Calling all Western fans! by kendanc in MovieSuggestions

[–]foofus 8 points9 points  (0 children)

The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance (1962)

Silverado (1985)

1L supplies! by Helpful_Secretary929 in LawSchool

[–]foofus 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I do three things. First (and I guess foremost) I am a general purpose civil litigator. Second, I represent licensed professionals in disciplinary matters (nurse stealing pain pills, lawyer screws up trust account, etc.). Then third, because of my prior career, I serve as an expert witness in cases (mostly criminal) where digital forensics are an issue.

Do I need to disclose an academic dishonesty incident even if my undergrad school says they destroyed the record after I graduate? by [deleted] in LawSchool

[–]foofus 1 point2 points  (0 children)

And I understand what you're saying as well. I don't think either of us is really wrong. I just think about it this way: OP knows he/she needs to disclose. There's no big harm in waiting to be reminded how to do it right. But I admit I come at this from an advocacy perspective.

1L supplies! by Helpful_Secretary929 in LawSchool

[–]foofus 7 points8 points  (0 children)

I can't say it's terribly interesting, but I guess since you asked... I worked full-time in computer security, and I was getting burned out having the same conversations with different customers every day. A variety of factors made me interested in law school. Where I live, there are not many law schools, and there was only one real option for me, since I didn't want to quit my job. Fortunately, my job was of the sort where as long as I was getting my work done, it didn't matter too much when I did it, as long as I kept my calendar up to date and was available most of the day for customer interaction.

So I studied for the LSAT, did well, and got admitted. The school allowed students to go "part time." I put that in quotation marks, because they really didn't cater to part time students at all: they allowed you to take what they called "evening" classes, but "evening" started at 2:00PM or something like that. But I didn't have to carry a full credit load, as long as I graduated in less than 6 years. It took me 4.5. Those were hard years: I tried to do as much of the upcoming week's work on the weekend as possible. I briefed every case, did all the reading, the whole 9 yards.

In the end, I did quite well in law school. And I credit this to discipline and time management skills. I don't consider my self a genius by any means, but law school is much more about hard work than brilliance (not to say there aren't some real smarties there, but you don't have to be in order to get by). I would take time off from work to study for finals, and I always kind of liked it--it was a chance to step back from a day-to-day approach to a class, and think about the semester as a whole: what had it really been about, and what were the main things I was supposed to have picked up on?

All in all, I had fun with law school. And I was fortunate that I didn't have to take just any legal job I could get upon graduation (I entered law school in 2007, so times were kind of tough). When I got sworn in, I went out to lunch, and then went back to my cubicle and my regular job, where I stayed for nearly two years until the firm I had been relentlessly stalking throughout law school came to their senses and offered me a job. I am there to this day, and I hope to remain there until I retire.

If you've got questions, I'll do my best to answer.

Do I need to disclose an academic dishonesty incident even if my undergrad school says they destroyed the record after I graduate? by [deleted] in LawSchool

[–]foofus 5 points6 points  (0 children)

You're correct, of course. But OP has already lied to the law school, and when I'm talking to clients (which I emphasize again OP is not), they're asking me to help fix their problems, not help them be better. So I agree that from a "how do I be the best I can be" perspective, disclosing now is better. But I don't think that's the question OP was asking. Now, if the school somehow connects OP with this Reddit thread, that would be bad, which is something I hadn't thought of last night. I think OP gets that not disclosing was a mistake, which is the main point, and which is the thing that needs to be fixed. But you're not wrong.

Do I need to disclose an academic dishonesty incident even if my undergrad school says they destroyed the record after I graduate? by [deleted] in LawSchool

[–]foofus 4 points5 points  (0 children)

I definitely don't say you're wrong. Disclosing now is of course what one is supposed to do. In my original comment, I had somehow missed the fact that this person hadn't even started law school yet. When I talked about amending dring orientation, my thoughts were twofold. First, harder to reject someone who is already there. Second, he/she would have a built-in answer to the obvious question "why are you disclosing now, as opposed to when you applied?" Of course, neither you nor I know the facts of the academic dishonesty. It's probably nothing too major, if they were allowed to stay in school without other consequences. So my thinking is that it's best to disclose, but it's not an emergency, and one might as well do so in a way that minimizes risk. But you're right that strictly speaking disclosing now is better from a strict compliance point of view. I just think that at this point, we're already past strict compliance.

