Posted by TDot on Nov 14, 2010 in
Unsolicited Commentary Good evening y’all! 
Yesterday I finally finished editing this entry on the monetary costs-vs-benefits of law school, which pulled together some easily-accessible data based on my own work history, ADA salaries in North Carolina, my tuition and fee payments for both N.C. State and NCCU Law, and so on.
Recognizing that it only took me about 2 hours for the data gathering / spreadsheet making / graphic creating / writing / editing, I didn’t tout it as a comprehensive panacea of analysis — even going so far as pointing out “[d]ata-driven analyses like this are, in a word, pointless. There are simply too many variables involved to produce anything useful[.]”
But that didn’t stop the comments on the post from being uniformly negative 
All the commenters raised points worth considering though, so rather than limit discussion to the comments section of that particular thread I figured I’d do a copy/paste in a separate entry with my responses.
For clarity, I’m using the same snippet-by-snippet response style I ran with in deconstructing the Pope Center’s hit piece on me way back in March. If you haven’t already done so, I’d encourage you to read yesterday’s entry and the comments yourself just so there are no concerns about me misrepresenting what was said 
Here we go…
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Aaron Massey: Since we’re both American, this might be completely anti-cultural, but I think you’re calculations are still significantly off because you’re not accounting for retirement savings plans. The head start on retirement that both the HS diploma and the BA/BS degree would have can make a big difference once you start factoring it in. A higher income is nice, but so is compound annual interest/stock appreciation.
I didn’t include any mention of retirement savings in my post, because it’s simply not relevant to the discussion
If you take a look at the “caveats” section of the entry, my only requirement is that any money earned during college or law school can’t go to defraying education expenses — done solely to artificially magnify the cost of that education for the purpose of the analysis.
The vast majority of college students work, which is why the common categorization of years in school as a true “opportunity cost” barely holds water (and retains even less). If a freshman wants to set up a 401(k) and put money into it from his side job, he wouldn’t run afoul of my analysis. Similarly, there’s nothing stopping a law student from taking a chunk of their financial aid refund or earnings from a summer associateship and socking that into a retirement plan as well.
Now in both cases they’d be better off financially by paying down their student loans, since their long-run net return on investments will likely be less than the 8% loan interest rate I’m using. But if they did that I couldn’t artificially inflate the student loan interest for the analysis 
If we assume students can and do work (but simply don’t defray education costs), a corollary question may be “Will they be putting away as much as someone working full-time?” And the answer to that is “It depends.”
Unlike the full-time employee, typically students get to have their living expenses (rent, electricity, etc) rolled into their financial aid package; it’s why economic analyses typically show traditional college-aged students having the highest discretionary income of any age group. Under those circumstances, a student could easily put away a comparable amount for retirement if they had the inclination to do so.
Since planning for retirement isn’t precluded by my analysis and could easily be done by all three hypothetical students, I think for this particular analysis we’d lose more from the confusion inherent in tackling too many issues than we’d gain from discussing 401(k)s and related savings plans
***
Aaron Massey: Also, I also think you’re generic approach to the four year college degree is a little difficult to justify. Some degrees (like computer engineering) have starting salaries that average about $60,000. Others are almost half that.
Could some folks start out making more money? Of course. But similar to bringing in the discussion of retirement savings, expanding the analysis to include a litany of possible starting salaries for the BS/BA track adds a lot of noise without much signal.
For example, if we’re going to differentiate degrees like computer engineering to account for the higher salaries, it’d only be fair analytically to also differentiate the law track to rely on that expertise — an attorney doing IP-related litigation before the US Patent & Trademarks Office will be making far more than the ADA salaries I included
Synthetic Work-Life Earnings Estimates by Degree
The generic approach also has the benefit of its reasonableness being reviewable against aggregate data compiled by the government. For example, the U.S. Census Bureau produced this compilation titled “The Big Payoff” analyzing data on average salaries and synthetic work-life earnings by education level, gender, race, and so on.
Based on the government’s compilation, I’ve overestimated lifetime earnings of the diploma-only worker by ~$150K, underestimated the BS/BA earnings by only ~$53K, but underestimated professional degree earnings by ~$1,698K (aka $1.7M). The rhetoric about them being “difficult to justify” notwithstanding, my numbers are generally in line with the government’s except for the legal salary (that I’ve gratuitously underestimated).
So while a more-nuanced approach might provide a minimal amount of added clarity (at the expense of a lot more reading), I’ve already tilted the numbers so far in favor of the non-law school route that doing so isn’t particularly meaningful.
***
Aaron Massey: Still, the most important problem with this sort of raw calculation is that your disclaimers in the preliminaries are far more important than the rest of the post. “Worth it” is a question of happiness, which is often not at all about money. Sometimes, life happens and no amount of money will help.
I wholeheartedly agree, 110%. It’s why I linked to Jack Whittington’s entry on that very topic, and why the “I’d have more fun doing law” argument was central to my email to BL1Y.
But since Jack already covered the “Happiness is important” route, and BL1Y covered the “You’re not going to be happy” route, that left me with only the financials
***
Aaron Massey: Realistically, the best advice anyone considering law school can receive about whether it is “worth it” is this: “Don’t just think that you’re going to be better off financially; run some numbers using some potential scenarios, including one in which you abandon law altogether. Also, don’t just think that more money will actually make you happier; be honest about what your life goals really are.”
I agree with everything here except the first word — strike “Realistically” and replace it with “Ideally”
Realistically, almost no one’s going to do that level of analysis… which is why I did it for them 
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BL1Y: A lot of the trouble with students going in to law school is that they look at data like this and see law school as an investment. It’s not.
