It's been a while since I have updated my blog. I have been very busy and I have gone on 18 job interviews, done odd jobs and have done other things to keep myself busy.
I even talked to my friends dad who was nice enough to help me try to get a job in his law firm. He graduated from Harvard and went to Yale law school, where he was on law review. He is a very smart, intelligent and insightful guy. He is a litigation partner at one of the 10 largest law firms in the nation.
I had lunch with him a while ago and told him about how I have several job offers on the table that are in the final stages. They are all non legal related and he flat out told me " I am glad you did the paralegal program when you lost your old job!"
I thought he was a bit crazy for telling me that, since I haven't been able to find any job what so ever in the legal profession. He said, "Now you know the ugly truth about how the legal profession is not as glamorous as tv makes it out to be. At least you did your paralegal program for free and now you have no debt. Imagine going to a third or fourth tier law school, having six figures in debt and making around $40,000 to try to pay off your debt. How would that make you feel?"
He wasn't trying to be mean to me or hurt my feelings, but he was right about one thing: The legal profession is very overrated! At least I had a first had look by doing my internship, working in a courthouse and seeing how few law jobs there are in corporate America.
A while back, he even advised me that I should only go to law school if I got a job after my paralegal program working with an attorney, and to do night school. This way I would at least have some experience, learn the industry and be able to start my own practice after graduating. I have had no luck finding ANY legal jobs whatsoever, so I am 99.99% sure I will never go to law school.
I will keep you updated on my job search and post more money saving websites soon!
-The Poor Paralegal
And that came from a Harvard grad and Yale JD. Too bad the lemmings will take his advice with a grain of salt, i.e. "But I'm special." Nice post, Poor Paralegal.
ReplyDeleteIf a 0L cannot attend HYS, do top 25% (top 10% would be better), and be on law review; then he should NOT attend law school. Shoot, even HYS grads are having trouble finding jobs these days...
ReplyDeleteAhh - but I'm holding out hope that you'll fall into that 0.1% that decides to go to law school. C'mon, it's a great profession. Unlike all the other suckers, you WILL beat the odds. You'll easily become partner. Go for IT!!!! If you take my advice, you'll be one more indebted monkey, debt slave trying to figure out what went wrong. If you have parents that will foot the entire bill for law school, then by all means GO! Otherwise do the paralegal gig and be happy that you have that. I know a lot of paralegals that make more than a lot of attorneys when overtime is taken into account. See lawyers are salaried. As a paralegal, you are "staff" and hence hourly.
ReplyDeletePerhaps This blog is underrated because you did NOT fall into the trap!( atleast, not the worst parts) Good to hear.
ReplyDeleteI thought you were going to tell me how your connections to a lawyer in big law might get you a job. Glad to read otherwise.
Glad to hear you are at least getting responses and interviews.
ReplyDeleteI'm in a similar situation. BA, MBA, ABA paralegal certificate. Was in telecom, then insurance claims, then networked my way into a full time paralegal position which lasted 3 years. Got laid off and was unemployed for 6 months then found a paralegal position with a payday loan company through a placement/temp agency. The son of the owner commented to me that I should go to law school so I can handle all of the employment, regulatory, contract and collections law issues the company pays outside counsel to handle. I'm sure he'd be loathe to pay my tuition to go and I sure as hell ain't gonna drop $100k into debt when I'm currently debt free, albeit living frugally on a 37k salary.
The legal profession sure isn't the high paying panacea everyone seems to see it as.