@gmail.com.
Akeem:I mean,
Tonée:I know. And we look yes. Hit us up, and we look forward to more episodes with you. Again, don't forget to get involved and contact us.
Akeem:Peace.
