Month: April 2016

LSA Year in Review

/ Charlene Ochogo / Leave a comment

Hi everyone! I have the pleasure of hosting a guest blog from our two fearless Law Student Association leaders from this past year, President Nirav Bhatt and Vice President Andrea Clavijo.

 Nirav was also a civil procedure teaching assistant for Professor Mark Brodin, the former president of the South Asian Law Students Association (SALSA), and a former 2L and 1L representative of the LSA. Andrea (or Dre, as her friends know her) was the founder of the BC Law Ambassadors program, a member of the Criminal Procedure Moot Court Team, and executive board member of the Latin American Law Students Association (LALSA), and a former secretary and 1L representative of the LSA. Both are amazing Eagles, friends, and people, and, on a personal note, my law school experience would not have been the same without them.

BC Law logo

Dear BC Law,

Thank you. As your outgoing elected leaders, we want to first and foremost send a huge thank you to all of you for your votes in confidence, your support and attendance at events, and, ultimately, your insightful and thoughtful suggestions to improve the student experience at BC Law. It has been an honor to represent the interests and needs of each and every one of you.

The BC Law community rightfully expects the Law Students Association (LSA), the student government on campus, to voice student concerns to the administration, preserve traditional programming that students have grown accustomed to, and use our resources and access to administrative leadership to continually improve student life at BC Law on all fronts – socially, academically, and professionally.

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BC Law Employment Statistics (Class of 2015)

/ Patrick Venter / Leave a comment

Law schools across the country, including Boston College Law School, recently released employment statistics for the class of 2015. These statistics represent reported employment outcomes of students ten months after graduation, in compliance with ABA requirements.

Here are some of the highlights:

  • Overall employment increased from 90.1% from the Class of 2014 to 91.5% for the Class of 2015.
  • Employment in full-time, long-term bar passage required/JD advantage jobs increased from 83.88% from the Class of 2014 to 85.4% for the Class of 2015.
  • BC Law placed 41% of graduates from the Class of 2015 in federal clerkships or with large law firms (100+ attorneys).

This last figure is particularly notable, as it exceeds the percentage for similarly-ranked schools, including Boston University School of Law, Notre Dame Law School, Fordham University School of Law, and highly-regarded national schools such as Washington University in St. Louis School of Law, and USC Gould School of Law.

These employment statistics are a testament to BC Law’s career services department (including Heather Hayes and Leslie LeBlanc), as well as BC Law’s alumni network and faculty.

 

Pat Venter is a 3L at BC Law. For information on computation of these statistics feel free to contact patrick.venter@bc.edu

The Primacy of BC Law Clerks

/ Charlene Ochogo / 1 Comment
Hi everyone! I am very pleased to be able to host a guest blog today from the Hon. Denis Cohen, BC Law ’76 and a judge in the Philadelphia County Court of Common Pleas, the top level trial court in Pennsylvania. 
 

What do I do now?

It was the fall of 2000. Tom Ridge, who was Governor of Pennsylvania at the time, appointed me as a Court of Common Pleas Judge (the top level trial court in Pennsylvania), and I was confirmed by the State Senate. I was about to preside over many trials. What should my next step be—and what about hiring for that all-important position of law clerk?

As the president of the BC Law Alumni Association’s Philadelphia-Area chapter, I thought it would be great to have a BC law graduate serve as my clerk. Given the distance from Philadelphia to Boston, I didn’t know if that would be possible. I contacted the Director of Career Services, who was thrilled that I had reached out. She knew a recent alumnus who wanted to practice in Philadelphia. Before I knew it, I was interviewing Gabriel. He was impressive, so I hired him.

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Watch BC Law Students Argue at the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals!

/ Sajid Shahriar / 3 Comments

As part of BC Law’s Center for Experiential Learning Ninth Circuit Appellate Program, four of our third-year law students prepared briefs and argued today in front of the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals on behalf of indigent clients.

In the Ninth Circuit Appellate Program, supervised law students prepare briefs and argue immigration cases brought by indigent clients who would otherwise be without counsel. The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, headquartered in San Francisco and hearing cases arising from Alaska, Hawaii, Washington, Oregon, California, Montana, Idaho, Nevada, and Arizona, screens pro se cases and selects those that present important issues that deserve further development. Past cases have included asylum, withholding, Convention Against Torture claims, questions relating to immigration consequences of criminal convictions, and issues of statutory interpretation that present questions of first impression to the Court.

