An Annual Ritual: Minnesota Lawyer Interviews Unemployed TTT Grads Before the Bar Exam

Earlier this year, I wrote several posts based on the 2009 Minnesota Lawyer interview with Minnesota TTT grads who were planning to take the bar exam.



This is what I had to say about the 2009 interview in April of this year:

None of the graduates in the video seemed to have a job lined up at the time of the bar exam. I hope the guy who failed the bar exam twice passed the third time around if only to save himself from wasting more money on test prep courses. But Ms. Guertin from William Mitchell School of Law nails it when she says at 1:02 that passing the bar exam doesn't necessarily mean you're guaranteed a job.

The bar exam will not guarantee anyone a job right now. The only thing that will be easier is finding doc review work and you can make more money than a law graduate who isn't admitted to the bar. That's it. I hear and read about law school graduates who think passing the bar is the golden key to a great legal job. It isn't. Wiser graduates like Mike at Barely Legal (btw, he started blogging again last month after a long hiatus. Welcome back!) decided to save his money and not take the exam.

People will have different opinions on this but I think the bar exam in this economy is a waste of money and time, especially for third tier graduates who never had a chance at finding a good job in a recession. If you end up finding a great law firm job, let them pay for the exam instead. Don't take out another loan from Sallie Mae or Access Group to take the exam. If you fail, consider it a blessing or buy used Barbri books off of Craigslist if you decide to take it again. You have to ask yourself whether more torture and money down the drain is worth it if you're in a state that has a high unemployment rate and little opportunity to find a good paying legal job. I'm curious to know if any of the graduates in the video found jobs after passing the bar.

What I said in April about last year's bar exam takers remains true today for this year's bar exam takers. Here are some important additional thoughts and statistics provided by Scammed Hard who first reported on the 2010 Minnesota Lawyer's "special report" covering the Minnesota bar exam:

Given that the four law schools in this small market spew out 1,000 new grads every year, things must be especially tough for TTT grads trying to find work. Despite its relatively small population, Minnesota boasts the 12th highest lawyer per capita ratio in the Union, with 11.2 lawyers for every 10,000 people. When even your local T-25, the University of Minnesota, graduates more than half of its Class of 2010 without jobs, one can only imagine how much more awful thing must be down in the TTTs, or especially at the local TTTT, Hambone University School of Law.

How long are these people going to allow themselves to be scammed? After suffering through three years and tens of thousands of dollars' worth of hell, just to end up unemployed, it must feel great to be plunking down for bar review and the exam without having the slightest idea about where you will eventually find work. These folks from the lower tiers are, sadly, especially likely to never find work as lawyers. Nando has already given us a trio of excellent exposés about the dismal employment prospects offered by these law school puppy mills. I must grudgingly admire the irrational optimism that these grads display in continuing on the road toward lawyerdom, but as a scamblogger, I know what awaits them. We've had a smattering of commenters from these schools show up on the scamblogs in the past few months, and none of them paints a rosy picture of their class' employment. In fact, they all agree that most of their former classmates are unemployed, indebted, and desperate. Yet the charlatans and book-cookers who run these institutions are still busy tallying the seat deposits and packing the next 1L class in time for the fall semester.

Yes, how long will thousands of students in over-saturated legal markets allow themselves to be scammed out of thousands of dollars for nothing more than the illusion of prestige of having a JD and passing the bar exam? And why aren't mainstream legal news publications like the Minnesota Lawyer asking serious questions about the employment rates of these recent graduates instead of vapid questions like what they had for breakfast or what time they went to bed the night before? What?!? The real question everyone is dying to know is, have you found a job yet? And, how much money in student loans did you borrow on top of the $150k you borrowed for three years of law school to take the BARBRI course?!? If Minnesota Lawyer actually did their job, maybe more 0Ls and law students would think twice before plopping down another $5,000 for no good reason whatsoever. Or they would start asking their law schools questions as to why three years and $150k still isn't enough to prepare students for the bar exam.

Why Are You Taking the Bar Exam?

According to the video below provided by Minnesota Lawyer, 830 law school graduates took the Minnesota bar exam last July. Never having stepped foot into Minnesota, I had never heard of any of the law schools attended by the bar exam takers in the video. I can only assume,without checking USNWR rankings, that none of these schools are considered "top tier" - at least not outside of Minnesota. The Minnesotan who sent me the video also informs me that the Minnesota job market is in the crapper, much like the rest of the Midwestern states, and there aren't any jobs. So why did these students decide to take the bar exam?



None of the graduates in the video seemed to have a job lined up at the time of the bar exam. I hope the guy who failed the bar exam twice passed the third time around if only to save himself from wasting more money on test prep courses. But Ms. Guertin from William Mitchell School of Law nails it when she says at 1:02 that passing the bar exam doesn't necessarily mean you're guaranteed a job.

The bar exam will not guarantee anyone a job right now. The only thing that will be easier is finding doc review work and you can make more money than a law graduate who isn't admitted to the bar. That's it. I hear and read about law school graduates who think passing the bar is the golden key to a great legal job. It isn't. Wiser graduates like Mike at Barely Legal (btw, he started blogging again last month after a long hiatus. Welcome back!) decided to save his money and not take the exam.

