How many Hours a Week Required in Law School?

[CleanHands]

21 hours ago, SNAILS said:

You always take the low road I your posts. You could have easily encouraged the OP and told him, "Hey, if you are really smart, you'll get straight A's and still be able to work your side job." But you did not do that. You instead took the opportunity to insult someone and put them down.

For context, this OP could fairly be characterized as an asshole based on his brief stint on the forums, and @Rashabonwas referencing his assholery from another thread.

[Turtles]

OP, I managed with more (i.e., full-time) work hours during full-time 1L. It's doable but a major pain the butt. I don't recommend if you have family care responsibilities, but if your work commitment is only 20 hrs and highly flexible, that may work. You can read my response here: 

 

Edited January 16, 2022 by Turtles

[BlockedQuebecois]

1 minute ago, Turtles said:

OP, I managed with more (i.e., full-time) work hours during full-time 1L.

I appreciate your advice in these topics because you’re one of the few people I can think of who have done 1L while working full time.

But don’t you think it’s worth disclaiming that you have not yet completed 1L or even gotten grades back at this point? (In fairness to you, though, your other post is at least present tense even if it doesn’t highlight the lack of grades)

[Big Pecker]

1 hour ago, CleanHands said:

For context, this OP could fairly be characterized as an asshole based on his brief stint on the forums, and @Rashabonwas referencing his assholery from another thread.

Thank you for that hyperlink. I wasn't fortunate to see that thread in real time but it was just as good after the fact. 

[CleanHands]

17 minutes ago, BlockedQuebecois said:

I appreciate your advice in these topics because you’re one of the few people I can think of who have done 1L while working full time.

I also think this should be emphasized. While I respect the hell out of @Turtlesbeing able to manage that (I could not) as well as envy his coming to arrangements that made it work (never have been offered such flexibility), it truly is an extremely exceptional situation and I think tons of asterisks and disclaimers need to be attached to it (to a greater extent that @Turtlesis providing, although to his credit he's not entirely trivializing it) if he's putting it out there for applicants as doable.

Edited January 16, 2022 by CleanHands

[Turtles]

2 minutes ago, BlockedQuebecois said:

I appreciate your advice in these topics because you’re one of the few people I can think of who have done 1L while working full time.

But don’t you think it’s worth disclaiming that you have not yet completed 1L or even gotten grades back at this point? (In fairness to you, though, your other post is at least present tense even if it doesn’t highlight the lack of grades)

Fair point!

OP: I have not yet received grades and I am only halfway through 1L. I did also complete the full first year of the MBA program under the same conditions (all new subject areas for me), with straight As, but law school is of course a different beast and MBA grades mean little (curved to a hard B/B+). If law exam grades come back next week shockingly lower than anticipated I'll come back and give a stern warning not to follow in my footsteps.

But from the few assignment marks / midterms so far, and the feeling that I wouldn't be spending too much more time on class work if I had extra free time (there's a clear point of diminishing returns and lack of motivation after putting a certain amount of time/effort in), I think my grades will be roughly representative of where I would have been if I spent a little more time studying, reading, or practicing exam writing. I had time to keep up with the courses, i.e., do most of the readings, attend all classes, revise notes and study, prepare a summary from scratch and stitch together existing notes/summaries for the other 2. If grades come back lower than expected, my hunch is it'll reflect my exam writing skills rather than knowledge or understanding gaps -- although granted, perhaps I would have done more practice exams given more time, although it's also possible I would have procrastinated and spent more time stressing instead. Hard to say. We'll also see if my professional experience is helpful for the 1L recruit.

[GGrievous]

6 hours ago, Turtles said:

I had time to keep up with the courses, i.e., do most of the readings, attend all classes, revise notes and study, prepare a summary from scratch and stitch together existing notes/summaries for the other 2. 

How many hours per day/week would you say you spend on law school outside of class? We've had a similar discussions here before and it was quite clear I take more time than most. I just don't get how you people do it. 

Edited January 16, 2022 by Barry

[Fruitdealer]

46 minutes ago, Barry said:

How many hours per day/week would you say you spend on law school outside of class? We've had a similar discussions here before and it was quite clear I take more time than most. I just don't get how you people do it. 

Caveat that I was a pretty average student (split very high/low marks depending on the course but averaged out to around 50 percentile), but I only attended classes I liked and skipped the majority of all other classes, usually that meant I skipped about half the classes any given semester from 2L onwards. Amount of time spent on total classwork per class was usually around 10-30hrs (read a can/map before exams or write a paper).

That probably wasn't advisable at all, but you can definitely get away with a lot if you really wanted to.

[GGrievous]

12 minutes ago, Fruitdealer said:

Caveat that I was a pretty average student (split very high/low marks depending on the course but averaged out to around 50 percentile), but I only attended classes I liked and skipped the majority of all other classes, usually that meant I skipped about half the classes any given semester from 2L onwards. Amount of time spent on total classwork per class was usually around 10-30hrs (read a can/map before exams or write a paper).

That probably wasn't advisable at all, but you can definitely get away with a lot if you really wanted to.

I’m on the higher end of your hours, but I go to every class. I don’t really have anything else to do anyway, and I find it helpful for the most part.  I spend about 5-6 hours a day (no weekends unless I have to), the hours between classes and usually one or two at night. With having to do EC stuff and regular life stuff, I am too burnt out to do anything else for the day. 

[Fruitdealer]

9 minutes ago, Barry said:

I’m on the higher end of your hours, but I go to every class. I don’t really have anything else to do anyway, and I find it helpful for the most part.  I spend about 5-6 hours a day (no weekends unless I have to), the hours between classes and usually one or two at night. With having to do EC stuff and regular life stuff, I am too burnt out to do anything else for the day. 

To be clear, thats 10-30hrs per semester per class, not week.

Edited January 16, 2022 by Fruitdealer

[GGrievous]

2 minutes ago, Fruitdealer said:

To be clear, thats 10-30hrs per semester per class, not week.

Jesus Christ

 edit: well yeah on that kind of time frame I could see how you could have a full time job on top lol.

Edited January 16, 2022 by Barry

[Fruitdealer]

13 minutes ago, Barry said:

Jesus Christ

 edit: well yeah on that kind of time frame I could see how you could have a full time job on top lol.

To be fair it was irresponsible and would not suggest it given the cost/time investment into law school and I did get randomly screwed in an exam that had some questions referencing information on some handout that I never got.

Edited January 16, 2022 by Fruitdealer

[Turtles]

On 1/16/2022 at 4:38 AM, Turtles said:

If law exam grades come back next week shockingly lower than anticipated I'll come back and give a stern warning not to follow in my footsteps.

An update for transparency: final first semester grades came back around what I expected, nothing lower than a B+. I stand by what I had posted above, with all the nuances and the emphasis on needing flexibility to be able to make it work.

Edited January 17, 2022 by Turtles