The Court schedules the opening brief to be filed in October, the reply brief in January, and oral argument before a panel of sitting judges in April of the same academic year. Students travel to the court hearing to present oral argument. The Court then issues its decision based on the merits of the individual cases.

Students develop and apply numerous skills, including client communication, legal research, brief writing, and oral advocacy.

These students have been preparing all year for this day, and you can watch their arguments here:

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Spring Break: Law Student Edition

/ Maria Colella / Leave a comment

When I accepted Boston College Law School’s offer of admission in 2014, I did not know exactly what to expect from my law school experience. It was the first time since third grade that I was going to show up to school on the first day without knowing a single person.

I woke up at 5 a.m. to drive down to Newton from New Hampshire on the morning of orientation. If I had left after 6 a.m., my dad assured me, I would not make it on time. Throughout the day I got to know the campus and sat through presentations by the Dean and other faculty. They called BC the “Disney World of law schools,” but said that we would also be challenged academically. They spoke of the Jesuit ideals of the quest for knowledge and care for the whole person, the importance of contributing to society and treating your classmates well. At the time, I was hoping what they were espousing would turn out to be true.

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Meet the Affinity Group Leaders: Heather Perez (LALSA)

/ Marx P. Calderon / Leave a comment

Name: Heather PerezHaynes-IMG_5060

Year: 2L (Class of 2017)

Organization: Latin American Law Students Association (President)

Undergraduate Institution: Boston University

Experiences between college and law school:

I worked in public service in Boston as the Legislative Aide for State Representative Willie Mae Allen. Later, I served as the Chief of Staff for Boston City Councilor At-Large Felix G. Arroyo, and helped lead his campaign for Mayor.

 Favorite event that your organization plans:

LALSA hosts a “Day in the Life” for local high school students to come to BC Law and get a personal look at being a law student from the perspective of LALSA members. Part of our goals as an organization is to provide mentorship and it’s great to be able to do that both within our BC Law community and in the Greater Boston community.

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Bending Gender Perceptions in the Legal World

/ Sajid Shahriar / 4 Comments

Author’s Note: Kelsey Gasseling (KG) is a 1L at BC Law and a member of LAMBDA, the LGBTQ affinity group at BC Law. 

When I was 17 years old I went on a gender pronoun boycott. After coming out of the closet and realizing life could go on somewhat normally (no fire and brimstone, much to my Catholic school-kid surprise), I started to analyze what made me, “me.” I had the fortune of being a white teenager from the Pacific Northwest, with a supportive mother and access to a vibrant LGBTQ youth center. This gave me a relatively safe space to explore my identity outside of the conventional male/female binary. Today, I find myself confronting a new set of questions revolving around gender norms in the typically more conservative Boston legal market.

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A Letter to the Class of 2019 from the President-Elect of the LSA

/ Rob Rossi / Leave a comment

Editor’s Note: Alex Porter will serve as the President of the Boston College Law Students Association for the 2016-17 academic year. Much like his predecessor, Alex embodies the very best qualities that BC Law students have to offer. As a member of the Boston College Law Review alongside him, I know for a fact that as incoming students you will be in very capable hands. Without further ado, I am very pleased to present his welcome letter to the Class of 2019.

The_Four_Alexes[1]

President-Elect Alex Porter (second from right) along with three of his classmates.

Congratulations on your admission to Boston College Law School!

This August, you will become the newest (and most celebrated!) members of our truly extraordinary community.  It is a community that eschews one-size-fits-all happiness because we choose instead to value the whole person.  Here, it matters that you were the captain of your track team in college, or served as an aide to the Secretary of Transportation, or had first-hand knowledge of tort law due to an unfortunate car accident.  Here, whether your family came on the Mayflower or whether you just stepped off the plane from Bangalore, your classmates will want to know – and will value – your story. Please understand that this doesn’t mean an easy ride; you will work harder than you ever have in your life, and you will be challenged to achieve more than you thought possible in the classroom and beyond. But you will do it in a supportive, caring environment that lifts you up so we all get there together, rather than tearing you down.

Friendly competition can be a great thing, but cutthroat competition is not, and we won’t stand for that here.

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