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GW Journal Competition Coming Up Again
A reader who will remain anonymous writes roughly:Well, reader, about all I can say is: Good luck! But I can also say that I enjoyed the competition last year and it really needn't be hard or onerous. Therefore, my advice is to try to have fun with it. The bluebooking isn't all that bad. One way to do it is to look at the shortcuts in the front (or is it back? depending on the directions for the competition, I guess) cover of the bluebook and cite everything based on the examples you see there. Then go through each citation one-by-one, read the rule(s) that govern it, and make sure you've dotted every “i.” If a rule sends you to another rule for some reason, go read it—it might tell you something you've forgotten. Remember to abbreviate appropriately w/case names and other places where abbreviations are allowed/required. Don't forget subsequent history where necessary (according to the rules). What else? That's what's on the top of my head. I've found that when bluebooking, it's best to be as thorough as I can be, then put it aside for a while, then go back and start checking my work against the rules one last time. I always always always find at least some little thing I'd forgotten the first one or two times through. The fun part is summarizing the cases succinctly and constructing an argument from the materials. Make the argument you want to make, not the argument you think some judge wants to hear. If you write what you want to write, it will be better, even if your judges disagree with it. A good strategy may obviously be to summarize the cases first, then free-write your argument quickly, writing it like you would if you were writing a note to a friend or something—casual, your own language, just getting the points down that you want to make. Then go back and revise and expand that into something slightly more formal and support it all w/good citations. That's how I did it, anyway. Oh, one more thing: I'm pretty sure I made it on a journal in large part b/c of how I ranked my choices. If your grades aren't stellar (mine aren't), the best choice is AIPlA b/c it's the only journal that doesn't consider grades. Other than that, obviously make your choices based on whether the subject matter of the journal interests you (your choices are obviously severely limited at our wonderful school w/its paltry four options; not that I think the world really needs more legal journals, but...). I bet I haven't told you anything you haven't heard already, but this is the best I can do. There's really no secret that I know except what I said already: Try to make it fun. If it's not at least a little fun, you probably shouldn't even do it b/c it's not like the work will get better once you're on a journal. I'll be curious to hear from any 1Ls (after the competition, of course) who would like to share how things went for them. Best of luck everyone!Everyone and their brother is giving us advice for the upcoming Journal competition. I figured I should turn to one of my “blog-idols” as well:-) Got any advice or tips? Post something before 4pm... after that, we are in hiding!!!
Posted March 3, 2005 11:49 AM | advice law school
THANKS! Fabulous advice. With regard to ranking...do you recommend "realistic" ranking even if that journal is not one that you are necessarily interested in? For instance, I.P. is not (and probably will not ever be) my thing but I do foresee Government Contracts in my future. Is it more important to be on "a journal" or to participate in one that is more along the lines of my interests?
Posted by: Remaining Anonymous at March 3, 2005 01:39 PM
From my standpoint as someone who hires lawyers (and I'm a GW alum), if you're not on law review, every journal's the same to me. And from that standpoint, why would you want to participate in something you're not interested in?
If you have the choice between Law Review and "another journal," pick Law Review. Otherwise, AIPLA = Environmental Law = Government Contracts = whatever.
In fact, to the extent there was a Real Estate journal at GW, I would prize that for someone who was interested in joining my department (obviously, I'm a dirt lawyer), over some allegedly "superior" journal.
Posted by: David at March 3, 2005 02:24 PM
Just as an additional point, because I don't think I really spoke to yours, again, I (and keep in mind this is one BigLaw lawyer talking) couldn't care less if you were on an irrelevant journal or not, if it's not Law Review.
So if you're interested in Gvt Contracts, I'd go for that journal over "realistic" ranking, because I don't much care about journals that aren't Law Review to begin with, but being on a relevant journal to the field you're interested in getting into would help you.
If that's not clear, let me know.
Posted by: David at March 3, 2005 02:27 PM
David-
If I am interpretting your advice correctly...I should (obviously) aim for Law Review as # 1 as a means of resume building and impressing you BigLaw folks. If that doesn't work out and I am interested in Govn't Contracts, I should try my hand at that journal for good experience. Beyond that, it may be a of little consequence to be on a journal, as it won't really impress anyone? (seems a bit more cynical when laid out this way...but I just want someone to give it to me straight!)
Thanks for your advice.
