Time is a bit short tonight, so the draft post I mentioned yesterday isn’t going to get finished and I don’t have time to cobble up + proofread anything else.
So in its place I’m offering a tip based on this news article from the News & Observer: don’t do what I did
New chancellor would make changing majors easier at NCSU BY ERIC FERRERI – Staff Writer
Published Fri, Nov 12, 2010 04:49 AM (Modified Fri, Nov 12, 2010 05:24 AM)
Tags: local | news
RALEIGH — By the time Greg Doucette realized he was lousy at studying computer science at N.C. State University, it was too late.
Doucette was formerly a student at NCSU. 'I enjoyed computer science, but I wasn't very good at it,' he said. (Photo by HARRY LYNCH - hlynch@newsobserver.com)
Too late to change his major. Too late to transfer. Too late to do anything except slog through with a barely passable grade point average. He managed by propping up that GPA with stellar grades in economics and political science courses – two disciplines he would have preferred majoring in if switching weren’t so difficult.
NCSU’s new chancellor, Randy Woodson, knows that Doucette’s travails are not unusual at the university. He wants to make it easier for students to change majors. The issue will be tackled by a task force looking for ways to improve student success.
Woodson hopes to reduce the number of students who leave NCSU not because of bad grades but because changing majors is so difficult.
NCSU incoming freshmen apply directly into their chosen fields. It’s a way to introduce students to major-specific courses early, assuring they have enough time to tackle all the technical courses needed for a degree in engineering, design, textiles and the like.
But if students don’t choose the right major the first time, they may be stuck in a discipline they don’t like or transfer out of the university in search of a new path.
Many of NCSU’s academic disciplines require targeted, specific coursework that doesn’t translate to other areas. Students who change course essentially have to start over building credits for their new majors, thus lengthening their stay in college.
NCSU’s six-year graduation rate of 73 percent could be far better, Woodson said, if changing majors was easier.
From fall 2008 to fall 2009, 1,109 students left NCSU while in good academic standing, according to university data. Many of those left, Woodson said, because they were in the wrong major and couldn’t transfer enough credits to stay on track to graduate on time.
“We’ve got really talented students, and they’re not being successful enough,” Woodson said. “We’re losing too many students because they can’t find a home.”
Other universities
This problem isn’t unique to NCSU. Across the United States, land-grant universities with strong programs in engineering, natural resources, design and other technical disciplines require a similar path. In contrast, a university with an arts-and-sciences base, such as UNC-Chapel Hill, enrolls students first to an undergraduate college before making them decide on a major.
In admitting students directly to their chosen field, universities like NCSU create a more efficient academic experience for students – as long as they don’t change their minds, said David Shulenburger, vice president for academic affairs with the Association of Public and Land-Grant Universities.
To ease the transition for the many students who do want to change, many land-grant universities are now adopting principles of a “common core” curriculum. Used more often by universities with an arts and sciences base, a common core is essentially a standard set of courses in English, writing, and mathematics that a student would take in the first two years. These courses are recognized widely, making it easier for a student to change majors within a university or transfer to another.
It may not be an easy fix for NCSU, where students start major-specific coursework during their first year. But at a time when students don’t want to pay for extra schooling, many universities are looking for ways to tweak their requirements, said Shulenburger, formerly the longtime provost at the University of Kansas.
“Every university now understands higher graduation rates and shorter time to degree are important,” he said. “It’s worth having the faculty sit down and wrestle with the question of giving students some flexibility in the freshman and sophomore years.”
Advising’s importance
If you’re a freshman studying animal science at NCSU, you’ll take general courses in math and writing as well as classes specific to that degree. The university tries to minimize the number of courses that don’t transfer, said Gerry Luginbuhl, assistant director for academic programs within NCSU’s College of Agricultural and Life Sciences. But students also must get good advice both when choosing a major and when they arrive on campus.
“Advising is so important,” Luginbuhl said. “Students, at 18, some really don’t know what they want to do.”
eric.ferreri@newsobserver.com or 919-829-4563
***************
SIDEBAR – One student’s story
Greg Doucette, 29, is now a second-year law student at N.C. Central University. (Photo by HARRY LYNCH - hlynch@newsobserver.com)
Greg Doucette, as a freshman at N.C. State University, signed on as a computer science major because he had some tech savvy and knew the field paid well.
But he hit a wall in a discrete mathematics course, which he failed. By then, it was too late to transfer into economics or political science because, either way, he’d have to take an extra year of courses.
Instead, Doucette took just enough of those courses for a minor in each. His GPA in computer science: 2.1. His GPA in political science: 3.0. His GPA in economics: 3.6.
He’s now a law student at N.C. Central University.
“I enjoyed computer science, but I wasn’t very good at it,” said Doucette, who became a student leader and eventually served as the sole student member of the UNC system’s Board of Governors. “I love economics and political science, but the tradeoff wasn’t worth it. A lot of the credits I had would not translate to anything useful.”
Staff writer Eric Ferreri
My Economics GPA would have been a perfect 4.0 if it wasn’t for me slacking in my Intro to Econ course my freshman year At least I got an A in that Discrete Mathematics course the second time around?