If you sit on the couch eating potato chips every day, your JD doesn’t bring in any money. If you go back to your old job, your JD typically won’t get you a raise (especially if compared against 3 lost years of seniority). A JD is merely a credential on your resume that may, or may not, make certain new job paths available to you.
What many law students don’t realize going in is how much work is then required. The JD doesn’t bring you any extra income, you do. You have to work for it.
I’m not entirely sure there’s a point here.
The same complaints you’re levying against a JD are also true of a BS/BA, but I don’t think that means we make the leap to saying folks should avoid giving up 4 years and various sums of $$$ to get a college degree.
***
BL1Y: And, for many people, the stress, boredom, long hours, and shitty atmosphere are not worth the increase in salary.
And, what makes law school a particularly shitty “investment” is that until you start working after graduation, you really have no idea whether you’ll like it or not.
This is a perfectly fair criticism, though I think you overstate the ability to figure out if someone would like law or not before going to law school.
There’s nothing preventing an aspiring law student from performing a little due diligence by trying to get a job in the legal arena and/or talking extensively with current practitioners. Is it going to be a perfectly accurate representation of actually living the life of a BigLaw associate? Not at all. But it should provide at least enough of an idea that it would remove “Am I going to be content / not hate my life?” as a concern before going in.
And once they’re in, if for some reason they haven’t done their research beforehand, at the very least they should learn whether or not they hate it through summer associateships or clinic work or something similar — hopefully in time to bail out before tacking on another 2 years of student loan debt.
If they haven’t done any due diligence at all before or in law school, or they have but pride stops them from getting out even though it’s not for them, they can’t then turn around and claim unfair surprise when they enter the job market and hate what they do for a living. As Professor Ks said last year, “Laziness is not a defense.”
***
BL1Y: The huge rates in depression, drug abuse, and suicide indicate a very high risk of being stuck in a job you hate. In fact, it’s probably easier to get a job in Big Law than to get an enjoyable one.
I concede I’ve got rose-colored glasses on this one, having already “enjoyed” the life of a homeless college dropout myself. I’d happily trade a sh*tty work environment that at least keeps bills paid over having to sleep in a shelter next to Bob the Crackhead and wondering if my personal effects will be pilfered by Methamphetamine Jane by the time I wake up
But, more broadly, concerns over work environment are applicable to the BS/BA folks and the diploma-only people too. That’s the nature of just about any marketplace.
My suspicion is that the higher incidents of the various pathologies you noted are more the result of higher reporting, since lawyers play higher up the socioeconomic ladder — it’s easier to be an addict when you’ve got the money to spare, and to hire a therapist to talk about your depression when you actually get health insurance benefits and vacation time that you can take without wondering how your rent’s going to get paid.
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Va.: I was really looking forward to this post, but I’ve got to say I’m a little disappointed with the methodology.
It was a quick post by a current student cobbled together on ACC football Saturday — cut me some slack 
***
Va.: I also think that your analysis doesn’t really capture the “worst case” scenario that I’m seeing play out among people I know. Your expectations of being able to obtain a job after law school are certainly reasonable (or at least they should be), and you seem to have no illusions (unlike many law students) about how easily $160k jobs are to come by. However, despite applying for any and every job they see (including ADA positions), many people I know aren’t employed. I know people who graduated in 2008 who are still doing temp attorney contract work. Some can’t even get that. A lot of people aren’t doing what they set out to do or have had to make geographic compromises that take them away from friends and family. Although I certainly hope you find a job before graduation or soon thereafter, being unemployed for 6 months to a year or more can start you off in a financial hole that can be pretty difficult to get yourself back out of. The uncertainty is stressful and “settling” for jobs you don’t want lowers your quality of life.
Unemployment is a legit point, and one I thought about when I was writing the entry.
But I opted to exclude it as the “worst case” scenario because the overwhelming majority of people still find jobs. Even acknowledging the games law schools play with their employment data, few schools have 6-month employment rates below 80%. It didn’t make sense (to me at least) to tailor the analysis toward the other 20%, particularly when the economy will likely be turned around by the time 2013 gets here.
If we want to factor in unemployment, though, it can be done fairly easily from an economics perspective by weighting the results. Essentially we’d take the projected work-life earnings and multiply by the percent probability of being employed, e.g. the $2.7M x 80% if we assume permanent 20% unemployment for the person’s entire work-life.
Doing comparable calculations for the other two columns makes law school less attractive from a marginal cost-benefit standpoint, but still a financially better option than just high school or just college even factoring in law school costs.
I’m less sympathetic on the “they’re not doing what they want yet” argument, but that’s also out of my own personal bias than any rational reason. My first job after dropping out of N.C. State was loading UPS trucks from 3am-8am Monday-Friday; it didn’t pay much and definitely wasn’t what I wanted to do, but it kept a (non-crackhead-containing) roof over my head and helped shore up my financial foundation while I looked for better work. The same principle applies to the law grads — I know it’s not much consolation to the people stuck in that situation, but where you start isn’t where you end up
***
Va.: And a good chunk of law schools are private and have much higher tuition than you do.
Very true… but a point that doesn’t necessarily change my conclusion
On the one hand, I concede that plopping in cost data for other law schools affects the lucrativeness when using my salary numbers.
On the other hand, students have a choice in what law school they attend as far as cost is concerned. Using me as an example, NCCU Law was my first choice because UNCCH Law charged twice as much despite similar bar passage rates and employment prospects in North Carolina (which is where I’d prefer to stay professionally).