People will have different opinions on this but I think the bar exam in this economy is a waste of money and time, especially for third tier graduates who never had a chance at finding a good job in a recession. If you end up finding a great law firm job, let them pay for the exam instead. Don't take out another loan from Sallie Mae or Access Group to take the exam. If you fail, consider it a blessing or buy used Barbri books off of Craigslist if you decide to take it again. You have to ask yourself whether more torture and money down the drain is worth it if you're in a state that has a high unemployment rate and little opportunity to find a good paying legal job. I'm curious to know if any of the graduates in the video found jobs after passing the bar. If any of you are reading this please update us on your job search.

Law Student Seeking Assistance! Help Please!

This chick must have been a blast to hang out with in college.  But now she's hunkered down and trying to become an attorney.  But, much like yesterday's chili dinner, juvenile indiscretions come back to haunt you when you take the bar.  Read her email below and give her some advice.  She certainly needs it. 

Hi Angel,

I came across your blog, and I was hoping you could help me answer a question. When I was a juvenile, I was charged with a possession of alcohol. Then, in the spirit of Halloween, I got really into character and was charged with impersonating a police officer. Those were both juvenile offenses. Both charges were dismissed after I completed some sort of pre-trial intervention a/k/a probabation. I also received a minor consumption during my rip-roaring college party days.

An attorney, a judge, and the employees at "juvie hall" said that I didn't need to tell anyone on any applications about my juvenile indiscretions. And, I didn't mention them on my law school applications. The applications didn't even specifically ask for juvenile issues anyways. Either way, I am completing my 3L year as we speak. I was going over bar applications for two states I might end up practicing in and they both pretty much ask for details pertaining to even the slightest accusation from one's juvenile and adult years. That means, I will have to disclose the juvenile incidents, and that in turn will create a discrepancy between my school application and character/fitness interview. So, the real question is, should I tell my school 3 years deep into my education that I made an omission absent mindedly; or should I disclose to the character and fitness committee? Or both? Or neither? It is rumored that my school expels people for lesser indiscretions, even slight violations that may be academic or disciplinary in nature. I think I've got a better shot with just telling the C&F committee and picking up a censure.

Either way, I guess I really don't know what to expect, and I would appreciate your input. Thank you for any time and assistance you can lend to this situation.


Sincerely,
Paulette
 

Wall of Shame V: The National Conference of Bar Examiners Trying to Screw the Blind!

Lucky her.  Leave it to lawyers to try to screw over a law grad with disabilities by trying to deny her the necessary software to take the exam, as required as a reasonable accommodation under the Americans with Disabilities Act.  This story is so telling; it's apparent that the Legal Industry thinks it's above the law.  Anyways... she won. She gets to take the bar.  Then what?

This reminds me of a student that I once had as an adjunct professor.  I used to teach Legal Research and Writing in a Community College Paralegal Program.  The best student in the class by leaps and bounds was a blind guy.  Let's call him Howie.

When Howie started the program he could see as well as you or I.  But he was diabetic, and he didn't take care of his condition.  He would eat candy bars non-stop, thinking he was invincible.  So, at some point at the end of his first year (it's a two year program), he had an "attack." I'm not sure the name of it, but it was something like a stroke that left him blind and stuttering.  He was still brilliant though.  Even though he had a horrible stutter, he would contribute in class and, eventually, get his point across.  And we would take field trips to the local law school's library, and he had a seeing eye person that would help him with his research.

It struck me how the legal world was the last holdout in publishing books in braille.  Not one of the states published in braille.  Not one!  But Howie did his best.

My final exam was actually my moot court brief.  Yep, I had my paras write the moot court brief.  It was a challenging final, but they rose to the occasion.  My thought process was that it would be a plus if they could write like lawyers, and write like lawyers they!   Howie, using a voice recognition program, managed to put together a 45 page appellate brief.  His citations were nearly perfect and his use of the law was flawless.  I was very proud of him and, if he didn't get the best grade, he certainly got something close to that.

But what bothered me to the end, and even today, was his job prospects--or lack thereof.  I have had enough experience with attorneys to know that he would be discriminated against because the cost of accommodating him would be too high for a solo.  And BigLaw doesn't typically recruit from the ranks of a mere paralegal program.  Instead, they tend to recruit undergrads from Harvard, Columbia, Yale and Duke.  So, that leaves him with trying to find a job with solos and mid-sized firms.

Are lawyers to good to adhere to the standards placed by the ADA?  Well, considering that the National Conference of Bar Examiners tried to break this law--I can only say yes.  Or at least they think so.  And what will this blind lawyer do?  I hope she succeeds and that she will find a job wherein following the law is a non-issue.  Maybe she will help Americans with Disabilities in their struggles, being able to cite her own struggle against Lawyers--of all people.

Anyway, for that the National Conference of Bar Examiners deserves to be on the Wall of Shame.