Have a great night y’all! Hopefully I’ll have something other than shameless self-promotion tomorrow!
Despite my chronic disappearances over the past couple months, we’ve been blessed here at law:/dev/null to still have a steady cadre of regular readers along with a (surprising) stream of newcomers.1 And since the recent blawgpocalypse I’ve been asked by folks in both groups what prompted me to stake out this particular piece of internet real estate — and I realized I’ve never actually posted an answer to the “Why do you blog?” question beyond a brief one-line reference on our “About” page
So I figured now’s as good a time as any
Without further ado, my four reasons for entering the blawgosphere way back in August 2009:
Therapy: I wasn’t kidding when I wrote in the very first post that “law:/dev/null is really just my own brand of therapy to get me through law school. Some people exercise, some prefer gardening, some drink (a lot). I write.” My classmates have learned firsthand that I’m no shrinking violet when it comes to saying exactly what’s on my mind, so penning my commentary here lets me get it out of my system without subjecting them to something they don’t want to hear in the first place
Curiosity: Even though the bachelor’s degree on my wall is for computer science and I created a niche web development company back when I was a college dropout, I was so tired of doing computer-related stuff academically that I never really got into the whole CMS / RSS / CSS / [pick-an-acronym-and-put-it-here] thing in my personal life When I wanted to blog, I’d write a note and post it to Facebook because it required minimal tech work; there are 95 of those to date, and it’s where things like T. Greg’s Tomes got started. But with the acute shift from undergrad to the remarkably-less-tech-savvy atmosphere of law, I figured it’d be fun to experiment with a WordPress deployment and all the attendant web work that goes with it.
Scarcity: I first got introduced to the world of law student blogs the night before 1L Orientation, where I stumbled upon Dennis Jansen’s blog and a few others… that I proceeded to read until 2am.2 One of the things I noticed while reading was that the overwhelming majority of law school bloggers I found were at T14 law schools, and none of them were in the southeast quadrant of the country like me (although Mariel is close). So even though I was greatly appreciative for the insights, I wanted to present a different perspective as a law student at a distinguished-but-unranked law school in the South. And judging from the hundreds of search queries on NCCU Law over the past year, I’m apparently not the only one looking for that type of info before starting law school
Keeping in touch: I couldn’t come up with a cute one-word-ending-in-y description for this one Despite an absurd level of shyness that I have to mentally force myself to ignore, I’m generally a pretty sociable guy. But I’m also a Type A workaholic who took my first bona fide vacation in years just this past Independence Day, and it’s really easy for me to lose touch with people in the process.3 The biggest appeal to starting law:/dev/null was creating a way to let folks know what I was up to and that I was still thinking about them, even if I didn’t have an opportunity to get lunch or talk at length on the phone. I’m not sure how well it’s worked so far but hopefully the folks who are important to me know that ::fingers crossed::
So there you have it folks, a quick glance into the mind of TDot4 and the motivations behind law:/dev/null
I hope all of you have a fantastic night, and a great soon-to-be weekend!
Hours after I was supposed to go to bed, and the catalyst for the ensuing hilarity/embarrassment during that first day of Orientation [↩]
It’s also one of the central reasons why I use thousands of text messages every month, peaking at 10,821 not too long ago — or 1 text message every 4 minutes for an entire month [↩]
I’ve actually got a TDot’s Tips entry ready to go that I was planning on posting tonight, but a couple hours ago one of my friends on Twitter tweeted about a portion of a Facebook note I had written what feels like an eternity ago.1 So I figured since many of y’all have been reading my (crazed) musings for quite awhile now, you deserve a copy/paste of the original note to help shed some light on the man behind the laptop
And even if you didn’t, I’ve got classes starting at 8:30am tomorrow so I need to finish studying and go to bed
You can read the original note (and ensuing comments) on Facebook here. Here’s the copy/paste, with footnotes added for the few items that have changed since starting law school:
ok I give up! — 25 things about TGD by T Greg Doucette on Saturday, June 20, 2009 at 3:57pm
Back in late January, a friend of mine at UNC Pembroke tagged me in a note posting 25 random items about her and asking the folks tagged in the note to do the same — in what turned out to be the first salvo in the latest wave of Facebook “chain notes.” A couple dozen tags later, I still hadn’t written one myself mostly out of (i) laziness and (ii) hoping I would outlast the fad.
Despite the nagging inbox messages and IMs and texts, eventually folks stopped writing the notes in favor of whatever new thing was going around. And there was no note from El TGD. Victory was mine.
Then I guess people felt bad for not responding months ago, b/c the summer rolled around and they started sprouting up again. And again. And again. So after being tagged another couple times, I’m finally throwing in the towel, taking a break from work, and posting my own note so I can assuage my guilty conscience. I even went back and tagged all the people who tagged me originally — and threw in a few extra folks just to subject them to the same shame for not writing a note of their own when they got tagged months ago
====================
THE RULES
==================== Once you’ve been tagged, you are supposed to write a note with 25 random things, facts, habits, or goals about you. At the end, choose 25 people to be tagged. You have to tag the person who tagged you. If I tagged you, it’s because I want to know more about you. I may have tagged you even if you’ve posted 25 random things already. In this case I just tagged you because I love you!