Posted by: Anonymous at March 3, 2005 02:59 PM
Well, yeah, that's basically what I'm saying. Now, I hasten to add that I'm merely one guy, and I'm not a partner yet (although I'm a very senior associate). But that's my feeling when I look at a resume. Just to make things more complicated for you and my advice less helpful, I do only see resumes after they've been screened, so for all I know, our Recruiting department cuts everybody without a journal.
Posted by: David at March 3, 2005 06:42 PM
Unfortunately, I'm not familiar with GW's non-Law Review journals, but some non-Law Review journals do stand out due to their established reputation. I went to Boalt Hall, and there were a few students every year who declined to try out for Cal. L. Rev. because they knew they wanted to do environmental law, so they opted to work on the Ecology Law Quarterly. Since ELQ is the oldest (one of the oldest?) environment journal out there, someone who knows this may look upon ELQ membership with some favor. When I was clerking and helping the judge screen applicants, if I saw a Boalt student on ELQ, I'd look to see if the student had been taking environmental courses. If he/she had, I would treat ELQ as more or less comparable to Law Review.
Posted by: Tung Yin at March 3, 2005 09:48 PM
This comment thread is kind of depressing..."Sorry kids, if you're not on Law Review then nothing else you do really matters unless it gives you some kind of intrinsic satisfation...which, frankly, doesn't matter. Sorry."
As a law student who is not on a journal, and has really no desire to be on a journal (mostly b/c in my opinion the journals my school has to offer aren't interesting), I guess I don't really have a dog in this fight...but still.
Even hypothetically, if a screening process potentially or actually does take out all the resumes of people who aren't on a journal or law review then I guess some nice firm somewhere will miss the fact that I used to manage 6000+ people and that my prior work history is more legally relevant than that of every single person who is on my school's law review and journals put together and multiplied by a factor of 3. Huh...strange how that works out isn't it?
Posted by: energy spatula at March 5, 2005 02:10 AM
Yes, maybe one will. But that wasn't the question. The question was "Does it matter what journal I'm on or is it more important to just be on a journal no matter what?"
And the answer, from my experience with BigLaw, (not any other legal jobs), is that Law Review really helps, and other journals will help you to the extent they are relevant to the practice you're trying to get into. And otherwise, you can find another thing which will set your resume apart from the other zillion we see. For example, "the fact that I used to manage 6000+ people and that my prior work history is more legally relevant than that of every single person who is on my school's law review and journals put together and multiplied by a factor of 3."
But to try and pretend that being on Law Review isn't a big help is to shut your eyes, put your hands over your ears, run around and scream and otherwise pretend the world isn't the way it is.
Posted by: David at March 7, 2005 05:40 PM
I'm not blind to the wonderful "opportunities" that law review affords people, and I don't begrudge anyone their abilities that got them onto law review in the first place. I am thinking on a more macro level regarding the entire legal profession...kind of built on a house of cards in the sense that so much emphasis in terms of hiring is put on things like law review (which many people think is pretty useless for showcasing any type of writing or analytical skills -- i.e., they're just not as great as everyone would like to believe) and grades (which are arguably fairly arbitraty considering that 50 people in a class may be within a few points of each other and yet some receive "good" grades and some receive "bad" ones).
My point, as always, is that if law firms hired according to other factors, such as demonstrated practical skills, experience with high-pressure work situations/past career experience, interviews that weren't just grade screening sessions, etc., perhaps there wouldn't be big firms whining on law.com about how Gen Y doesn't have any work ethic and no one wants to work hard anymore.
I *always* advocate for individualistic hiring practices based on some kind of interview that is more than perfunctory and that establishes a rapport between interviewer and interviewee where interviewer gets an actual glimpse of whether interviewee might be a valuable asset to the organization. I could write a book on my terrible law firm interviews...stupid questions, interviewers that hadn't read my resume, interviewers that totally depended on me to push the interview along, firms that told me, point blank, that I was lucky to even get an interview with them because my grades aren't perfect and then just sat and stared at me for five minutes...waiting for my gushing thanks no doubt.
We joke all the time in school about how law schools push for diversity in admitting students and then spend three years making us all the same...and unfortunately, "the same" that they're making us is someone no one wants to work with and who is hired based on things like law review and grades, which, while important, are not Important.
/soapbox.
Posted by: energy spatula at March 8, 2005 01:35 AM
Did you make journal?
Posted by: Anonymous at July 13, 2005 08:00 PM