And on the third hand, in many cases the more expensive schools also have better employment rates and salaries — a point you yourself made to me back in January
***
Va.: Anyway, I think your conclusion should probably be a bit more cautious in tone. If you don’t get the job you want, or any job at all (god forbid…), then the evaluation would certainly change.
This is probably true. But would any of y’all still read this blog if I wasn’t flippant most of the time?
Besides, if I don’t end up where I want maybe BL1Y will let me join him, Namby Pamby and Nando in the Cynics Club 
—===—
So that’s my rebuttal y’all
Have any comments / criticisms / witticisms / thoughts of your own? Please post them below
Tags: About TDot, Damned Lies and Statistics, Money Money Money, NC State, NCCU Law, Tuition & Fees
Posted by TDot on Nov 13, 2010 in
Unsolicited Commentary Just over a month ago, I shot an email to BL1Y as part of his open-ended challenge to defend reasons for going to law school. I wouldn’t characterize his counter-argument as bulletproof, but I doubt it was meant to be — BL1Y has staked out his niche as a sardonically dismissive critic of the legal arena (“Defunct Big Law Associate” as he puts it) and he excels at it, so he’d be stepping out of character to offer anything beyond a cursory rebuttal.
I’m comfortable letting the man own his chosen niche
But then a few weeks ago Jack Whittington over at World Wide Whit posted an entry on the non-monetary side of law school’s value. It’s a good read, and prompted a colleague to remind me of the BL1Y entry and ask me for my thoughts on the financials.
Fast forward past my weeks of slacking on the blog posts, and you get this entry
Is law school really worth it, just looking at the money involved? To borrow the title of Thursday’s entry, “Yes, but…”
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I. THE PRELIMINARIES
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Data-driven analyses like this are, in a word, pointless. There are simply too many variables involved to produce anything useful for more than a couple people in a very narrowly-defined set of circumstances.
Anyone that tells you otherwise is lying to you. Period.
But with that disclaimer out of the way, having the data to look at it can still provide some insights — particularly if you happen to fall in that narrowly-defined set of circumstances
For this entry, I’m using myself: a mediocre student at an unranked Tier 4 law school interested in becoming a prosecutor in the same state.
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II. THE CAVEATS
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As you’d probably expect, there are a lot of these
Here goes:
- Generally, these stipulations (and even the data itself) are intentionally focused on producing the worst-possible case for law school. If law school’s still “worth it” under this worst-case analysis, by default it’s “worth it” under normal circumstances.
- This is also a “cash only” analysis. On income, I’m only counting salaries and excluding benefits since they’re difficult to value. On costs, I’m only counting tuition and mandatory fees; optional expenses are excluded since they’re… well… optional
- All of the income scenarios assume someone starting at 18 years old and “retiring” at 55 years old.
- The starting point for each income column is based on the data sets in Section III below.
- For the diploma-only column, it assumes a +$2K/yr raise over each of the first 5 years. My rationale is that a non-degree-holder will usually get very close to their (generally low) salary limit in the marketplace fairly early in their career.
- In terms of inflation / cost-of-living raises, after the initial 5 years the diploma-only column assumes a 2% raise per year. For the BS/BA column, it assumes a 2.5% raise per year. And for the JD column, it (i) uses the 20-year step structure the state government uses for salary increases in the first 20 years, (ii) assumes no additional salary range increases during those 20 years, and (iii) projects a 1.1% salary increase for each year after maxing out at the top step.
- Feel free to quibble with me over the percentages Regardless of the specific rate, each of the 3 columns would be adjusted in tandem — and since this is a differential analysis, that limits the significance of any rate changes.
- I assume the student either (i) isn’t working during the years in college and law school, or (ii) if they are working they’re putting $0 towards defraying the cost of education (e.g. you spent all of your summer associate earnings on hookers and blow
).
- On the cost side, the law school column includes an extra $21,000 per year in student loans taken to help cover living expenses in place of a job. This amount is roughly comparable to what North Carolina law students can take before maxing out under the U.S. Department of Education standards.
- The “Tuition & Fees Total” row can be considered a proxy for total required student loan debt (plus the extra $63K for law school living).
- For the student loan interest row, I’m using a 30-year repayment at 8.0% interest. This is done intentionally — revisit the first bullet point — to maximize the amount of interest that would have to be paid out. Realistically you’ll want to refinance at a far lower rate on a shorter repayment term
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III. THE DATA SOURCES
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In terms of data collection, I gathered info from a few sources:
- First, I used my own tax returns from when I had dropped out of N.C. State to help approximate earnings for someone without a college degree.
- For the BS/BA column, the starting amount was based on a survey of several of my friends who are alumni of N.C. State’s Department of Computer Science along with about a dozen other alumni from various disciplines (including the lower-paying humanities degrees common among law students).
NALP salary data for 2009
- On the law column, I downloaded all of the ADA salaries in North Carolina from the News & Observer’s Data Central portal that includes a list of all state employees and their salaries. To check the reasonableness of using this data, I also grabbed one of the spiffy graphics from the National Association for Law Placement on reported salaries in the legal industry. For salaries reported to NALP this past year, 95%+ of attorneys make $40,000 and up. Their curve correlates well with the ADA salary data, which tops out around $120K for some ADAs who’ve been around for 30ish years.