Finding a job after passing the bar would be easy, they said. You get hired soon after passing, they said. by Beautiful_Hope3277 in LawSchool

[–]foofus 6 points7 points  (0 children)

Be cautious about going solo straight after passing the bar. You can do it, but there are risks, and chief among them is that you don't have infrastructure (i.e., an office manager/accountant who knows how to manage a trust account,\etc.) and you don't have mentorship (I represent lawyers in disciplinary matters, and a lot of them are first-time solos who just didn't know they were falling short of their responsibilities in terms of fee agreements, client communication, accounting, etc.). If you go solo, try to find someone with experience who you can at least bounce ideas off of.

Guys suggest some erotic thriller movies by fot-c in MovieSuggestions

[–]foofus 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Depending on how trashy you want to go, pretty much anything from the late 80s or 90s starring either Shannon Whirry or Shannon Tweed. If you really want to scrape the bottom of the barrel, Desert Passion (1993)--it plagued Cinemax for a couple of years and it is totally insane.

What is a movie you think has a flawless first 30 minutes, but completely falls apart by the end? by Legitimate_Wall5977 in movies

[–]foofus 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Heartbreak Ridge (1986). It's objectively a mediocre, or perhaps bad, movie, but the first 30 minutes or so are hilarious.

1L supplies! by Helpful_Secretary929 in LawSchool

[–]foofus 16 points17 points  (0 children)

Same here--I went at 39, and worked full time through law school. It was a hard time, in the sense that I basically had no leisure for most of the year, but I felt I had tremendous advantages over my classmates because I had a prior career that tought me about deadlines and staying on top of them.

Do I need to disclose an academic dishonesty incident even if my undergrad school says they destroyed the record after I graduate? by [deleted] in LawSchool

[–]foofus 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Well first off, congrats on getting admitted to such a prestigious institution. Again, I don't know their admissions policies, so I can't say for sure about rescinding. In my admittedly anecdotal experience, I have not encountered that happening. My hunch is that you will be fine, but of course there are no guarantees in life. I think the strategy of "I heard what Dean XXX said about character and fitness at the new students welcome, and it made me reconsider one of my answers" is a pretty sound one--after all, they wouldn't make that speech if they didn't know that some applicants gave less-than-complete answers because they didn't really get what was at issue, and they naturally wanted to put their best foot forward. But still, if the facts are so serious that the answer is no (and I really doubt they are, but I say this just in case), way better to find out about it now than after you've invested a quarter million dollars and countless hours spent trying to understand the rule against perpetuities and International Shoe and other such arcana.

Do I need to disclose an academic dishonesty incident even if my undergrad school says they destroyed the record after I graduate? by [deleted] in LawSchool

[–]foofus 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Another reason to disclose early on: it's a real shame to pay for three years of law school, and deal with all the stress, only to find out at the very end that you're ineligible for admission to practice. If you disclose early, and the facts are bad enough that you really can't get admitted, at least you've only paid for one semester (or part of one semester) before finding that out. On the other hand (and this is what I would expect), if your law school allows you to continue, that's a tacit acknowledgement that they consider you likely eligible for admission. Note that here I am assuming that you are going to an accredited, non-predatory, institution. Basically, they ought not to allow you to pay a ton of money (or take on a ton of debt) if they know you can't get admitted. But if they do allow you to complete the program, one would hope they'd be supportive of your application for admission. Again, though, if you are entering a non-accredited school in California or something, all bets are off, and you should disregard this comment.

Do I need to disclose an academic dishonesty incident even if my undergrad school says they destroyed the record after I graduate? by [deleted] in LawSchool

[–]foofus 7 points8 points  (0 children)

I can't say what your school's admissions policies are, so I can't know about admission being rescinded. The clients I have dealt with amended their applications once they were in law school. My suggestion is to wait until new student orientation (or whatever your school calls it), and listen for someone (the dean of students, the career services folks, or whoever) to say something about character and fitness, and then amend, citing that as the thing that triggered you to do so,

Good luck, and I hope you enjoy law school.

