perspectives

What Students Are Thankful for at Boston College Law School

/ Tess Halpern / Leave a comment

Thanksgiving comes at a difficult time of year for law students. While we want to enjoy the holiday, the hours of travel and time away from our computers can make it stressful as finals inch ever closer. But this year, I wanted to make sure we as a community took at least a little time to focus on what the holiday is all about. There’s plenty to be thankful for here at Boston College Law School, so take a moment to remember what you love about this school. Here’s what some students had to say when they were asked what they’re thankful for at BC Law.

Conner Packebush, 1L: The community, which is incredibly kind. It’s also so easy to talk and connect with professors.

Maria Russo, 2L: Friends who make the stressful finals season more bearable.

Adel Clemonds, 3L: Affinity groups and free food.

Meghan Doyle, 1L: The welcoming community.

Jared Coltey, 2L: First Generation Professionals — this group has given me a sense of community and belonging during stressful times in law school.

Katie Cross, 3L: The amazing friends Boston College has given me that make coming to school everyday something to look forward to.

Christian Bilgrien, 1L: The professors showing care for our mental health.

Laura Stateler, 2L: Community, community, community. 

Paul Sevigny, 3L: Community, support, and being treated like a human first and foremost.

Katarina Bettencourt, 1L: The kindness and support of students and faculty.

Nicole Kerrigan, 2L: My section’s softball team.

Aaron Morris, 3L: The understanding and appreciation of life outside of law school from professors, faculty, and other students that allow law school — and the stresses it brings — to not overtake my entire life.

Andres Leiva, 1L: The opportunity to meet lawyers from big law firm practices and make professional connections.

Cordelia Houck, 2L: The sense of community both inside and outside the classroom, which makes the stress of law school more manageable. When things get stressful, the people around me keep me grounded and remind me that there’s more to life than law school. 

Gabriel (Gabe) McCarthy, 3L: The friends I have met from all walks of life, and the chance to learn from such amazing professors.

Tess Halpern is a third-year student and president of the Impact blog. Contact her at halperte@bc.edu.

The Implied Warranty of Fitness

/ Justin Sells / Leave a comment

As finals season approaches, many of us are buried in our textbooks, reviewing case briefs, finalizing outlines and memos, and visiting professors during office hours. In doing so, a few may have encountered the doctrine of “implied warranty of fitness.” For some, this doctrine might sound familiar from contract law.1 For others, it might sound familiar from property law.2 But the “implied warranty of fitness” I’m referring to exists beyond model codes, cases, and classrooms: the implied need to be physically and mentally fit. 

For newly minted 1Ls, law school has shown us that we constantly engage in rigorous and complex thought processes, from comprehending unnecessarily convoluted cases and writing legal memos to pondering hypotheticals and participating in competitions. These “mental gymnastics” require countless hours studying in the library and at home on top of regularly scheduled class time—all of which is spent sitting down. Evidently, life in the legal world is largely sedentary, which makes sense considering that physical fitness is neither an ABA requirement nor testable material on the UBE.

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Get to Know the CSO: Dorothy Commons

/ Tess Halpern / Leave a comment

A career services advisor can be an amazing resource in law school as you navigate OCI, externships, clerkship applications, and more. However, it’s important that you find the advisor who can best help you reach your personal goals! To do so, follow along with this new series to learn about each CSO advisor at Boston College Law School. Here is our interview with Dorothy Commons.

What’s the best piece of career advice you can offer students?

Believe in yourself and embrace a growth mindset. As an advisor, I often browse through LinkedIn to identify alums who are in certain practice areas or settings, and while doing so, I come across many who I worked with when they were law students. This has become a fun practice, because our alums are doing some really cool things with their careers — which should be no surprise because, like you, they are smart people who went to a great law school! I often notice that many are in very different positions from the first ones they had, and some have pivoted a few times. I know some started with what they thought was their dream job, and others began in positions they knew they would move on from. The common thread here is that they worked hard, remained curious, believed in themselves, and moved forward. 

All the stresses of law school can, at times, make some students doubt themselves, and the stress of any job search is real. But please remember that you are here for a reason. Believing in yourself, putting yourself out there again and again, and reflecting on your experiences will help you learn, grow, and find opportunities. 