- For the undergraduate cost info, I used the tuition and fee data from my last year at N.C. State multiplied by four years. For law school I did the same thing, using this year’s rates at NCCU Law and multiplying by three years. In both cases these end up producing overestimated expenses — since tuition and fees were both cheaper last year, and the cheaper still the year before — but the difference isn’t significant enough to matter.
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IV. THE EARNINGS
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Putting all of this together, here’s the chart of annual salaries over time:
Raw salary data from 18 to 55
The green cells are years where someone is working. The red cells are “in school” / opportunity cost years, where the student either isn’t working at all or is working to pay for stuff other than their education. And the yellow cells depict how long it would take to “pay off” the cost of education if 100% of the salary was devoted solely to paying off education-related debts.
Remember the latter item is an artificial construct for illustration only — realistically folks will be repaying student loan debts for years, not putting their entire salary toward it. And we’re intentionally using a 30-year repayment schedule to artificially inflate the cost of law school
Also remember this chart is for “providing a common starting point for talking” purposes only. It has -0- predictive value. We all control our own destinies; if someone’s not making enough money, they can find a way to make more — it just might involve making decisions they’re not comfortable making. But in general no one is stuck doing the same thing for 30 years if they really want to do something else
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V. THE ANALYSIS
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So now we have roughly what our hypothetical earnings would be if we worked until 55 years old with (i) just a high school diploma, (ii) a college degree in an average major, or (iii) a law degree working as an ADA in North Carolina.
Now let’s bring in the cost data and do some comparison. Here’s a quick chart showing how things shake out:
Even after repaying law school, the JD earns more than the BS/BA
So under this model an average college graduate can reasonably expect to make an average of ~$18K more a year than someone with just high school diploma, enabling them to “pay off” their education in 3 years and 1 month. Factor in the cost of repaying that schooling and the net advantage over a diploma-only worker drops ever-so-slightly to +$17K/year, or roughly $605K over a 33-year career.
Using this same model, the soon-to-be-ADA can reasonably expect to bring in ~$409K more during his career than his baccalaureate-bearing friend — even after the 3 additional years of “opportunity cost” and the expense of paying off student loan debt that’s almost 6x more (and working 3 fewer years to boot).
====================
VI. SO IS LAW SCHOOL REALLY WORTH IT?
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It certainly is for me
Even with working a government job and staying there permanently, I’m looking at making at least $1,000 more per month than I would with just my college degree. And that’s making the (hopefully false) assumption I’m not competent enough to earn more. It also doesn’t include any assistance from foundations like NCLEAF, which provides $$$ for student loan repayment for lawyers working in the public interest arena.
And, as Jack noted in the post I linked up at the top, I’ll be doing something far more enjoyable to me than being a script monkey in a cubicle
But, as with all of these things, your mileage may vary. If you don’t like law but think it’s a quick way to get rich, doing law school is probably a bad idea. If you’re determined to go to an expensive law school but will be tempted by suicidal thoughts if you’re one of the majority of lawyers not pulling in $160K+ a year, it’s probably a bad idea. Etc etc etc.
****
There you have it folks. I’m sorry it’s so long, feel free to commence with the TL;DR comments below
The moral of the story is, for me at least, deciding to pursue the law route was definitely a good idea — and I’ve got the data to back it up
Thanks for reading, and enjoy the rest of your weekend everybody!
Tags: About TDot, Damned Lies and Statistics, Money Money Money, NC State, NCCU Law, Tuition & Fees
Posted by TDot on Nov 11, 2010 in
The 2L Life Good evening folks!
I’ve got a draft entry with a cost-benefit analysis of law school that I’ve been meaning to finish, and depending on how tomorrow turns out it might (maybe?) finally get done. But tonight’s entry is on a somewhat-related variant that I think (hope?) might be useful to someone (anyone?)…
…and at the very least I promise I’ll link you to someone else worth reading if you think this post is subpar
Last night I was one of seven students at NCCU Law to serve on a panel entitled “What is law school really like?” — similar to the panel I was on at N.C. State back in the Spring — where we spent a couple hours answering law school-related questions from about two dozen undergrads.
In the middle of the Q&A, a young lady asked if she should just go straight into law school once she graduates from undergrad, or if she should take a few years off to work first. And the first three responses to her question were all along the lines of “I can’t answer your question. You have to know yourself to decide that. Etc.”
It was a perfectly legitimate response, but one that I think strikes too much of a balance — to the point of not being useful. If it’s what you really want to do, my $.02 on the “should I go to law school right away?” question is of the “Yes, but…” variety.
Here are a few reasons why:
- Life doesn’t stop for law school. When we’re in undergrad slaving away in classes, it’s easy for us to discount just how much freedom we have to do what we want. As we get older we not only rack up bigger financial obligations — cell phone payments segueing to car payments segueing to mortgage payments (segueing to student loan payments) — but we also tend to fall in love with a spouse or children or a combination of the two. None of that stuff goes away when you decide to go to law school. I’ve got a number of Legal Eagle colleagues with families and/or sizable monetary responsibilities, forcing them to skip class in an emergency or work a side job to keep the bills paid or take time from studying to be parents / husbands / wives. It’s a testament to their tenacity that they can pull it off, but many folks also conclude the wall is too high for them to scale so they never go to law school at all.
- “Now” money is more alluring than “later” money. Dove-tailing off the previous point, having readily-accessible cash flow is a comforting feeling. I didn’t make much money during the five years I was a college dropout, but I was making enough that I could keep the lights on in the apartment and food on the table. Any time something went wrong I knew a payday was coming up that could replenish whatever I’d have to pull from savings (or, more often than not, pay on a credit card ). Giving that up for a lump-sum financial aid refund twice a year coupled with a ban from the ABA on working more than 20 hours a week is a big lifestyle shift, and makes the transition from the real world back into the academic world more challenging than it needs to be.
