advice

Law School Core Classes as Tatte Desserts

/ Reilly Doak / Leave a comment

Tatte Bakery & Cafe is a Boston staple– with a location less than one mile from the Law School, it’s one of my favorite places to catch up with friends, splurge on a fancy coffee, treat myself to a baked pick-me-up, or do a little bit of reading with a change of scenery.

To give prospective law students an idea of what classes are like and current law students a sweet reprieve from their post-Spring Break deluge of work, I have assigned each legal core class a Tatte pastry that I feel most represents it. If your favorite class didn’t make the list, feel free to add it in the comments!

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Food Review: Too Many Burritos

/ Travis Salters / Leave a comment

Last month, we launched a spotlight series focused on local foods, because no one should need to search far for good food. We started with a quintessential American staple — bagels. Today, we turn to a food that serves as the perfect quick lunch or dinner when you’re heading to or from campus – BURRITOS! Keep in mind, as we mentioned in the first review, the locations we’re critiquing are narrowed to those in the immediate Newton area surrounding the BC Law campus. 

We (Tess Halpern and Travis Salters) traveled to six different restaurants for burritos in the span of approximately two hours. To keep our orders consistent, we stuck to one chicken burrito, typically with lettuce, pico de gallo, rice, beans, and cheese inside. Needless to say, we didn’t feel our lightest after this experience. May our sacrifices serve the people! 

Read on…

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What’s Law School Really Like? Let Me Tell You.

/ Michael Deere / Leave a comment

When I was applying, I brought my wife to Admitted Students’ Day. It was a Big Deal. We both dressed up. She sat with me through the mock class. We had lunch together in the cafeteria. She came to the panels, went on the tour, and generally learned as much about law school as I did. It was a good day. A really good day. And though I learned a great deal, I still wanted to know: what’s law school really like? How do people dress for class? Is cold-calling really as bad as it seems? Will I make friends? Are the professors like Kingston in The Paper Chase? That kind of thing. 

I think what I was looking for was the law school equivalent of those really detailed product reviews on Amazon that you just kinda trust. You know the type. The reviewer always sounds like they really want to like the product, but they’re just not sure. They go over the results of their research. They compare models. And they’re always weirdly specific about little things: “yeah, I ran the Samurai Slicer on full speed. Noticed a slight wobble, but that’s pretty standard on models like this one that use a polymer base instead of steel.” It sounds authentic. It sounds real. 

Where was that for BC Law? Not the HR presentation, not the Tour Talk, but the weirdly specific Amazon review. Well, guess what? It’s right here. So after you unsubscribe from the r/lawschooladmissions subreddit and join r/lawschool, take a moment to yourself, crack open a Success Beer, and read on to find out what BC Law is really like…

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The 1L Summer Internship Search: Four Things to Keep in Mind

/ tesshalpern / Leave a comment

When I was a 1L, I thought I would secure my summer internship over winter break. However, I quickly realized that was a bit of a pipe dream as I kept applying to opportunities and getting little response. I wasn’t too concerned until February rolled around, when I started to fear it wouldn’t happen for me. I was a hard-working student! I had good grades! What if I never got an internship?!

If you’re at this point in your 1L summer internship search, be sure to remember the following:

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The Most Important Advice I’ve Received about My Summer Job Search

/ Michael Deere / Leave a comment

Along with every other 1L, I am applying for a summer job. I’ve been to networking events, workshops, panels, and how-tos. My notebook overflows with well-meaning advice and guidance. The problem is that none of it applies to me. I don’t have a resumé; I’ve never had one. 

I’m what people call a “non-traditional” law student. I came late to law school after building a career as a professor. I did have a distinguished undergraduate career, filled with awards, accolades and accomplishments. But I can’t put those things on my resumé. That was twenty some years ago. It would look weird, my notebook says. Out of place (underlined). They were important things. Bright, big things. They mattered then, and they matter now. But it won’t help me land a summer job. Employers don’t want to see that, quotes the notebook. So, /select/highlight/delete, and just like that, parts of my life are cut away. Besides, I need that space so I can focus on my strengths (circled; exclamation point). Because the resumé manuals tell me I have to…wait, where is it…oh, right. Lead with my core competencies (question mark). And above all, circled and twice underlined and given arrows all around it, the number-one-most-important-thing-to-remember-is…just be yourself!