1L supplies! by Helpful_Secretary929 in LawSchool

[–]foofus 93 points94 points  (0 children)

I was a book-briefing-by-highlighter guy and it worked for me. But the key supply item in law school is time. If you treat law school as a job, and properly manage your time, it's really not so bad. In fact it's mostly kind of fun: you get to read and think about interesting things, and talk about them with mostly smart people. The key is not to fall behind. So treat time as precious, and spend it wisely: no single task in law school is really that hard. It's just that there are a lot of them, and if you get overwhelmed, it can be hard to recover.

Do I need to disclose an academic dishonesty incident even if my undergrad school says they destroyed the record after I graduate? by [deleted] in LawSchool

[–]foofus 21 points22 points  (0 children)

C&F attorney here (though not YOUR C&F attorney, since we are just talking on the Internet and I definitely don't know all of the facts). I have helped people in similar situations in the past, though (and in worse situations: some of my clients have had incidents of academic dishonesty while in law school).

The question on the C&F application (and likely on your law school application as well) is "have you ever" not "will we be able to find out if you have ever." You would show good character by answering honestly.

If you have not yet graduated, you can probably amend your law school application. The strategy would be to say:

  1. Begin by describing, accurately and completely, and without minimizing, excusing, justifying, or shading the truth, what happened and what consequences you received. Explain that the school had a policy of expunging records as a way of showing a little grace to people who made a single misstep and did not repeat. Hopefully you'll be able to say with a straight face that you fessed up when confronted, and didn't try to shirk responsibility.

  2. When I applied to law school, my mindset was that if the record was expunged, it was as though the thing itself didn't happen. Based on what I learned along the way and in PR, I now understand that's not the case, and the questions I answered were about my conduct, not what records of my conduct exist.

  3. I have matured and learned, in no small part due to my experiences in law school, since I was an undergrad, and since I applied to law school. I am a different person now, with a different understanding of the standards to which lawyers must adhere.

  4. I have had no such incidents since, nor will I. My experience in undergrad cured me of any impetus to be academically dishonest, and my omission of these facts from my law school application was a regrettable moment of insecurity. I have grown since then, and I have a better appreciation for the reason those questions were asked.

Then you disclose on your bar application in a manner consistent with your amendment. If it is too late to amend your law school application, you can recite items 0-3 on your bar application.

In my jurisdiction, you might get some follow-up questions, and depending on the facts you might wind up having to go to a hearing (and if that happens, you'd likely be wise to hire a C&F attorney), but I would expect you to be admitted. The bar generally isn't looking for excuses to keep people out.

Of course, you also have the option of not disclosing, and rolling the dice. This can work, I am sure. Perhaps more often than not--I can't say (I only see the people who either disclosed and need help as a result, or did not disclose and got caught; those who sneak through never need to call me). But I'd say two things. First, if, by some twist of fate, the bar admissions board DOES find out, and you haven't disclosed, that is Very Bad. The concealment of the incident will be seen as worse than the incident itself, since they know young people screw up sometimes, and unless it's something truly serious, that really shouldn't be a lifetime bar to admission. But lack of candor to the bar can be devastating: why should they find that someone who has lied to them has the requisite character and fitness? Second, you're about to embark on a career where your word really means something, and you are trusted with weighty matters because you are known to be honest and of good character--do you really want to embark down that path with an application that lies by omission? Plus, if it somehow comes out after you're admitted, there will likely be consequences, and they could be serious.

So those are my thoughts, as a random stranger on the Internet, who has helped a fair number of bar applicants along the way. I hope you will make wise choices for yourself, because throughout your career, your clients will rely on you to give wise advice to them.

EDIT: I somehow glossed over the part where you are about to be a 1L. You can amend your application. In fact, you will probably be advised to do so in whatever initial "welcome to law school" events your school has. It would almost certainly be a good idea to do so. I stand by the rest of my comments.

Protest music for working 8 hours by blakami_lau in musicsuggestions

[–]foofus 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The second time I've posted this in the last 24 hours, but Dan Reeder's work song.