- Law school’s not getting any cheaper. Speaking of challenges, the combined cost of law school tuition / fees / books isn’t going down. You’ve not only got basic economic inflation but also two sets of market pressures driving up rates: the war between law schools to boost their rankings, and the inflated volume of applicants caused by the deflated economy. Even public law schools, the bargains of the legal education arena, will find their tuition rates going through the roof over the next few years as federal stimulus money runs out and states look for ways to balance their ledgers. The longer you wait, the more money you’ll be paying up-front and through student loan interest over the next 20+ years.
- It’s not getting less populous either. Law schools are also churning out thousands of newly minted lawyers every single year. That’s not going to change — the population might grow or shrink a smidge around the margins, but it’s safe to conclude they’ll continue to churn out thousands of new lawyers. every. single. year. These are the folks you’ll be competing with for jobs in the legal marketplace. Time spent in between undergrad and law school could just as easily be time spent as one of those newly minted lawyers, building experience in what’s going to become your career.
As for the “but…” part, despite everything I just told you, if you’re the type to get burned out it’s probably better to wait. Assuming you did a straight run through undergrad (instead of pulling a TDot) you’ll be in school for at least 7 straight years from the start of undergrad through getting your J.D. Remember having that feeling right around the 5th grade that you couldn’t possibly imagine having to go all the way through the 12th? That’s what you’ll be going through.
I also don’t want y’all taking this entry as a knock on the folks who decide (or don’t have a choice) to wait on getting their law degree. There’s a tremendous amount of value in the overly-clichéd topic of “life experience”; The Prophet actually penned an entry on that very subject just a couple days ago. And I can vouch for that reality: even though I absolutely hated being a dropout at the time, when I finally got back into school it definitely made me more appreciative of the education I was getting. The work experience I racked up has been a great help with finding employment and deciding what I want to do for a career.
And it gave me all sorts of colorful true-life stories to regale people with at parties
But as beneficial as my experience was in hindsight, I’d never wish it on anyone. It wasn’t fun. There were many many days where I felt far-less-than-enthused with my life, where I was, and where I thought I was heading. And you can get just as much “life experience” as an attorney as I got being a random guy who only had a high school diploma
So that’s my $.02 on going to law school now versus doing it later. Take it with the usual caveats, your mileage may very, I could be wrong, no express or implied warranties of any kind, etc etc etc — and have a good night!
Tags: Money Money Money, NCCU Law, pre-Ls, The Prophet, Tips, Tuition & Fees
Posted by TDot on Nov 2, 2010 in
The 2L Life Good evening y’all!
I’ve had this backlog of entries I’m working on, but concluded earlier today they’re never going to get posted. Sorry
Time has just been in short supply here lately. Back on Friday I helped judge the tryouts for the 1L Trial Team, Saturday was a rough day emotionally, Sunday was Halloween, Monday had class all day, today was class and Election Day, tomorrow’s got a dentist appointment then class then a guest speaker at NCCU Law, Thursday’s got a motion in limine due in the morning and a philanthropy dinner with EIC in the evening, then at some point Friday I might conceivably be able to get everything knocked out… at which point I’d probably be a few entries behind again.
So I decided rather than work on the backlog, I’d just let it all slide and try to get back into a one-post-per-day habit again for more than a week at a time
On that note: have any of you ever heard of the Legal Studies Institute or The Fund for American Studies?
One of my professors forwarded me an email yesterday to check it out, and even offered to “nominate” me for the program (whatever that entails). But as I’m looking through their website all I see is me having to pay $$$ — something I’m not interested in doing, and don’t have the finances to do even if I was. I’ve also tried poking around Google for more information but have yet to find any comments or testimonials or anything from actual attendees that isn’t also sponsored by LSI/TFAS themselves.
Any of y’all have any insights or thoughts? Would this program be worth my time (and potential expense), or should I stick to finding an internship in one of the DA’s offices around here?
Comments are appreciated Thanks in advance, and have a great night!
Tags: 2L, EIC, 雅雅, Money Money Money, NCCU Law, Trial Team
Posted by TDot on Oct 5, 2010 in
Student Government I’ve been a big fan of my colleagues in the NCCU Law Student Bar Association since we took office in April, and (surprisingly) we all still get along exceptionally well. Aside from one minor pseudo-controversy in May I can’t recall a single time where we’ve butted heads or couldn’t reach a consensus on something.
It’s definitely a fun experience.
But as much as I enjoy the warm fuzzy feelings, I’m a bigger fan of cold hard data — and earlier tonight we got confirmation this year’s SBA is pretty awesome, raising over $4,400+ for the first quarter of our fiscal year
That’s not only a 53.6% spike over the year-ago quarter, but a spike that came despite a shrinking student body due to funding cuts by the North Carolina General Assembly.
And based on the records I’ve been given, I’m pretty sure it’s an all-time record for us
We’ve still got three quarters to go of course, but things are turning out pretty well so far — and that’s $4K more we’re now able to give out in student organization appropriations that don’t have to come from student fees
Hope all of you had a great day too, and have a good night!
Tags: Competence FTW, Money Money Money, NCCU Law, SBA, UNCASG
Posted by TDot on Sep 24, 2010 in
Student Government Folks, I know y’all get sick of me complaining about a certain campus newspaper, but the effort it expends to manufacture controversy about the UNC Association of Student Governments really perplexes me at times — and unfortunately it’s one of the few publications regularly read by folks at UNC General Administration.
