Archive for the ‘orientation’ Category

C.A. Esquire- The Most Important Weapon in Your Law School Arsenal

Posted: September 5, 2011 in 1L, Affad Shaikh, briefing cases, esquire in training, law school, orientation
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Its my third week of law school now.  I have ditched my comfortable apartment, along with the local coffee shop and am taking up permanent residence in the dreaded library.  It’s disturbing because it’s so quite here.

Anyway, there is so much to share from the past two weeks have been an immense learning curve (steep as Half Dome).  One thing that I have come to realize is that the case briefs are the most important weapon in your law school arsenal for success.

I have slacked on properly briefing my cases, but, regardless, when viewed from the “law school big picture” perspective, makes complete sense to brief your cases independently from the beginning.  If you are not in law school, then start thinking like briefing your notes for whatever subject you are studying.  Briefing your cases is not just about the case you are reading, its a total system of attacking the law school reading you are doing.

During orientation week they tell you and teach you all sorts of stuff.  I can say safely that most of the things they advised me on, I have thrown by the wayside.  They said “supplements are like crack”- yes, supplements, or commercial outlines, hornbooks etc. are like crack, they allow you to survive the madness that is law school and should be used in moderation, also you need to KNOW HOW TO USE THEM TO YOUR ADVANTAGE.  Supplements can help you or hurt you, short term or in the long term.  (I will leave the elaboration for another blog post)  Another thing they show you how to do is do your case briefs.  Learn how to do the brief the way they teach you, but ditch it after the first week of trying it and do it the following way:

  1.  Look at the reading assignment for your class, jot down all the cases and the minor cases mentioned in the text.  Also jot down the major themes or issues that the text is addressing.  If you are so miserably lost that you have no clue where to feasibly find this information out, let me let you in on a secret- read the table of contexts, read the titles and look for words that are repetitive; this will give you a good grounding on what subject are, or substantive issue, the reading is addressing.
  2. Hit up your supplements.  I got commercial outlines keyed to my textbooks and I also got further explanations on the substantive issues for my classes.  Take your cases and issues and match them up in the supplemental books.  I will sit down and read the explanations book first to get direction for the legal issues I am supposed to be understanding.  While I read this, I highlight and write in the margins the things that relate back to what I have on my jotted down notes.  I then hit the commercial outline and read the cases that we will be going over in class.  I don’t highlight or write in these at all, I focus on just reading through the case briefs provided in the commercial outline. (Don’t have supplements, not to worry, see below for a quick fix.)
  3. I hit the books, I read over the assigned reading, I work in my case briefing into the book, I take my notes in the book as well.  BUT LISTEN, DO THIS FIRST: skim to the Problems and Notes, or Notes and Questions section, you will find this after each significant case.  Read through that first.  Most likely you will find the most important facts and reasoning of the court highlighted there, you will find the rules or facts that change up the courts decision etc.  Reading that first can be a better compass on what your reading if you do not have supplements.  Once you finish this (and highlight, note as you see fit) read your cases, one at a time, just read first, then go back and read for issue, holding, reasoning, facts etc.
  4. Use a color coding briefing process- which technically in the short term will keep you from having to do individual case briefing- but will not prevent you from having to do the case briefing at some point before you midterm or final.  I have a system where I use 5 highlighters that identify the various parts of the case brief.  I go through reading the case a second time looking and identifying those various parts of the case brief.  After a while you book is going to look like a rainbow, but better a neon rainbow you can refer back to in class while your half asleep then to stare down at the book while your professors eyes glare down at you and you can’t make sense of anything on the page or recollect anything you read at 3AM in the morning.  Here at least you will know when you look down at your book, GREEN is the procedural posture- and respond as such.
  5. After class or better yet before class, you should write-up your case briefs.  Make sure you make marks or take notes on the things our professor points out and incorporate those into your case briefs.  With the volume of information being so intense, this little service the professor provides can save you from having to shift through thousands of paragraphs worth of information trying to figure out the black letter rule, facts and reasoning to apply on your midterm or final. (this part I need to work on)
I hope I summarized my process in a way that makes sense.  There is obviously more to this, what I have tried to do is quickly figure out what works for me, what other law students have advised me about and place it in the context of how I am approaching law schools bigger picture, academics is all fine and dandy, but I am more in-tune with the practice aspect and I need the tools of the trade from my law school experience, not necessarily the intellectual, or lack thereof, meandering through law school figuring things out experience.

Day 18- Chronicles of An Aspiring Esquire- Orientation Week

Posted: August 18, 2011 in 1L, Affad Shaikh, alcohol, alcohol, American Muslim, esquire in training, Islam, Law, law school, orientation, Ramadan
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So now that I got a name for my posts on law school experiences, its only proper to start the reflections for Ramadan with one that incorporates my experience with school thus far.  All week I have been at Law School Orientation (LSO).

