Law Career Paths Advice Helps Prospective Students

Photo by Mateus Campos Felipe on Unsplash 

Long dreadful hours, thousands of pages of reading, and overzealous thinkers ready to pick your brain.

Encountering those overzealous thinkers referred to as professors are part of the beginning of the process of heading toward a career of serving others in an enormous way. This career is law.  Different people take various paths to becoming a lawyer.

Before some people even have thought of dedicating their life to serving others, seeking justice and speaking for the voiceless, sometimes they take another route first.  These individuals thought of pursuing other careers until the legal passion warrior taped them on the back.  This was the case for Alabama employment law attorney Kameron Monet. Monet wanted to pursue a career in performing arts but after taking a few law related classes and joining a mock trial team she grew an interest in a legal career.  

“I realized that the same feeling I got on stage was the same feeling I got in the courtroom.  The communication, persuasive, reading and writing skills I gained in the performing arts directly correlated to law school,” Monet explained.

Now for South Carolina native Kelsey Ashford, she realized she wanted to pursue law after attending her first law school open house. Her decision to pursue law came after she earned her bachelor’s degree in public relations with a minor in English and began a master’s program.

As far as deciding a specific area of law to go after, she plans to reserve her decision until she attends law school.  

“I’m open to all divisions of law at this point because I know that I may find a practice that I’ll feel passionate about once I attend law school.    However, I’m interested in criminal law, corporate law, and international law at this time,” she explained.

Monet became passionate about employment law after gaining summer experience.

“I did a summer clerkship with the law firm I currently work for and genuinely fell in love with learning about employment law.  That’s how I knew this was the are for me!,” she wrote in an email.  The Cumberland School of Law graduate encourages people to pursue law, if they have an interest.

“I think it’s an amazing field to be a part of and there are so many benefits to simply knowing and understanding laws,” Monet explained.

While many are interested in law, in order to become a lawyer in the United States one must graduate law school and pass the bar exam. However, before going to law school, prospective students must take the Law School Admissions Test.

Prospective law students have the option of taking LSAT prep courses, hiring a tutor or self studying to prepare for the test that is part of the admission process that is designed to determine how well you will do in law school.   The test scoring ranges from 120 to 180.   To prepare for the test, some study for a few months to a year or longer in order to receive a score of between 160 to 180.

As of 2020, the timed exam tests you on the way you think and features sections referred to as logical reasoning, analytical reasoning and reading comprehension.

Various people have advice on how long one should prepare for the LSAT in order to receive a high score. Monet suggests a prep course and a time frame for studying depending on how much time you have.

“If you can afford it, invest in a LSAT prep course. If you cannot afford it or just simply want to try to save money, self study like I did. I used Powerscore Bible books on Amazon,” she explained in an email.   “I suggest you study about 3-6 months out from the exam depending on how much time you can dedicate to studying.”

Now preparing for law school is on a whole different level.

Some law school students and attorneys’ advice is to do everything you can to prepare for law school like Miguel Willis, a Law School Admissions Council Presidential Innovation Fellow suggest.

“Learn more about how law is part of every industry. The more you know, the better prepared you will be,” Willis said. “From books to news articles and magazines, read as much as you can.”

Willis also suggest taking courses that will interest and challenge people while mentioning that classes like philosophy will help with critical thinking skills.

“Writing and research are key skills for law school, so take as many writing intensive courses as possible, including English and literature.

There are a lot of people interested in a legal career as there is a spike in law school admissions and LSAC has the data that reveals this.    Susan Krinsky, executive vice president for operations and chief of staff at LSAC, provided date in a February 2020 podcast referred to as “Keeping Up To Data.”

She discussed data in early 2020 compared to the same time in 2019. Krinsky explained that 114 law schools are experiencing volume increases, 80 are experiencing volume decreases, and seven are showing no change as compared to last year.