Yet another example comes to us in today’s paper (original story available here at dailytarheel.com):
ASG actions may be illegal
Lobbying may violate state law
By ISABELLA COCHRANE | The Daily Tar Heel
The body that voices the students’ views to administrators and elected officials could be carrying out its top priority — lobbying legislators — illegally.
The UNC Association of Student Governments, which includes delegates from 17 UNC system institutions, has been meeting with legislators and presenting them with petitions to keep tuition low for students.
But association President Atul Bhula was unaware of a N.C. law requiring organizations that fulfill certain criteria to register with the N.C. Secretary of State’s Office before lobbying.
Bhula received a notice from the office Wednesday reminding him of the law. The department has not yet determined whether the association fits the definition of a lobbyist group.
If the organization fits the definition of a lobbyist group and does not register, it could be banned from lobbying for up to two years as well as face a $5,000 fine, spokeswoman for the office Liz Proctor said.
State statutes define a lobbyist as someone who is paid to engage in lobbying for a governmental purpose.According to the statutes, a lobbyist must spend more than 5 percent of his or her time per month actively trying to influence legislative or executive decisions.
If lobbying is the association’s top priority, they could fall under that category.
Bhula’s stipend as ASG president is $7,000 per year, which is paid for by student fees — a $1 fee from every student in the UNC system. Other officers in the organization are paid $1,000 to $5,500.
Christy Tillery, a paralegal with the N.C. Ethics Commission, said true unregistered lobbyists violate state law.
“If you’re a true lobbyist in regards to the definition you should be registered,” Tillery said. The state law requiring organizations to register went into effect in 2007.
Continued lobbying without being registered in North Carolina is a misdemeanor offense.
“I never registered, and I’d be skeptical of anyone saying they have to do so,” said former ASG President Greg Doucette.
Doucette said he doubts that ASG members fit the definition of a lobbyist because they don’t spend that much time persuading legislators.
“Right now the legislation isn’t even in session until January,” Doucette said. “Basically we’ll only have a couple of months to lobby.”
Doucette said an argument could be made that because ASG officers receive compensation, they need to be registered.
“Everyone who does not receive a stipend doesn’t even meet the definition of a lobbyist because no money is changing hands,” Doucette said.
Bhula said he had not looked into registering with the state earlier because he was unaware that the organization fit the criteria of a lobbyist.
“Regardless, we’re going to lobby this year. We’re going to get that taken care of as soon as possible,” Bhula said.
The organization plans to have someone lobbying in Washington, D.C., but focus for this year will be state legislators, he said.
“At the federal level we’d be looking at Pell Grants to ensure we have more money,” Bhula said. “The federal stimulus money is going to run out so it’s a hard battle to fight there.”
Bhula said he plans to discuss the registration process at the organization’s next meeting Saturday so ASG can lobby legislators in the future.
“We hope to more effectively use our dollar for internal investments,” Bhula said.
“Lobbying in North Carolina is our main concern.”
Proctor said that despite the group’s past lobbying actions, the state department was unaware of the association’s actions with legislators.
“This is the first time that we have heard anything about it,” she said.
Contact the State & National Editor at stntdesk@unc.edu.
Published September 23, 2010 in Association of Student Governments, News, State
Now I know the news reporters don’t usually write their own headlines so I can’t be too upset about that part, but weasel words are generally bad form for something purporting to be news. Just about anything “may” be illegal.
Then there’s the mischaracterization of what the law actually says (something I’ve suspected may be common with most media outlets). You can read the current lobbying laws in North Carolina for yourself, but the synopsis is that they just don’t apply to the UNC Association of Student Governments.
The main reason is that we’re a unit of government under the UNC umbrella. We don’t get to manage our own budget; a $1/student fee is paid to UNCGA who handles all the accounting and places numerous (onerous) restrictions on what UNCASG can do as a result. The group’s President is an ex-officio member of the University system’s policy-making Board of Governors. The group’s office manager, employed by UNCASG, is a state employee. I could happily list other criteria explaining why we’re a government entity — and thus exempt from the lobbyist registration law — but you get the idea.
Let’s assume though, for the sake of argument, UNCASG isn’t a government agency and is in fact a private non-profit: the lobbying law still wouldn’t apply because none of the UNCASG personnel meet the criteria of a “lobbyist.”
Under the relevant subsection that would apply to UNCASG, the statute’s two elements required to be a “lobbyist” include being an employee who “a significant part of [his/her] duties include lobbying” and “in no 30‑day period less than five percent (5%) of that employee’s actual duties include engaging in lobbying”. None of the UNCASG personnel meet both elements.
First, contrary to the article’s claim, lobbying the N.C. General Assembly isn’t UNCASG’s “top priority” and lobbying simply doesn’t constitute a “significant part” of anyone’s duties — something the DTH already knew.
How did they know? Because their substandard Editorial Board attacked me in one of their hit pieces last year for my “piggybacking” strategy with the Legislature, where UNCASG relied on the professional (and registered) lobbyists of UNCGA to do the bulk of the lobbying work, then have student leaders dropping in when it would be politically effective for us to do so.
UNCASG’s top priority is keeping in touch with the 215,000+ students it represents. It’s second priority is representing those voices on the UNC Board of Governors. Lobbying state legislators is quite a bit further down the totem pole, if it’s even on there at all.
Assuming arguendo that lobbying was a “significant part” of anyone’s duties in UNCASG, they still wouldn’t meet the second element required to be “lobbyists.”
