Intellectual Life

A Letter from the Incoming Editor-in-Chief of the Boston College Law Review

/ Rob Rossi / 1 Comment

Editor’s Note: Jennie Davis is the incoming Editor-in-Chief of the Boston College Law Review.  Despite prior engagements such as final exams and learning how to run an entire publication, Jennie was kind enough to author a post about the academic journals at BC Law, and the writing competition that plays so prominently in membership selection. We are very pleased to present her letter about the rewards of working on a journal, and how interested students can get involved.

Being a member of Boston College Law Review has been the most challenging and rewarding experience of my career thus far. As a result, I would encourage all law students to take advantage of this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to get to know your peers on a different level, learn what professors do outside of class, and push yourself to become the best writer you can be. To help you make your decision, I’d like to share with you a few of the reasons why I decided to join a journal here at BC Law and how the experience has shaped my legal education. Continue reading →

My Thank You Letter to BC Law: Looking Back On The Past Three Years

/ Luciabc / Leave a comment

It was about three years ago now that I was making my decision as to where to attend law school. It was a tough decision for me, as I am sure it is for most people. Even though I knew which school was the best fit for me, I was stressed out about turning down bigger scholarships elsewhere. Every time I went to send in my deposit, I started to second guess my decision.

It is a very personal decision to choose where you’ll spend the next few years of your life. Looking back now, I feel so grateful that I chose Boston College, and I feel lucky to have a mother like mine, who encouraged me to go with my gut in choosing BC. Last week I finished up my academic career here, and I am already starting to feel nostalgic for the community of friends and mentors I have found at Boston College Law School. Here, more than anywhere else, I have found a school where professors keep in touch with their former students, where administrators go out of their way to share opportunities with students, and where the group of classmates you find end up feeling like family after three years of going through life’s ups and downs together.

The first, and most important group, that deserves thanks is the BC Law student body. I made my first, and closest friends in Section 3, but as the years progressed I have gotten to know an amazingly diverse, passionate, friendly group of my classmates. These people have studied with me during exams, passed along their carefully formatted outlines, and accompanied me on all sorts of misadventures over the past three years. Especially when I compare my experience to those of my friends at other schools, I feel so fortunate to have found such a stellar group of people to spend the past three years with. On a broader scale, our student government, the Public Interest Law Foundation, and the myriad affinity groups here at BC have truly excelled at making Boston College a welcoming, fun, and engaging place to be a student.

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If You’re Reading This You Should Commit to Boston College Law School

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Editor’s Note: Nirav Bhatt is the incoming President of the Boston College Law Students Association. Much like his predecessor, Nirav embodies the very best qualities that BC Law students have to offer. As his classmate, LSA colleague, and intramural basketball teammate, I can personally attest to the ways he pushes those around him to better both themselves and the BC community as a whole. In keeping with the Drake theme of this post’s title, he is and has been Steph Curry with the shot in all conceivable situations. Without further ado or musical references, I am very pleased to present… 

If You’re Reading This You Should Commit to Boston College Law School

by Nirav Bhatt, President, Boston College Law Students Association 2015-16

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A Letter to the Class of 2018 from the President of BC’s LSA

/ Rob Rossi / Leave a comment

Editor’s Note: One of my very favorite parts of attending BC Law is the constant interaction with classmates who push you to be better. They motivate you to set goals that would have seemed unthinkable on the first day of 1L year, and inspire you to exceed even those heightened aspirations. Although she would never admit it herself, Lainey Sullivan is the living, breathing embodiment of this type of BC student. I reached out to Lainey and asked if she had the time to write a brief welcome letter to next year’s incoming students, and what she sent back blew me away. Per usual. Without further ado, I am very pleased to present…

Why I Will Miss BC Law and Why You Shouldn’t Miss the Chance to Be an Eagle

By Lainey Sullivan, President, Boston College Law Students Association

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The Big Decision: How to Pick the Law School That is Best For You

/ Luciabc / 3 Comments

Selecting where you are going to spend the next three years of your life (at least) is a stressful and important decision. I remember when I was trying to decide which school I would attend I kept going back to three factors: the quality of the school, the financial situation I would be in, and the geographic location of the school. I think for most people the ultimate decision comes down to some combination of these factors. 

