Friday, November 12, 2004
The Great Equalizer
So this afternoon I took the MPRE (Multistate Professional Responsibility Exam), the required ethics portion of the bar exam. This is where the rubber hits the road, so to speak, and our law school training is supposed to pay off. Most people go to law school so they can subsequently pass the bar and then practice law. So passing the bar is an important thing to do.
I walked out of the testing place with a friend of mine who goes to Boston University Law School. He commented that although he's very comfortable with his place in the pecking order of BU, now that he's being evaluated along with people from all the law schools across the country, he's not so sure where he stands.
I go to the most reputable law school in the country. I even decided to use my "Harvard Law School" #2 pencils at the exam (although that decision could also have something to do with the fact that they were the only ones with good erasers) to remind myself of that fact. But going to Harvard is no comfort when you're up against everyone else. The bar examiners don't care what school you go to; they only care how many questions you got right. The bar exam is the great equalizer. Whether you go to Harvard or Joe Billy JimBob's School o' Law, you have to take it and you have to pass it. In fact, sometimes I feel our education here at this elite school is so elitist, it doesn't prepare us for the actual law of the way the world actually works. In that case, it might be an advantage to go to a smaller, more practical-minded law school.
But just like the judgment bar, the legal bar doesn't pay attention to your resume.
I walked out of the testing place with a friend of mine who goes to Boston University Law School. He commented that although he's very comfortable with his place in the pecking order of BU, now that he's being evaluated along with people from all the law schools across the country, he's not so sure where he stands.
I go to the most reputable law school in the country. I even decided to use my "Harvard Law School" #2 pencils at the exam (although that decision could also have something to do with the fact that they were the only ones with good erasers) to remind myself of that fact. But going to Harvard is no comfort when you're up against everyone else. The bar examiners don't care what school you go to; they only care how many questions you got right. The bar exam is the great equalizer. Whether you go to Harvard or Joe Billy JimBob's School o' Law, you have to take it and you have to pass it. In fact, sometimes I feel our education here at this elite school is so elitist, it doesn't prepare us for the actual law of the way the world actually works. In that case, it might be an advantage to go to a smaller, more practical-minded law school.
But just like the judgment bar, the legal bar doesn't pay attention to your resume.
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