Law School
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Prepping for your Summer Job
My 1L year, the month I was supposed to start looking for summer job options, I received bad news after bad news involving my family– all of which culminated when I was told that my dad had just been diagnosed with cancer (he’s fine now, thankfully!). With all this added stress, guess who never made it to career services, or even knew that deadlines for jobs starting in MAY were approaching in December? Me. It was me. By the time I could actually focus on finding some type of summer employment, I was scrambling to find any agency that was still looking for help. Luckily, after cold-calling a few nonprofits, a…
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Finding Your Voice In Law School
To talk or not to talk in class– that is the question. No one wants to be a gunner, and I won’t encourage people to talk in class just to show off–that’s not my jam. However, the unique thing about law school is that almost always there’s a forced participation by way of the socratic method. Sometimes you know it’s coming if the professor goes in some type of order; other times, you’re waiting (dreading) to be called. Because participation is inevitable, it’s important to have confidence in how you convey your opinion in class. Nothing screams timid and weak like someone that gets easily flustered and rolled over by…
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The Beginning.
It’s the last Friday of the month! How is it already almost October, Fall, and nearing the end of the year?! I don’t understand it. But this post is titled “The Beginning” because it is a new season and because tomorrow so many people will go take the LSAT, which is the official real beginning of the law school process. We wish all of the test-takers an abundance of great luck and calm minds. And for those Latinas taking the exam we want to scream: Si Se Puede! We are keeping our fingers crossed! For the last Friday post, let’s share some of our favorite stories from around the…
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Spotlight On! Solo Practitioner Daissy Dominguez
Today is the first of a very exciting series entitled: Spotlight On! The idea is to showcase new Latina attorneys and learn about the early successes in their careers. To start this series we’re interviewing Daissy Dominguez, a solo practitioner based in Chicago, Illinois. Daissy joined the bar on October 31, 2013, and opened her own practice, which focuses on criminal defense, immigration, and landlord/tenant law. I’m super excited to tell you all about her because I’ve also had the pleasure to work with her on some cases and know that her dedication to the community is the real deal! How did you decide to start your own solo practice?
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Study How You Study
We previously discussed how to prep for 1L week and –surprise–the main focus was getting prepped for studying. But it’s worthwhile to delve into “how to study” a little deeper. I say this a lot, but it’s actually really important to realize that you will be most successful if you study how you study. Think back on all the college classes where you excelled and mimic those study habits. Note that I wrote excelled, not: barely put in the work but somehow still passed–that won’t fly in law school. The reason why this is important is because law school has the tendency to push people into doing the same thing. According…
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Breaking Law School Barriers I: Finding Guidance
This series, Breaking Law School Barriers, tackles the big and small issues that come into play when you’re deciding if you’ll even attend law school. The purpose is to give practical advice for college students, and for current law students and attorneys to give suggestions about their real world experience. So you want to go to law school? Felicidades! I think it’s great and we need more women of color in the profession. There are a lot of questions that you’ll have to answer before you can take the right steps to get into school (finances being a big part), but before you even get to figuring out how to…
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A Little Help From My Friends
When I started law school there were maybe 15 latinos in my class, “the largest ever!” my school proclaimed. They put most of us in the same section as well, which I actually did not mind. Since then, however, throughout the U.S. the number of hispanic students entering law school continues to decrease. The impact of few people of color earning J.D.s will have long-reaching ramifications. A J.D. is empowerment. If the people in power continue to only come from the same type of background, with similar forms of privilege, then real change will be a slow and dismal. Despite all of that, perhaps right now, you are in school,…
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When Offensive Comments Happen
At some point most of us will encounter someone spewing out something ignorant about our ethnicity or our gender. You would think that once you reach the esteemed halls of law school that it would stop. Unfortunately, there are people seemingly so steeped in privilege that law school is one of the first times they are “forced” to interact with people of color. But for the rest of us, we have to often be the only or one of the few people of color or Latinas-period-in our section or class. By being so isolated we are given an added burden of being the voice for our people, and having to…
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How to Survive Law School
If you’re starting law school this semester, I have a few things to say–first, congratulations! This is a super exciting endeavor and you deserve a lot of acknowledgment! So Yay! My second piece of unsolicited advice is to not let anxiety and fear of the unknown overcome you. Instead, become fearless and adopt a badass attitude. This new chapter will be overwhelming, and if you’re going to survive you have to fortify yourself with confidence–it’s the only way you can make it through the next three years. For some of us, that self-confidence may come naturally. But if you’re like me, you’re feeling not only excited and anxious, but also…
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Prepping for your First Week as a 1L
I remember the long train ride as I went to my first law school class. Property, with Professor Rose. I brought my laptop because even though I had never used a laptop to take notes in undergrad, I just knew that in law school note-taking on a computer was a must. Twenty minutes into the class, my computer’s battery ran out. Then I realized I had forgotten to bring my power cord… It was a whimper of a start for my legal career. Do you remember your first law course? I hope it was better than mine. Now, obviously that didn’t really predict what school would be like, and I…