For everyone who is thinking about where to attend law school, do your research before you make your decision. When you make the decision to attend law school you do so with one real goal: employment. So make an effort to look into the employment statistics of every school you’ve been accepted to. When I was looking at BC’s I realized that the employment rate was much stronger than comparable schools, and even some higher ranked schools that I had been accepted into. It’s also important to look at what types of jobs students go into. Are they large firms, or public interest? Look at whether most students end up in positions that are in-line with your ultimate goals or vastly different. You’ll be able to gain some perspective by comparing three or more schools. Also pay attention to which cities students end up working in. I visited one school in Virginia which touted it’s connections to DC, but actually ended up placing more people in southern states. If you really want to get into it, you can also look at state bar statistics, and see which schools have more students take the bar in the state you’d ultimately work in. This may be an indicator of how regionally connected a particular school is, and whether or not there will be a strong alumni network in the region. Also, make sure that the bar passage rate is respectable for the schools you consider, as you’d be shocked at the rates at some lower ranked schools. Bar passage rates will also tell you something about the quality of classmates you’ll find at different institutions.

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BC Law moves up to #34 in US News

/ Rob Rossi / 1 Comment

Yesterday, US News & World Report published the 2016 installment of its annual ranking of top law schools across the United States. BC Law moved up two spots from its 2015 ranking to number 34, putting it into a six-way tie with BYU, Fordham, Indiana, Ohio State and UNC.

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The merits of the methodology used to determine these lists, and indeed the idea of rankings themselves, are always debated. Unsurprisingly, most people tend to favor the lists that rank their schools most highly, especially if the disparities are at all notable. For example, while BC Law moved up to number 34 in the US News, that ranking still falls far below its place on Above the Law‘s list:  Continue reading →

Tinker Bell or Prison Time? (Paradigms of Criminal Law Part One)

/ Amelia M. Wirts, Esq. / 2 Comments
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sujatha baliga, Restorative Justice Project and Associate Director, NCCD, speaking at the Rebellious Lawyering Conference at Yale Law School, Feb. 21, 2015 (photo taken by me)

“What do crime victims actually want?”

That is a question that sujatha baliga is asked quite frequently as a facilitator in restorative justice programs that focus on making a victim whole after a crime rather than punishing the person who committed the crime. “You can never really predict what will make a victim whole. Sometimes, it’s Tinker Bell,” balinga said. Continue reading →

Passion Killing and Mercy

/ Amelia M. Wirts, Esq. / 1 Comment

Finding one’s wife in the act of committing adultery, flying into a rage, and killing her or her lover is probably not a murder. At least that is the way American law has treated that scenario. Passion killing is an old term that used to designate small set of circumstances, like finding your wife with another man, in which intentional killing did not amount to murder. These circumstances, including such chivalrous acts as ‘mutual combat’ and ‘resisting illegal arrest’ were fixed, and they could drastically reduce your sentence.

The distinctions that structure our law are often also the distinctions that structure our shared values, and sometimes in the middle of a criminal law class, you can get an insight into those values.  Continue reading →

BC Law Magazine: John Kerry AND Amazing Law School Admissions Essays

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For anyone thinking about law school, and BC in particular, the latest issue of the BC Law Magazine (http://lawmagazine.bc.edu/) is not to be missed. One of the things BC prides itself on is educating future lawyers who go out to serve their communities in a variety of ways. This issue of the magazine profiles a number of such leaders who got their start at BC Law, including of course Secretary of State John Kerry. As if that wasn’t enough, there are also a number of exceptional law school admissions essays reprinted which are great examples of the kind of succinct and compelling narratives which can grab a reader’s attention. Enjoy!

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Helplessness: Why this philosopher needs a law degree

/ Amelia M. Wirts, Esq. / 2 Comments

Do you think the world is basically just? Do people get what they deserve most of the time? Provoked by an article in The Guardian entitled “Believing that Life is Fair Makes You a Terrible Person,” I discussed this question with one of my best law school friends on a ride home from school. Neither of us could square the idea of fairness with the world in front of us, and I think that is why we are both in law school.

The article discusses a theory– the just-world hypothesis– based on a number of studies. The theory suggests that people just can’t handle being helpless in the face of great injustice. So they find ways of imagining that the injustice is deserved. They imagine that this poor family is lazy, that black man was a criminal, or this woman was asking for it.  On the other hand, the same studies suggest that when terrible things happen and there is a concrete way to help, people tend to sympathize with the sufferer rather than blaming her.

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