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Memo Week’s Secret Memo

/ Alex Mostaghimi / Leave a comment

Memo week came and went with the grace of a Vanderbilt train crash. While all LP students are told at the beginning of the semester what they can expect, memo week still manages to derail our priorities. Nevertheless, if we heed the lessons learned from this short period, we might be able to build healthy habits to avoid future pains.

Memo week tends to bring the first symptoms of stress to the forefront, and its showing is magnificently diverse. 

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Killers of the Flower Moon

/ Christopher Tan / Leave a comment

The air is crisp. The leaves are brown. The days ever shorter. Amidst it all, the paperchase rumbles on. 

At this point in the semester, with the crucible of case readings, legal research, and memo writing taking its toll, I found myself delving into the core of why I chose a legal career. What about the law drives us law students to put up with such demands? I needed a reminder, and a recent screening of the “Killers of the Flower Moon,” the new movie by Martin Scorsese starring Leonardo DiCaprio, helped answer the question.

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Embracing the Process

/ Justin Sells / Leave a comment

As 1L year advances, I find myself asking this question more and more: “What type of lawyer do I want to be?” Speaking to many of my peers, I am relieved to know that I am not alone in experiencing this repetitive self-inquiry—they too ask themselves this question almost daily. Though to be clear, by “type of lawyer,” I am not merely referring to a specific area of practice, but also to the values that I see myself striving to uphold as a practicing attorney. In attempting to answer this question, I tend to reflect on the emphasis that my professors place on applying a critical perspective to the cases and issues we explore both in class and in everyday life. Our job as lawyers in training, so it seems, is not just to understand the letter of the law, but also to understand the motivating forces behind the law, the law’s impact on the judicial process, and the law’s impact on society at large. Why did the court rule the way it did? What are the societal implications of the court’s ruling? Does the ruling complement or negate public policy? How should the court have ruled? 

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When Fall Comes to New England, Law School Can Wait (ish)

/ Reilly Doak / Leave a comment

Before attending BC Law, I had spent next to zero time in New England. Years ago, I remembered listening to the song When Fall Comes to New England by Cheryl Wheeler on car rides with my dad. Once I came to Boston, I was determined to ensure that I could sing along after graduating without feeling like a fraud. As I finish my final semester here, I want to have no regrets about enjoying New England’s fall.

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Get to Know the CSO: Naomi Bass

/ Tess Halpern / Leave a comment

A career services advisor can be an amazing resource in law school as you navigate OCI, externships, clerkship applications, and more. However, it’s important that you find the advisor who can best help you reach your personal goals! To do so, follow along with this new series to learn about each CSO advisor at Boston College Law School. Next up is the Associate Director of Career Services, Naomi Bass.

What is your role in the CSO?

Since 2021, I have been an Associate Director in the CSO. My role includes advising JD students about career options and decisions at all stages of their law school experience. Our team collaborates to create and deliver professional development programs, conduct mock interviews, review application materials, and engage with BC Law alumni on a range of programs to support our students on their career journeys.

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Reflections as a 3L

/ Seung Hye Yang / Leave a comment

When people told me as a 1L that law school would fly by in the blink of an eye, I never really believed them. It sounded like a tall tale at the time, when I was still trying to figure out whether Quimbeeing cases was worth it (spoiler alert: Quimbee is always a good choice and will save you so much time). But now as a 3L, I have to say that law school did indeed fly by–and as the end of my law school career approaches, I have much to reflect on.

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Law School: Stepping Stone or End Goal? 

/ BC Law Impact Guest Posts / Leave a comment

By Alyssa Leston

So you made the decision to go to law school. 

Maybe–like me–you realized it was the last day to sign up for the LSAT for the upcoming application cycle, forcing you to spend a frantic few weeks studying and then researching which school was the right fit. 

Or maybe you’ve known for years that this was your path; months of preparation, tours, and networking brought you to the school you are at now, feeling ready and excited to start achieving your dream.

Or maybe, now that you’re here, you’ve stopped caring about how you got to where you are, because you realized that regardless of the process, you’re not excited to be there after all. 

So, what now?

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