[TGD's edit: I didn't write the rules, I just copy/pasted them ]
====================
25 THINGS ABOUT TGD
====================
1) The “T” stands for “The” (or “Thomas”, depending on who’s asking).
2) Before anyone ever used the phrase “larger-than-life ego” to describe Barack Obama, they were using it to describe me.
3) Loyalty is more important than competence. And I passionately despise incompetence. So you can imagine what I think of disloyalty
4) I also have issues with people who i) complain all the time, ii) always need to be taken care of, iii) are unreliable or iv) only contact you when they need/want something.
5) I am a firm believer in a benevolent and almighty God, although I generally keep my faith to myself and usually avoid theological conversations.
6) I didn’t have an alcoholic beverage until I was 25. And I still never touch the stuff in the presence of my grandparents.
7) My greatest contribution as a lobbyist was figuring out how to explain why I don’t smoke (one of our clients was the Cigar Association of America). Remind me to tell you some time if you haven’t heard it already.
8) My eyes are really, really sensitive to light. That’s why I usually keep my office fairly dark and always wear sunglasses outside. It’s also apparently earned me the nickname “The Vampire” among certain denizens of Witherspoon Student Center2
9) It takes a *lot* to get me angry. And on the rare occasions it happens, I’m usually perfectly fine after a decent night’s sleep.
10) In tandem with #9, it kills me to upset people (intentionally or otherwise). Except when it relates to #3 or #4
11) I’ve learned more in the past 4 years at NC State than in the 7 years before it combined — and more in the past 11 years being in North Carolina than the previous 17 combined.
12) I was raised in Virginia Beach, but never really appreciated the ocean until I moved to Raleigh. As much as I love oak trees, I prefer the coast.
13) Women are my kryptonite. Of all the dumb things I’ve done in my life, the majority were done for a girl.
14) At some point about two years ago I was looking back on the path I took to come back to NCSU… and stopped worrying about failure. It’s a transformative and profoundly empowering realization, even though it also helped torpedo my GPA.
15) Despite #14 I’m still excessively competitive, especially when it comes to basketball, video games, and politics
16) There are only 2 decisions I’ve made in my life that I can genuinely say I regret. Few people know either of them. No one knows them both.
17) Once upon a time I was the youngest elected Vice Chairman in the history of the Wake County GOP… and have since been convinced that most of the “party leaders” in North Carolina are utter fruitcakes. Now I generally prefer local Democrats and national Republicans (except for those dumbasses in the House who equated themselves with Iranian protesters).
18) I’m a pretty good cook (breakfast is my specialty), and I’m very protective of my kitchen. But I’m also not terribly adventurous with food — the most exotic thing I’ve tried was alligator, and I wasn’t impressed.3
19) I’ve taken tap, jazz, and ballet classes, sang in chorus, and acted in theatre (and even a movie). And contrary to popular belief, none of it was to meet girls.
20) I’m open to pretty much any kind of music, but my iTunes library is overwhelmingly R&B, rap, and classical.
21) When I first came to NCSU, I couldn’t afford a computer. Looking back, I don’t know how I was able to pass my classes without one.
22) As much as I complain about being stressed, I’m a Type A workaholic and haven’t taken a bona fide vacation in years.4 And forcing me to turn off my BlackBerry for more than an hour is almost as painful as waterboarding…
23) Surprisingly, I enjoy being a teacher and mentor. I have no idea where life is going to take me, but I wouldn’t be surprised if that ended up being my career after law school and the USMC.5
24) The most rewarding experience I’ve had in my life so far has been serving in Student Government at NCSU and in the UNC Association of Student Governments. I’ve met dozens of amazing people, worked with some of the best student leaders this state has ever seen, and learned more than I thought was possible — all while helping to improve people’s lives and having more than my fair share of fun
25) I am a hopeless romantic, an incurable idealist, and an unapologetic believer in American exceptionalism and the God-given rights of man. I bleed Wolfpack red. I’m allergic to bullshit. I hate cold weather. And I’m done with this note
Law stuff tomorrow Have a great night everybody!!
Feels like eternity even though it was only 1.25 years ago It’s slightly disturbing how much 1L year has permanently warped my perception of time… [↩]
OK let me at least try to explain with a quick prefatory note before continuing: despite assiduously projecting an ego more-than-once described as “outrageously oversized,” underneath the cocksure exterior I’m essentially the total opposite. And because of that I never really learned how to take a compliment gracefully; most of the time I just get embarrassed, my face turns red, and I quickly change the subject.
Yes, I’m socially awkward. </surprise>
But like a well-trained puppy, I still like knowing when I’ve done something good / positive / cool / etc. I’m not talking about the gratuitous puffery over trivial stuff that passes for complimenting folks nowadays — “You color-coordinated your attire today! Here’s a cookie!” — but the comments made when folks genuinely appreciate something for whatever reason.