But the problem with being yourself is that it’s hard to know who that is.

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4 Ways to Get the Most Out of Your Panopto Recordings

/ tesshalpern / Leave a comment

When classes went remote during the Covid-19 pandemic, Boston College installed cameras in every classroom to record lectures. These videos are designed to encourage sick students to stay home, as they can now do so without falling behind on classes. However, there are many other ways to use these recordings to your advantage! Here are some tips for using “Panopto” this semester.

Review Material While Outlining

This seems like a no-brainer, but it’s probably the best use of Panopto recordings out there, so it’s worth mentioning. You won’t be able to watch every class lecture during finals week, so you shouldn’t rely on these recordings too much as the semester begins winding down. However, watching a class or two to refresh your memory on particularly challenging or confusing topics could be really useful.

I tend to only use these recordings during finals prep when I’m reviewing notes that no longer make sense to me. Going back to the Panopto from that class and watching the short clip where I took those notes can clear up a lot of confusion. This is a great way to quickly resolve an issue without halting your study progress to meet with a professor. Getting to the bottom of the confusion on your own will also help you remember the material better than you’d be able to if a peer simply told you the answer.

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Food Review: The Best Bagels Around BC Law

/ Travis Salters / 1 Comment

The Impact Blog is launching a new spotlight series focused on local foods! We believe that one of the most important features of an area is the food, and no one should need to search far for good options. We’ll provide critiques and reviews of foods in the immediate Newton area surrounding the BC Law campus. Not all establishments are made equal, so whether you’re planning on coming to BC Law or just recently moved to the area, we’ll try all the local spots so you don’t have to.

Our first review turns to an American staple that doesn’t receive the credit it deserves. An often overlooked, taken for granted, carb-y snack: BAGELS!

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11 Tips for Exam Season

/ Travis Salters / Leave a comment

Ahhhhhh. Deep Breath. Exam Season is upon us yet again.

For some of us at BC Law, exams simply need to come and go so that we can get on with our Winter Break. For others – particularly you 1Ls – these few weeks will be incredibly stressful as you try to figure out how to both study for and execute on exams, which are two distinct skills that each need attention. 

As we enter reading period, the BC Impact Bloggers compiled a list of 11 of our most effective exam strategies. Note: these are not necessarily academic strategies, but rather tips for enduring and persisting through this difficult time.

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A Neurodivergent Guide to Navigating Interviews as a Law Student

/ Jonathan Bertulis-Fernandes / Leave a comment

I have always found interviews challenging. As someone with a stutter and who identifies as neurodivergent, the interview format seems tailor made to cause me problems. Being a law student with a regular schedule of internship and fellowship applications has only added to my issues with them.

To me, the interview format is a uniquely discriminatory and exclusionary way of recruiting. Interviews feel inherently ableist because they benefit individuals who are able to perform in this very specific setting, while systematically disadvantaging individuals who cannot. Moreover, they provide a space for implicit bias to infect hiring processes and ensure that the same types of people get offered particular opportunities.1 This is a significant problem in the legal sector, where interviews effectively act as gatekeepers to a profession that is already overwhelmingly non-disabled and neurotypical (as well as white, straight, and cisgender).

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A Brief Guide to Selecting Your 1L Elective

/ tesshalpern / Leave a comment

At most law schools, the 1L curriculum is locked into place, meaning students don’t have the opportunity to customize their schedules. But BC Law gives 1Ls the unique opportunity to take an elective, allowing students to interact with peers from other sections, take a break from large doctrinal lectures, and get some experiential learning in a practice area of their choice.

Course selection is right around the corner at BC, so if you’re a 1L, you may be feeling pressure to pick the best elective. The common advice is that you’ll get a good experience out of any elective you choose, and I definitely stand by that. Yet, you should still take some time over the next few weeks to follow these steps so you can make sure you get the most out of your semester.

1. Read the elective descriptions

To help 1Ls choose their electives, professors provide little synopses about the goals of their courses, the material they cover, and in some cases, how their classes will be structured. If you haven’t already read the descriptions of the electives offered next semester, you can find them here.

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