LSO has been intense, not the content of the workshops, but rather because of all the running around I have had to do for school.  If you are applying to law school, I highly recommend not skipping out on your LSO.  It’s probably the only time where you get to see everyone in your first year class.  Each first year law class (1L) is divided up in sections and will spend all your times with the students in your sections- classes, legal writing class, study groups forming.

Which is actually another point, study groups are important, and you might be the sort that needs a study group to manage all the material covered, the LSO is the time to figure out who makes a good individual to be in your study group.

From what I have read and heard about law school, it’s an isolating experience and gets extremely lonely.  If you aren’t ready for that, than the first semester- if not year- will be very difficult to cope with.  You can’t socialize the way undergraduate years were.  You hit the ground running, in fact, I have for my first day of classes over 100 pages of reading that I must be ready for.

Once the school semester begins, you won’t talk about getting to know your peers, rather everything will seemingly revolve around the 210k dollar experience you have signed on the dotted line for.  LSO is your time to “have fun” and “socialize” with people who will make up your next 3 years of life experiences, as well as frame the professional corps of colleagues once you pass the bar exam.

But from my experience I highly recommend taking care of all your business before you get to LSO.  I found myself having to hurdle over financial aid- in fact I spent hours on the phone with the Department of Education, with my undergraduate (UNDIE) loan servicers, with the financial aid office at Law School.  I have come to love the financial aid folks at my school, they were immensely helpful and understanding.  I had a heart attack when i saw the loan amounts for financial aid and had to sign my name on the promissory note.  I have never seen that amount in my life, except at a CAIR Fundraising banquet, but yes it was immense.

Besides financial aid, I was buying books, figuring out supplements and outlines for my courses.  I was figuring out my housing situation, buying a car because my car broke down and became ridiculously expensive to get fixed.  I also was managing my budget.  I highly recommend you create a budget for law school.  The expenses are ridiculous and living without a budget is courting financial doom and disaster.  I also was dealing with my religious obligations- Ramadan and Fasting.  I will spend the rest of the post reflecting on this but all the above items I will expand upon as I experience more of what works and doesn’t work.

Its not a hidden fact that I am a fairly observant Muslim.  I don’t think many of my classmates know that I am, which goes more to the fact that I don’t wear my religion on my sleeve.  I am not interested in imposing my religious beliefs on the broader community.  Religion is an important facet to who I am and guides my day-to-day life, but it’s surely not the only thing that makes me such a dastardly good-looking unique character!

But I haven’t been in school for over six years, so I experienced a bit of “culture shock” to the degree with which people drink alcohol and everything evolves around alcohol.  Aside from law schools infamous “BAR REVIEWS”- the events have nothing to do with law school education, and everything to do with getting drunk and disorderly at a local bar; every social interaction has been around the idea of getting smashed or drinking beer.

Aside from the fact that I am fasting, I don’t drink alcohol.  But being in this environment plays with my head.  I found myself thinking about how I wanted to hang out with these folks and I could go and just drink soda or something.  The toying around with my head was really difficult to deal with.  I was fasting, breaking of the fast wasn’t until after 730, the socializing started at around 6.  For an hour and half I could not drink anything so I would stand around and have to explain to people why.  But the awkward position of being in a bar telling people I am an observant Muslim whose fasting, so couldn’t drink or eat anything, but then the scenario begs the question- well isn’t drinking alcohol against your religion?

Yes, by the way, the two things people probably know about Islam is that alcohol and pork are forbidden, “Allah’s curse will smite you down” if you touch the forbidden things- at least that’s how I thought of it as a kid.  But the whole situation smacked of religious hypocrisy, so I decided that I couldn’t compromise myself, especially during this month of Ramadan, and go to these social gatherings.  I am sure there are Muslims out there who don’t have the same strict religious observance as I do, so they might drink.  Don’t hold them as an example of all Muslims, and don’t hold me as an example of all Muslims- we are each individual Muslims, as such allow us to have our individuality.

(I just pray that I would never come to a time in my life where I have to test myself with such a situation.  The reality of the situation is that, there will be plenty of these opportunities, American business culture is premised on alcohol and getting drunk.  I have heard of interviews for law firms taking place at bars over drinks.  What a difficult set of circumstances!)

Besides the bar and drinking scene, I also realized to what extent my professional life was ”Islamic culture sensitive”- A LOT!  Meetings during Ramadan would not have food or drinks, as a show of respect to the Muslim participants.  There were meetings where that wasn’t the case, but for the most part the majority of folks there were understanding so I did not have to explain I was fasting.  Which was all the more awkward to have to tell people I am not going to eat during lunch, or during the welcoming breakfast for LSO events.