For example, back during 1L Orientation two weeks ago I was selling NCCU Law paraphernalia for the SBA and met a 1L student in the evening program who was browsing the merchandise. We talked for a bit about what SBA did, what 1L year was going to be like, and so on… and then she asks “Do you happen to know who it is who does the blog? He did computer science or something like that before law school? I love reading it, it’s so funny!”
Absolutely nothing could have erased the smile I had on my face for days after that remark
That’s the type of stuff I’m talking about. So now that that’s clear, </prefatory note>. Moving on…
We’re in ConLaw today, which as of Week 1.5 is still my favorite class. We’ve finished the core basics on judicial review, including a quick discussion on Cohens v. Virginia, 19 U.S. 264 (1821) and a corresponding mention that only a government/state actor can violate someone’s constitutionally-enumerated rights.
So Prof ConLaw pitches an open question to the class: if one person can’t violate another person’s constitutional rights, how is the federal government able to regulate such huge swaths of private conduct?
For folks who follow politics — or who just happen to enjoy ConLaw — answers that jump out might include Congressional authority under the “necessary and proper” clause. Or maybe Congress’s taxing and spending powers. Or the 800-lb gorilla in the Constitution, the power to regulate interstate commerce.
But instead we had like 5-6 folks in a row who offered up answers that… well… weren’t correct, let’s put it that way. So I raise my hand and bring up the Commerce clause, then go back to surfing the web. I check out my Facebook wall and see this from a classmate:
Sorry for the multi-day hiatus here at law:/dev/null. There’s been some personal stuff going on behind the scenes that has really sapped my motivation to be productive,1 and unfortunately that included writing an entry for the blog.
But I missed y’all, so I’m making sure I put something together for tonight
Back during 1L Orientation a couple weeks ago, the NCCU LawStudent Bar Association put together a student panel where the 1Ls could ask us any questions they wanted. The 2012 class president and I represented the 2Ls, while the SBA President, Vice President and Parliamentarian offered the 3L perspective.
We got uniformly positive feedback from the 1Ls afterwards, but based on some of the faces I saw while the Q&A was going on I have to wonder if we were really just boring the f*ck out of them
The Q&A was capped at an hour, so I’ve gotten a few questions since then that I threw together into this entry. Just remember that my perspective is a bit different from other folks — not always in a good way — so take this with the requisite grains (translation: barrels) of salt…
One of your colleagues on the panel said she studied 60 hours a week to get her grades. Do we really need to study that much?
A: It depends
Don’t focus as much on the exact number of hours she quoted as on what she said afterwards: you have to know yourself. No one can gauge your own strengths and weaknesses, your own study habits, your goals, and so on better than you. That’s going to be a huge determinant in how much you study.
For example, I didn’t study anywhere near 60 hours a week during my 1L year. After spending over a decade working in the legal arena, a lot of the terminology and reasoning came naturally to me — so I maybe studied 2 hours a day at most, and most of that was just doing the required readings.
But the difference between my colleague and I? She’s one of the top-ranked students in the class, while I barely made the top half
If you have legal experience or naturally “get” this stuff, you may be able to study less; conversely, if the material is difficult for you to digest you’ll need to study more. If you’re content with barely passing, you can have a great time screwing around your 1L year3 and won’t need to study nearly as much as my colleague… but if you want to have a high GPA to get a decent internship or otherwise do something productive with your life, you’ll probably want to work a little (translation: a lot) harder than I did
***
Q: Ethan writes in with a similar question:
So some of my study partners have been in the library since at least 12pm and stay until the building closes. Am I missing something? I’m worried I’m messing up already…
A: See above — it depends
Some of your classmates will genuinely need to study that much, based on their study habits or their scholastic objectives or other issues; we certainly had folks like that in my classes last year. But you’re not going to get anywhere comparing yourself to them.
Remember: law school is a marathon, not a sprint.
If you want to gauge whether or not you’re “messing up already” before midterms, reflect on how well you’re able to understand the material and follow along in class. If you’re totally lost, go see your professor. If you see you’re professor and you’re still totally lost, then think about studying a bit harder or checking the law library for a hornbook or other useful supplement.
Putting in all the study time in the world isn’t going to benefit you at all if you’re not getting anything useful out of the time you’re studying
How time-consuming is being an SBA Representative or some of these other clubs? Do you think I’ll have time to do that and study?
A: Not to give everyone the same lawyer-esque response, but you’ve probably guessed by now — it depends
All of the SBA Representatives will need to participate in the normal SBA meetings, including when we hear requests for funding from all the student groups which historically takes about 6-7 hours. SBA Reps are also required to have office hours (good study time) and help with planning/implementing any SBA events that get held.
If this were the entire equation, I’d say “Of course you’ll have time”… but only you will know what grades you’re aiming for and how much you’ll need to study to get there.
I’d encourage you to run regardless — if nothing else, it’s a great opportunity to get out and meet your fellow 1Ls — but whether you’ll have time for it is a judgment call you’ll have to make for yourself.