Even at the height of my lobbying activity during my two terms in office — when we were successfully saving students over $25+ million dollars — I doubt I spent more than a few hours in an entire month at the N.C. General Assembly. That’s just how the political game gets played. You don’t talk to everyone in the Legislature; you talk to the key leaders who can pull votes, and since everyone else is doing the same thing you’re usually only going to get 10-15 minutes of their time.
If you assume the UNCASG Presidency is a 40-hour-a-week job, the President has up to 8 hours a month to lobby without becoming a “lobbyist” under this statute.
And if any President is spending more time than that on lobbying, they’re doing it wrong.
One final point before I wrap up: I was working for a lobbyist when the lobbying laws were drafted. I know who they were intended to affect, and I know who they did affect. Student-run student advocacy groups weren’t in either of those categories.
So if the N.C. Secretary of State’s Office or the Ethics Commission or anyone else is seriously concerned about UNCASG’s past lobbying efforts, I encourage them to file a claim against me. They’re going to be exceptionally hard-pressed to find anything even vaguely resembling the slightest scintilla of evidence that I or anyone on my staff was ever a “lobbyist” within the letter, the meaning, or the spirit of this statute.
And given the DTH Editorial Board’s lingering bitterness over my “aggressive character attacks” and their almost-comical efforts to rebuke me after-the-fact for them, I give them a week or so at most before they write an op/ed saying I was wrong and UNCASG should waste spend $100/person of student fee money to register their people as lobbyists…
Tags: "Real" world rants..., Money Money Money, UNCASG, UNCCH Daily Tar Heel
Posted by TDot on Aug 26, 2010 in
The 2L Life Way back in March I mentioned one of the benefits of 2L status: my weekend starts on Thursday at 4pm.
Didn’t realize how much more appreciative I’d be of that perk after a rough week
On the personal life front, 雅雅 is in Tennessee for optometry school and (understandably) homesick. The problem is she’s been there for 3 weeks now and it seems to be getting worse instead of better. Fully two-thirds of the text messages she sent me over the past couple days have been full of 
faces and references to missing me, missing her family, missing North Carolina, and so on. I try to cheer her up as best I can, but truth be told the whole situation sucks for me too… and constantly being reminded I can’t do anything about it just depresses the f*ck out of me. Not sure how to deal with it going forward but need to come up with something soon…
I figured out a solution fairly quick for Q.T. on the other hand, who over the past week has really gone out of her way to prove she has a maturity level roughly comparable to her height with a moral compass (to the extent it can even be called that) rivaling the most ignoble of politicians. And this is on top of her inconsiderate (footnoted) foolishness back on Monday. So I blocked her on Facebook. And Twitter. And Gchat. And BBM. And Skype. I’d remove her contact entry from my phone entirely, but I needed it for archiving the text messages in case I ever develop a vengeful streak one day.
To all you disloyal immature jumpoffs out there: deuces
It’s a crushing change for someone who was a friend for 2 years, attended my graduation, even made my shortlist back at Thanksgiving 
But with some people sometimes you just need to chuck the deuces.
Law school hasn’t been my typical 2L lollipops and rainbows either. The guy who recruited me for the VLAAC had some serious personal issues come up so he’s out of the competition, and me with him. Then there was yesterday’s workshop debacle. And with everything else going on I didn’t finish all the law school reading that had to get done for today, meaning I’ll need to shelve my plans to party this weekend so I can get caught up — I did, however, make sure to volunteer early and often in ConLaw when we were still covering the 3 pages I finished out of the 20 we were supposed to read
Sorry for the downbeat opening y’all, just needed to vent a bit. I’m done now
A huge bright spot of the week: finally getting my $$$ for the semester. So I lifted my spirits earlier today by paying off all my credit cards, restocking the apartment with about $300 in groceries, and buying a new electric razor (I officially now 
the Norelco Arcitec line). Now I’m packing to head down to Wilmington tomorrow to help with training for this year’s UNCASG delegates, which will at least give me an opportunity to be at the oceanfront tomorrow night — one of the very best forms of therapy ever created
I hope all of you have a great weekend, and I’ll do my best to keep things updated while I’m in Wilmington!
Tags: 2L, ConLaw, 雅雅, Money Money Money, NCCU Law, Q.T., Veterans Law Appellate Advocacy Competition
Posted by TDot on Aug 15, 2010 in
Site Stats What do “nom nom nom”, “::headdesk::”, and “#fml” all have in common?
Lots of people looking for nom-ing bunnies...
They’re all internet memes I’ve been using here on law:/dev/null for months now… and they’ve turned into a real headache when it comes to site maintenance
I first noticed something was amiss when the blog got hit by a massive wave of spam comments back on July 11th. The pageview spike was so massive I had to leave out that entire day when updating these bar charts, otherwise the “Pageviews per Day” bar would be about 50% higher than it is now.
To highlight the spike, I created a new chart below graphing the number of spam comments against the number of unique IP addresses we had in a given month (higher bars == more spam comments per capita).
As I spent the next couple weeks re-acquainting myself with .htaccess directives for this spam prevention entry, I noticed something else odd in the log files: we had a trio of referrer URLs showing megabytes upon megabytes of data being transferred but with -0- corresponding pageviews. After poking around I realized the bunny picture from this old Contracts entry was being hotlinked all over the place for reasons I couldn’t figure out.
So I logged in to Google’s Webmaster Tools for the first time in months, and figured out what was going on — over 15,000+ searches on 30 different variations of “om nom nom” 
July brought lots of spam...
