Most law students fund their educations from a combination of their or their family's resources; federal work-study, which allows you to work for the law school as well as in community service after the first year; federal loans; and institutional loans and scholarships. Once you've zeroed in on a number of law schools, the most efficient way to assemble your financial aid plan is to gather materials from all the schools you'd like to attend.
Most programs, federal or not, rely on the Free Application for Federal Student Aid, a form that requires you to reveal your income and assets, as well as the assets of your family and spouse if any. Although you can get the FAFSA from lots of places, here again the best procedure is to use the financial aid resources and information available through the admissions procedure at the schools you are considering. Almost every application for admissions includes information about the resources available at the particular school and about the national programs like federal loans.
LSAT cram books are probably responsible for the deforesting of Brazil. In addition to the Hricik and the Whitebread, there are a handful of other success guides, including books about how to study. Many of them can be found in the same section of your local bookstore where you found me.
Many of the people I interviewed learned a lot about their law school options from caring and more experienced people in their lives. If you aren't related to a lawyer or living near one in your hometown, call the local bar association and ask if there's a committee on women and the law. Once you've found it, ask if they can put you in touch with someone to talk about the pros and cons of law school. Your college probably has a prelaw adviser. My favorite prelaw adviser hung a copy of my Glamour magazine article on the bulletin board outside his office. Knowing about law school is their job. Take advantage of it.
If you live near a local law school, or if you attend a university with a law school, go to the admissions department and ask to sit in on a whole day of classes. Have a woman student take you around and ask her about her experience.
Other people evaluate law schools. The most famous one is the annual U.S. News & World Report issue on law schools, usually published in March. The U.S. News survey is the subject of some controversy, because it allows deans and other people to rank all the law schools according to what they think of them, and this is an awfully fuzzy measure. You will notice that the only aspect of the U.S. News ranking I thought was useful was the hard numerical data about the median LSATs in the entering class of 1995 (graduating '98). The other stuff is too vulnerable to manipulation for my taste. Still, you can get up-to-date info on the selectivity and placement rates, as well as the median scores, from the U.S. News report, which should be reliable.
Learn the 10 Factors That Matter to Big Firms More Than Where You Went to Law School
The computer is a valuable resource. Go into the library or someplace that offers the LEXIS/NEXIS database and look up the names of the law schools you're interested in. The search format is Library "NEWS," file "CURNWS," or "ARCNWS" for older info. If a scandal has broken, it may be reported there. If one or more of their faculty have written opinion pieces, a search for the school name will tell you what some of the faculty are thinking. Use the Internet. The Web sites of the law schools have a wealth of information about the faculty and the courses, and now you know how to use it. Many newspapers and magazines are on the Internet, and you can look up the name of your prospective schools there if you can't find the easier LEXIS/NEXIS service available anywhere.
Want to Change the World?
At the Mills College conference, the several hundred participants-lawyers, judges, law professors, law students-broke up into groups, with the assignment to create an agenda to change law school for women. After a day of conferring, they met in a plenary session to give their recommendations. Some of them were quite far-reaching-abolish tenure, create a Portia law school for women, etc. But a lot of them were very practical and achievable. When you get to law school, you may want to work to make some of these changes. Some of them you can even make yourself.
The Mills College recommenders again and again hit on the same ideas.
- Teach teachers how to run the Socratic method to help students learn, not scare the shy and encourage the bullies. What this means for you is that the whole structure of law school teaching is not your adversary. You can focus your learning in classes where the teachers do that already.
- Make the process transparent. What this means for you is that the mysterious game is really not impenetrable and it's not just an arbitrary exercise. The Mills conferees thought if law students understood what was basically going on, they would be more comfortable with their role in the process. I hope this book has started that process in motion for you.
- Teach other things. The people at Mills College weren't explicit about what they wanted taught, but I'm sure they meant to teach law as if women mattered, as if their freedom to reproduce when they desired to do so mattered, as if their security from rape and violence mattered, as if their touching faith in romantic love mattered, as if their commitment to childbearing and child rearing mattered. If you learn nothing else, take from this book that a curriculum that excludes women's claims and hopes is not natural or an "autonomous discipline." It's as old-fashioned as hoop skirts and garters.
- Law school is not an autonomous institution. The conferees revealed their exasperation with the dug-in world of law school and its "autonomous discipline" by recommending reaching out-to prospective students who will demand better treatment in exchange for their tuition payments, as well as to members of the bar who will exemplify the more humane values of the firms we saw, and to alumni, who will reform the schools from a safe distance. What this means for you is that although you have to retool yourself, you are also entitled to demand that the schools retool themselves and provide you with a better deal. Once you're accepted, you're in as strong a position as you'll ever be in. Make demands. Ask for a schedule that has at least one woman teacher before you accept their offer. Ask for a schedule that doesn't include teachers your research has revealed will demand that you become your own worst enemy.