***
Q: Gabriel also has studying on his mind:
I’m having trouble deciding whether or not to do my case briefing based on the outlines the 2Ls gave me, the stuff I find on random case briefing websites, or just do the reading and brief it all on my own? A combination of the two or three?
A: Definitely do the briefing all on your own, at least for the first few weeks. The stuff 2Ls pass down to 1Ls is designed to serve as a template since you’ll have no clue what to look for when you first start out. The whole point to briefing on your own is to train your mind to recognize the important stuff in a case.
After you’ve been at it for a month or two, odds are good you’ll be in the habit of briefing the case in your mind as you read — this is the precursor to the common “book briefing” you’ll see other students using, where stuff like “Issue” and “Rule” get scrawled in the margins of the textbook. At that point folks will start using the 2L briefs to save time, because by that point in the semester you’ll be focusing more on outlining than you will on case briefs.
***
Q: Henry is looking ahead to next year:
Is law school really just a big head game? What’s the biggest difference between 1L year and 2L year?
A: To the first question, I’d say yes.
You’ll hear folks repeat the law school aphorism “Your first year they scare you to death, your second year they work you to death, and your third year they bore you to death.” But if you know you want to be a lawyer and you’re determined to do whatever it takes to achieve that goal — or, conversely, you have a backup plan and don’t really care if you fail out — there’s nothing to really scare you in the first year.
And, at least in my opinion, a lack of fear goes a long way to maintaining your composure under pressure and mastering the 1L crucible.
As for the second question, the biggest difference I’ve noticed between 1L and 2L years so far is how relaxed everyone seems. There’s no discernible terror over being called on in class. People understand the material. Folks don’t seem to study as much as last year — hell even a slacker like me was actually two days ahead on the class readings
We’re only a week into the semester though, so I’m fairly sure things will change from here
***
Q: And we’ll finish with a question from Isabella about my own motivations for law school:
What made you pursue law after having done computer science?
A: As bizarre as I’m sure it sounds, I’ve actually wanted to do law since I was a kid
Some time around the 10th grade I really got hooked on civics, public service, and related stuff — read Supreme Court decisions for fun and so on.4 I decided I wanted to be a constitutional law professor at some point, and wanted to be Virginia’s Attorney General when I got older (before I moved to North Carolina and fell in love with this state ).
But I also grew up in a family that most folks would consider “poor” financially, so my college focus was on what was going to make me the most $$$ when I graduated. I had a talent for computers and I started at N.C. State right as the dot-com boom was hitting its stride. I was going to become a computer engineer and make six figures starting after graduation.
During the five years I was a dropout, I worked in the legal arena the whole time since I could make a decent wage without a college degree. Getting hired for computing-related jobs, by contrast, typically required various certifications that I couldn’t afford to get. So when I finally came back to N.C. State in August 2005, I knew law school was definitively where I was going once undergrad was done.
But I was also determined to get my Bachelor’s degree in some kind of computer-related field because I felt like switching into something else would be like admitting defeat, like I wasn’t intelligent enough to hack it in a “hard science” engineering discipline. I briefly entertained the thought of switching to Communications or Political Science or Economics before coming back to that conclusion every time. Not the most rational thought pattern in the world, I admit… but I damn sure have a Bachelor of Science degree in Computer Science adorning the wall of my bedroom
So that was a ridiculously long answer where a fairly short one would suffice: I’ve known I wanted to do this for years, I just didn’t do it sooner because I was stubborn as hell
—===—
That’s it from me for the night folks! I hope all of you have an amazing week!!
For example, dealing with people who treat you with a level of respect generally reserved for household insects… until they need tech support. And then don’t show up after asking you to be available at a certain time to provide said tech support. And then act incredulous when you no longer have the patience to continue dealing with them gratis or otherwise. [↩]
In case you’re new to these mailbag entries, all the names are anonymous — picked at random from the Social Security Administration’s Popular Names database. Feel free to send me an email if you’ve got a question for a mail entry! [↩]
For posterity’s sake, my “screwing around” was actually doing advocacy work with UNCASG. I’m bad but I’m not that bad. [↩]
It was a year ago today1 — the first day of my 1L Orientation at NCCU Law — that law:/dev/null went live with this brief post welcoming any newcomers who happened to drop by.
And my gosh how much has happened in just a year!
Case in point: a year ago I fled the Turner Law Building as soon as Orientation was done because I felt so totally out of place2… yet this week I’ve been at the law school daily helping out (voluntarily!) with 1L Orientation, offering whatever assistance and sage tidbits of almost-but-not-quite-wisdom that I can provide
In keeping with my personality, some numbers to commemorate law:/dev/null‘s 1st birthday:
THEN: 1 published post — NOW: 291
THEN: 178 total words written — NOW: ~141,268 (where’s this inspiration when I’m working on a brief??? )
THEN: 0 typos I saw — NOW: “Another one? @#$%. I’ll fix it later…”
I could go on with the shameless quasi-self-promotion but you get the idea
I’ve been blessed to do a lot of pretty cool stuff in my life, but getting law:/dev/null started — and more importantly, having y’all read it and at least pretend that you like it! — undoubtedly takes top honors.