For the most part LSO was great, now its over with, which means I can begin to jump into the books and tackle Contract, Property, Civil Procedure, Torts and Legal Writing.  To really benefit from the LSO experience you have to be there, so make sure you make yourself completely available to jump in and reap the benefit of your LSO events!

Day 13- Chronicles of an Esquire in Training

Posted: August 13, 2011 in 1L, Affad Shaikh, American Muslim, esquire in training, Islam, Law, law school, orientation, Ramadan, suhaib webb
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Today was the first day of Law School orientation, all future posts on my law school experience will be under a title yet to be determined, but for now I began using “Chronicles of an Esquire in Training”.  This Ramadan my reflections focused on the idea of sufficiency.  Particular focus has been on the idea of eating sufficiently.  But sufficiency is not limited to just eating food, obviously.  I told you about how you should try to use this Ramadan to go on a journey in which you could lose yourself in your inner reflections.  Well no journey is going to be a success if you do not plan for it, and here is where I pull out a hadith- The Prophet SAW said “There is no wisdom equal to good planning.”

Wisdom is not this intellectual thingie as much as it is an accumulation of life experiences from which you have learned some lessons.  Life experiences that teach the best lessons are failures I believe.  I have had a lot of failures, especially those leading up to my being in Law School.  I looked at my mistakes and my failures so I could work toward a goal.  My goal was to attend law school but it required that I address the shortcomings that prevented me from getting into law school- LSAT score, GPA, credit rating, family and personal discipline or desire to go to law school.  Now I am in law school I have an end result I am working toward, I have personal achievements I am shooting for.  But oftentimes I found myself setting a lofty goal where there are significant gaps between where I am and where the result I was trying to get to.  So when you start toward your Ramadan journey, just think about realistic and achievable goals so that way you can carry out what you want to do during the remaining time in Ramadan.

Read this great article on “Goal Setting for Muslims” by Ahmed Adam.

As you focus on your inner journey of self-reflection for the rest of Ramadan take a look at this video with Sheikh Imam Ustadh Suhaib Webb at Zaytuna College giving a lecture on “Fasting, Materialism and Time Management“

 

Chronicles of an Esquire In Training- The Begining of the Year They Scare You to Death: One-(hel)L

Posted: August 11, 2011 in 1L, Affad Shaikh, American Muslim, esquire in training, Law, law school, orientation, whittier law school
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I imagine a future where I can be referred to as- Affad T. Shaikh, Esq.- the post-nominal “Esq.” stands for “esquire”. I find that quite sexy and it sends chills down my spine thinking that in three years I will have a chance to sit for the bar test and take on the license to practice law. I won’t bore you with why I chose to pursue law school, nor will I go in-depth into how I got to law school, now. If you follow my earlier blog, then you know all about my civil rights advocacy in the American Muslim, Arab, South Asian and Middle Eastern community in Southern California so simply that’s what brought me to law school.

For now you should know that I am a sane and rational being that has elected, volunteered, knowingly-signed-my-life-away-to-student-debt in order to pursue a legal education and eventual career as a licensed attorney.

Also you should know that I am 28 years old and I have worked for the past five years in a non-profit full time. I should also share with you that I am somewhat athletic, that I enjoy food and I am unique. I am a practicing Muslim who identifies with my American experience but appreciates my South Asian (Pakistani nationality) heritage. I have friends, family and lots of interesting hobbies. I am human and tend to show great amounts of sympathy as well as empathy.

Slowly, I imagine as you read this chronicle, you will notice how all those things melt away until I am an insane, irrational, readily institutionalized law student.  Telling people about my new endeavor has elicited cautious, and often completely repulsed, reactions.  People see the logic in my decision to pursue law school, but most law students suggest I not attend.

So look out for titled posts “Chronicles of an Esquire in Training” (or if it catches on CEIT) where I hope to elaborate about my law school experiences, try to also tell you the lessons I learned having gone through the experience if you happen to be an aspiring law students you can better prepare yourself for law school. The first year I have been told is defined as the “year they scare you to death”; the second year is “they work you to death”; and, finally, the third year is “when they bore you to death”. The first year is also called 1 (one)-(hel)L. I already sense the ominous environment I am about to find myself in shortly.

I do not claim to be practicing the law in the State of California or in the United States. In fact, I am incompetent to offer any legal advice and nothing here is such advice. You will find my opinions and experiences and various interesting facets of the law I have met on my way towards becoming a future licensed member of the legal profession in the State of California. In essence I am an esquire in training, and this is just a sarcastic, real, obscene and frantic chronicling of my law school experience for the benefit of whoever reads this blog. Its a cautionary tale for some, for others inspirational or comical, however you take these blog posts, know that this is my REAL EXPERIENCE. So handle with care.