Do bad grades impact your success on the bar exam?

While I was waiting in a law school’s cafe for my lunch to warm up in a microwave, an article in magazine drew my attention. As it appeared later, a magazine is one of those cute magazines for law students that try to give so-called “smart” advices (unfortunately, very often too stale and useless) to law students, trying to convert them into “real” professionals.

An aforementioned article talked about grades in a law school. The article’s point was that grades will follow you during all your life. Some law school professors concluded that law school grades have both short-term and a long-term impact on student’s life. Put it differently (as I understood that article), if you are a C student, you are going to be a loser for all your professional life. [Indeed, I may have biased view on such issues, since I am one of the “not-in-the-top-50%-of-the-class” students.]

I believe there is some truth to such statement, as I was convinced by my own experience of rejections for job interviews (I am not even talking about getting an interview) and since I am more than sure that rejections occurred because of my crappy grades.

From my communication with practicing attorneys, I learnt that the grades definitely have a short-term impact: as a job applicant and a young attorney you do not have an experience and your grades are what a potential employer will look at with hopes to find out about your diligence in work and learning. However, after getting some experience, it is your professional skills that is important for an employer but not your grades you have received five years ago.

But who knows, maybe I do not know much about current legal job market and I am wrong about long-term impact. I will let my future to prove the accuracy of article’s conclusions.

What made me upset, mad and irritated is this article’s statement: grades impact student’s success on the bar exam. According to the author, grades constitute 70% of student’s chances to pass a bar exam. What? What bullshit? [Pardon my French]. Here I am, a no-so-good student with crappy grades who passed the bar exam from the first time, and there are students, who had much better grades than I do and they DID NOT pass. How will the author [or whoever made that conclusion] explain my situation?

Why am I saying all this? I think I understand good motivations of the author for writing that article—he/she wanted to develop in 1Ls that desire to get “good grades” that by all means will assist a future young attorney to find a decent job that will help to pay student loans. This is a good intention, no doubt. But what the author did not take into account, is that there are B- and C students who need different motivation and may read that unsupported crap and believe in failure on the bar exam and, later, in profession.

In other words, think positive, law students whatever grades you have. There are thousands of examples, that show different reality. Professor, on the other hand, should stick to their Socratic Method.

I feel like a shit

Sorry for using such words, but I feel like a shit. In a week exams will begin but I feel I know nothing. And I am the one who told that plan to get at least 2 As this semester. I hardly believe I can do it. I really really freak out. I feel like school made me even more stupid than I was.

Maybe I need to find some links on how-not-to-feel-stupid???!! :-))

Life is full of .... [fill a blank]

So what did I do today? I had a midterm on Income Tax class... yeahhh ... I was behind in studying and therefore I was nervous like never booooo... I did not sleep. Actually, I slept 3-4 hours at night... I studied and after I could not fall asleep. What a life! Consequently today I was exhausted and tired. Exam was easy. The problem is that I have realized that after I wrote an exam and left a classroom. What do I think of the exam? I failed ... [cursing]. I forgot to answer third question - yes forgot, even though I might have known the answer, and I messed up parties (as always) of the transactions (no suprise for me). as a result I applied wrong rules. I am miserable now and I want to cry but I do not have tears. The point of this giberish is not complaining (enough of it I had on these pages), but to discuss the fact of life - I study for exam and do not sleep at night, because I want to have a good result, and then I come to exam and almost fall asleep there, at least my mind did this. As a result I will have result not better than if I slept at night instead of snoozing above a textbook. Conclusion? study smart! do this step by step. I avoided that and here is the result :-(((

I always told that people are ugly creatures - see the article

I am outraged. Yes, I am a dog lover and I hate this freak who did this:

A Costa Rican artist found himself in hot water with the animal protection people in his home country after using a starving, sick street dog as part of an exposition in Managua, Nicaragua, in August. Guillermo “Habacuc” Vargas allegedly found the dog tied up on a street corner in a poor Nicaragua barrio and brought it to the showing.

He tied the dog, according to furious animal lovers, in a corner of the salon where it died after a day. Habacuc’s exhibition included a legend spelled out in dog food reading “You are what you read,” photos and an incense burner that burned an ounce of marijauna and 175 “rock’ of crack cocaine. In the background, according to reports, the Sandista national anthem played backwards.

According to the artist, his “art” was a tribute to Natividad Canda, a Nicaraguan burglar killed in Costa Rica by two rottweilers guarding property he had entered at night. The incident caused friction between the two countries. Habacuc told the daily La Nacion, “I won’t say the dog died. The importance to me is the hypocracy of the people where an animal is the focus of attention where people come to see art but not when it’s in the street starving to death.”

“The same thing happened with poor Natividad Canda. The people sympathized with him only after he was dead,” the artist added.

The artist apparently is unaware that at least three large, active organizations are dedicated in Costa Rica to the protection of animals and that several persons have been prosecuted for cruelty to animals. They are hampered in their efforts by the old Hispanic customs of disregard for animal welfare and by a lack of funding.

Text found on Costa Rica blogs

And he did this because some idiot, actually even worse because he was a burglar, got illegally at night to somebody's property!!!??? "the hypocracy of the people where an animal is the focus of attention" ????? People are cause of many evils that happen to them! I have not pite to criminals who are punished for their bad deeds. But what this little dog did to you, freak?

But even worse, people watched this and did nothing?