Thanks for being such amazing people and giving me an added incentive to keep going! I’m looking forward to the year ahead, the opportunity to meet even more of y’all, and hopefully even convince a few more to join me at the N.C. Central University School of Law
The vacation to Virginia Beach continues, spending today celebrating the 234th birthday of these United States… my favorite holiday of the year
雅雅 and I first spent the afternoon unsuccessfully trying to find parking somewhere near the Oceanfront, eventually giving up 2 hours later. I’m so accustomed to being at the beach either early in the morning or late at night that I totally forgot how insane it gets in the middle of the day
Moving around was a little difficult due to quarter-sized blisters I got on the balls of my feet Friday, but a pair of bandages and some flip flops solved the problem. I even took the opportunity to ride The Hurricane, the crazy high-speed contraption in the photo.2
I chickened out back in 2008 but figured I’d give it a shot this time around. It was an experience
Then we headed back to the grandparent’s house for the usual Independence Day grilled hamburgers, hot dogs, corn on the cob, and various other summer food… and ice cream After that we took the 10-minute walk to Mount Trashmore Park for the annual fireworks show.
I know y’all couldn’t be there with me, so I recorded a bit of video on my phone and posted it on YouTube so you can pretend
Hopefully all of you had a fun and festive day! Have a great night y’all!
Our 3rd theme park in 3 days: we went to Busch Gardens with the family yesterday, and to Water Country USA by ourselves the day before. Crazy expensive but sooooo much fun [↩]
For my NC-based readers, the Hurricane is similar to the Dragon’s Den ride at Emerald Pointe… except you’re not on an inner tube. It’s just you. [↩]
I took the weekend off so I could focus on the presentation I told y’all about Friday along with wrapping up my final exam for ADR Practices & Process. In between I went through the laptop to free up space, including shrinking my Bootcamp partition that contains Windows Vista.
Each of those experiences in some way reminded me how appreciative I am to have access to Apple products.
Some of Apple's Products
Yes folks: appreciative
And I’m not talking about the new-fangled iStuff either. I can’t get an iPhone unless/until they come to Verizon Wireless,1 and although the iPads are flying off the shelves they’re not really my thing. I’m talking about good ol’-fashioned Macs running MacOS X.
I’ve been an Apple fan most of my life. Back when I was in elementary school, Apple IIs were all over the place. Then the Mac line came out and they were everywhere too — I still remember going to the library in middle school to type my papers on a Macintosh LC II, because I preferred ClarisWorks and seeing when I bolded or italicized or underlined my text rather than having to decipher what different highlighting meant in WordPerfect on a PC
But by the time I hit high school Windows 95 was out and school systems were deploying PCs everywhere to save money. My parents bought a PC and that’s what I had to use at home, where BSoDs2 became a part of life and I screwed up the Registry on more than one occasion trying to use the uninstall scripts that came with most programs (Macs, by contrast, use packages that you can just drag to the trash bin). Apple was in its own death spiral back then, as CEO after CEO found ever more innovative ways to piss away millions of dollars.
Then Steve Jobs came back and knocked some sense into folks
I didn’t have a computer when I started college at NC State, and one day in the spring I flipped through the Classifieds in the Technician (our school newspaper) looking for someone selling a PC that I could buy. It turned out that was the only day Apple ran an advertisement looking to hire a campus representative as part of a new Jobs-approved outreach program. I applied on a whim, got an interview, and for reasons I still don’t understand I was given the job. In exchange for being a general Apple enthusiast, salesperson, and IT support guy for the campus, I was loaned a 333MHz G3 iMac (Bondi Blue), was paid $200/week, flown out to California each summer for “Campus Rep Boot Camp”, and hooked up with all the latest software.
And I haven’t looked back
I had to quit being a Campus Rep when I dropped out, but since then QuietStorm and I bought another Rev. D iMac, then upgraded to an eMac, then when I came back to NC State I snagged a Mac mini and then got my trusty MacBook Pro. I’m now running MacOS X “Snow Leopard”3 and looking forward to upgrading my laptop to the latest technology.4
I’ve got a lot of experience with Windows and various Linux distributions as well, so I’ll sidestep the quasi-religious war some Comp Sci folks believe in. But for anyone planning on going to law school, I strongly recommend getting a Mac. Here’s why:
High-quality hardware. It took 4 years for the circuit board on my MacBook Pro to die, and that was after using it a solid 8+ hours/day nearly every day for that entire time. Most of my colleagues had to buy 2 (or even 3) laptops during that same timespan due to failing parts. Apple’s computers are solidly built and include a ton of high-end technology, making them cost-competitive to a similarly-configured PC.
It just works. I’ve got a partition on my laptop running Windows Vista that I use solely for taking law school exams with ExamSoft. When I loaded up Vista last night, it began downloading the dozens upon dozens of software updates that Microsoft spews out on a near-daily basis… and during the installation of some of those updates I got a Blue Screen of Death and had to restart the computer Something is awry when the total system failures I learned to accept in 1995 are still happening in 2010. I haven’t had a “kernel panic” — the Mac/Linux equivalent of a BSoD — on any machine since MacOS X Panther came out 6 years ago. MacOS X is built on top of crash-resistant Unix (dubbed “Darwin”), which also gives you the perk of virus resistance as well. Plus its Quartz graphic engine uses PDF internally, so it not only looks amazing but you can print anything to a PDF file — great for sharing papers, essays, projects and so on. With MacOS X you don’t get a feeling like the operating system is standing in between you and your productivity; it’s more like a partner helping you get things done.
The iApps are amazing. Apple has an expansive slate of software products, including its iCal calendar program, its Mail app, its Safari web browser, its iLife suite (iTunes / iPhoto / iMovie), its iWork suite (Keynote / Pages / Numbers), and on and on and on.5 These are some of the slickest and most user-friendly applications on the market, and for many of them there simply is nothing comparable on Windows or Linux. I’m a particularly huge huge huge fan of Keynote, Apple’s competitor to PowerPoint. Keynote was in-house software Apple developed for Steve Jobs’s use in preparing his keynote presentations at MacWorld Expo (hence the name). The features built into this thing make it trivially simple to put together excellent presentations. I’ve been using it regularly since 2006 — for English class, my Senior Design project in Computer Science, UNCASG presentations, the list goes on — and the hours of time it saved me between Saturday’s plea bargaining piece and my group’s two presentations for Race & the Law make it more than worth the price.
The other apps are amazing too. Run a website? Panic’s Transmit is one of the best FTP programs I’ve used on any platform. How about instant messaging protocols? Adium combines over a dozen chat protocols into one refined interface. And although you might not be able to tell from this post, I’m actually a big Microsoft fan: their 2008 Office for Mac is far more intuitive than the Windows counterpart, and makes using Microsoft Word and Excel a lot less tedious. There are thousands of other really cool apps out there, far more than I can highlight in this already lengthy post. There’s a website dedicated to tracking these applications over at versiontracker.com — head over there and poke around
And, for the switchers, Windows is only a few clicks away. I mentioned up at the top that I’ve got a partition for Windows Vista. What I didn’t mention is that I’ve also got Windows XP, Windows 7, and Ubuntu Linux on here as well — a side effect of the Computer Science education
Windows running inside MacOS X with VMWare Fusion
If you’re a PC user switching to a Mac, you can ease into it by having Windows only a click away. Apple includes a program called Bootcamp that helps you add a full Windows installation alongside MacOS X, enabling you to boot your computer directly into Windows.
But the really cool stuff happens when you use virtualization. A company called VMWare has a product called VMWare Fusion that let’s you run “virtual OSs” at native speed inside MacOS X. I’ve included a screenshot of my Windows XP installation running (along with my terminal running the Unix top program). You can share files between the operating systems, connecting to the internet “just works”, the list goes on. Although virtualization has long been the refuge of technophiles like me, it’s great to ease the transition from one OS to another.
I could go on even more about some of the other features, applications and perks6 but you get the idea
Thanks for letting me preach a bit If any pre-Ls out there have technology questions, let me know! Until then have a great night!!
The Blue Screen of Death, basically what happens when Windows crashes. [↩]
Also known as MacOS X 10.6.4… roughly 7 full OS revisions from MacOS 8.5.1 that was released the day after I started as a Campus Rep [↩]
Which currently includes multi-core chips clocking well over 3GHz+… well over 10x faster than my first iMac [↩]
As a highlight of how long ago it was when I worked for Apple, iTunes v1.0 was really just a reengineered SoundJam MP — a program that I’ve still got on an installation CD! [↩]
Like using IPP to successfully print for free on a Windows-centric network [↩]
Not sure if we have any fathers who read law:/dev/null, but if there are a happy Father’s Day to you!
This is a weird holiday for me, has been for awhile. I’m a father in the definitional sense — Son of TDot turns 12 years old next month — and because of that some of my friends will send me text messages or give me a call with well wishes. But I also don’t play any meaningful role in his life1 so today isn’t really meant for people like me.
It does remind me, though, how traditional the “nontraditional” has gotten. I’ve never met my biological father, and was adopted by my dad when my parents got married… but spent a majority of my life growing up living with Nan & Pops. Even though Son of TDot knows who I am in an abstract way, he was adopted when his mom got married too. I know a number of colleagues with two fathers, both in the “my mom got divorced and remarried” sense and the “my parents are gay” sense. I know a larger number with no father in the picture at all, raised by single moms filling both the mother and father roles. And I know folks who were/are foster children, and others raised by their grandparents. The list goes on.
It’s those folks who are supposed to get recognized today. So if you’re a father, a grandfather, a stepfather, an adoptive father, a single mom filling in as a father, or anyone else holding that role in a family, I hope you have a very happy Father’s Day!
And to the rest of you, have a great night
I’ll spare you the details and attendant documentation; suffice to say I acceded to what I was told would be best for him despite regretting doing so most of the 10 years since. [↩]
Unfortunately I won’t be able to compose anything lengthy tonight — the applause from the peanut gallery is duly noted — because my network connection is going crazy with 30-90% packet loss and horrible latency
So instead you get a story of persistence in the face of adversity from a recent graduate of both my alma mater and NCCU Law, featured in this article in the Raleigh News & Observer a couple weeks back. Enjoy in my absence
Ex-con mom beats odds, gets law degree BY RUTH SHEEHAN – Staff Writer
Tags: news
In February 1990, Lynn Burke arrived at her public housing unit, escorted by a parole officer, to find her four young children living in squalor. Her crackhead husband had left pipes and needles in a back room. The kitchen sink was so clogged with grease, he did dishes in the tub.
Lynn Burke, 47, got out of prison and hit the books
Broken and broke after two years in prison, Burke had little reason to be optimistic about her future. Then her 7-year-old son held out something in his hand.
“I was thinking you might need this,” he said. For two years, he’d slept with Burke’s driver’s license under his pillow.
Burke realized in that moment that her children and others in her life believed in her against all odds.
Their faith – and Burke’s own drive – led her on a odyssey from a felony fraud conviction to representing clients for the Orange County Public Defender’s Office.
Burke, 47, graduated last month from N.C. Central University Law School and is studying for the bar exam in July; she hopes to begin criminal defense work in the fall. Burke knows her story is rare; she wishes it weren’t so.
“Cons are like everyone else. We want to contribute. We want our children to be proud of us,” she said. “My story shouldn’t be miraculous. I’m a regular person who screwed up royally. If I can do this, anyone can.”
Burke didn’t grow up in poverty. Her father was a corporate lawyer, her mother, a nurse. It was an upper middle-class upbringing in upstate New York, then Tennessee. Still, Burke said, she never learned key lessons about how much things cost, about education, about personal responsibility.
At 18, she got pregnant and couldn’t bring herself to give her son up for adoption.
One night his father dropped off checks he’d stolen and told Burke if she ever needed anything for their son, she should just write a check. She did – until she got caught.
She was put on probation at 19 while pregnant, by another man, with twin girls. Within a year she had her fourth baby and was sentenced for the first time. She persuaded the father of her three younger kids to marry her so they wouldn’t be sent to foster care.
Burke was still on probation when she moved to North Carolina to be closer to her ailing mother. In 1986, she registered at N.C. State.
But when her mother died that fall , Burke fell into a deep depression. Overwhelmed by caring for four preschoolers, she called her husband’s mother in Tennessee to send his younger sister to help.
Instead, he and his drug habit arrived. Before long, Burke reverted to her old habits, kiting checks, returning stolen items for cash. Anything to make ends meet. Until, in the end, she got busted but good.
Superior Judge Donald Stephens sentenced her to prison for nine counts of felony fraud.
Coping with her past
On Feb. 9, 1990, Burke was released. She quickly learned how few employers are interested in ex-offenders.
To dodge criminal record checks, she used her maiden name on job applications. Eventually, she was always found out.
She started a floral delivery business in Raleigh. It thrived, then foundered. Finally, she persuaded her father to hire her as his legal assistant. She took to the paperwork and the lingo.
In 2006, 20 years after she first registered, Burke graduated from N.C. State with a degree in social work.
She began to wonder if she couldn’t take her experience with the legal system – both inside and out, as a de facto paralegal for her dad – and become a lawyer herself. She applied to N.C.Central’s law school twice and finally got in. Through sheer determination, she got through.
Judge Kristin Ruth, who sees lots of ex-cons in her child support court, knows how unusual Burke’s success is.
“She’s one who never gave up,” Ruth said. “You see her talking to the clients and there is an instant connection. She can honestly say ‘I’ve been there, done that. I’ve been in that jail cell. And now I’m here.’”
Dennis Gaddy, executive director of the Community Success Initiative, which assists ex-offenders, noted that 70 percent of children whose parents have been in prison end up in prison themselves. But “there is a way to turn setbacks into a comeback,” he said, calling Burke one of his program’s stars.
Passing on life lessons
Burke said she tried to teach her kids the lessons she never learned. All four worked jobs through high school, helping her pay bills, buying their own clothes.
All four graduated from college. Her son’s a Raleigh cop. The twins got degrees in public health. And her youngest daughter graduated from NCCU.
One day last spring, while interning for the Wake County Public Defender’s Office, Burke decided to stop by to see someone she first met in court in 1988.
Judge Stephens didn’t recognize her.
“You sentenced me to 10 years in prison,” Burke said.
Ah, yes.
“I told him, ‘Judge, I just wanted to let you know that I understand what a difficult job you have and that you were just doing what you had to do,’ ” she said. ” ‘I also wanted to let you know that all four of my kids graduated from college.’ ”
“And what are you doing these days, Ms. Burke?” the judge asked.
“I’m going to law school,” she replied.
The usually unflappable judge did a double take. “You’re what?”
“I was happy to hear it,” Stephens said. “We don’t hear many success stories. Ms. Burke had the tenacity to climb her way out.”
Burke plans to practice criminal defense, representing people like her who have “screwed up royally.” She wants to be one of their believers.
“I want to be that benefit of the doubt that someone can change,” she said.
At least I got an A in that Discrete Mathematics course the second time around? 
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