Apparently when I switched how WordPress sets post URLs last month (from the old numeric “?p=1234″ to the current setup), the search index for that Contracts entry went up high enough that the bunny picture became the #1 result for anyone doing a Google search with “nom nom” in it.
Not the entire entry of course. Just the bunny pic.
Things have calmed down a bit now that I’ve started banning spambots and limiting the hotlinks. My guess is traffic will go back to a more-linear growth pattern for August. We’ll see what happens
***
On the search query front, we had a bunch of duplicate searches but also some fresh ones. Here are 20 of the 100+ unique search terms that brought folks here in July:
- chazz clevinger: worked with me as the Vice President of Legislative & Public Affairs for UNCASG two years ago. I haven’t kept in touch with him much since law school started, but he did good work for the students of North Carolina.
- nc dmv 30 day tag for insurance lapse: cost me $63, and I didn’t even need one
- nccu lsat score evening program: for 2009-10, was 151 for the evening program, with the 25th percentile folks at 148 and the 75th percentile folks at 155 according to the class profile.
- blackberry messenger group nccu school of law ’11: exists, but I’m not a part of it since I’m in the Class of 2012 Hit up one of the 3Ls for more info.
- tdot surplus vehicles: HA! I wish I had surplus vehicles…
- does duquesne law school give midterms?: I don’t know about Duquesne Law, but NCCU Law does
- letter demanding payment from ex girlfriend: is probably not going to accomplish much of anything…
- negative things about nccu law: vary depending on who you ask. I’m a huge NCCU Law fan, and my only real complaint is that the wi-fi can be spotty in certain areas of the building (like the Great Hall and the Fishbowl). Hopefully they improved that over the summer.
- 2010 11 tuition north carolina: is unfortunately still going up by almost $1K at several universities, since state legislators decided to balance the budget on the backs of students
- nccu law fall 2010 class calendar: can be found on the Law School Registrar’s TWEN page, or downloaded from the NCCU Law “Academics” page.
- nccu school of law’s grading curve: follows a strict-C median, which I happen to enthusiastically support
- mary wright 1l advocacy competition: takes place every Spring semester for 1L students. You can watch the video of my 3rd place performance here.
- daryl wade unc: is probably not the same guy as Daryl Wade, the former Student Body President at UNC School of the Arts who served as Vice Chairman of the UNCASG Council of Student Body Presidents last year. I’m sure the other Daryl Wade is still cool though… even if he goes to UNCCH
- are 1l’s included in the 30 day delay for financial aid?: For the vast majority of 1Ls, no. This was actually one of the questions we had at my 1L Orientation last year, so you’re not alone in wondering
- what percentage of nccu law school are white law students?: roughly 35-40% each class year. Another 45-50% are black, and the remaining 10-20% are spread across other races. We’re routinely ranked among the most diverse student bodies in the country.
- nccu minority scholarships for white law students: “No, officer…”
- nccu law fall 2010 book list: can be found above the academic calendar on the NCCU Law “Academics” page.
- acpi:system state: could signal a dead motherboard Take it to get looked at ASAP.
- which computer apple or pc for law students: Apple. Hands down. Trust me.
Definitely a different mix of search results getting here this month…
***
And finally, here are the Top 5 most-viewed posts for the month of July 2010, quite a bit different from past Top 5s due to the new indexing changes:
- On avoiding contract enforcement: Mmm Ks nom nom nom (02/16/10)
- On inexpensive résumé websites: Things TDot Likes: Persona Non Obscura (12/08/09)
- On post-1L class ranks: Learning what I already knew (07/12/10)
- On having a shadow: Spreading the (Law School) Gospel (02/17/10)
- On saving money: TDot’s Tips: Tips for the pre-L’s on $$$ (05/29/10)
*THANK YOU* as always to each of you for your continued support of us here at law:/dev/null!
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Past Site Stats entries:
Tags: #fml, 1L, 2L, ::headdesk::, Blawg Love, Damned Lies and Statistics, Duquesne Law, Exams, I ♥ Apple, Ks, Law Grades, Mary Wright 1L Closing Argument Competition, Money Money Money, NCCU Law, Tech Talk, The Curve, Tips, Tuition & Fees, UNCASG
Posted by TDot on Jul 17, 2010 in
The 2L Life I’m not sure how many of you are familiar with The Atlanta Post, but it’s essentially a website blending both news aggregation and original content geared to “inform, educate, and motivate African-Americans.” Even if you’re not part of TAP’s target demographic, there’s plenty of info on the site worth a read.
One example is their listing (published yesterday) of the Top 10 historically black colleges and universities in the country. There are roughly 90ish four-year HBCUs spread across 21 states and the U.S. Virgin Islands, and about 40 of them are public institutions.
And only 1 public HBCU made TAP’s Top 10 list.
I’d tell you who it was, but you probably already guessed From the full entry at the Atlanta Post:
The only public college in this top-ten list, North Carolina Central University represents an unbeatable opportunity for prospective students to receive a high quality education at only a tiny fraction of the price of other similarly-ranked institutions. With a wide range of undergraduate, graduate, professional, and doctorate degree tracks, NCCU has something to appeal to everyone, including Business and Law programs and ample hands-on research opportunities. Overall, North Carolina Central University offers an unparalleled cost-benefit ratio among HBCUs, making it an attractive option for anyone reluctant to accrue large debts yet not wanting to compromise education quality.
Tack this on top of National Jurist magazine ranking NCCU Law as the #1 Best Value in the country
Tags: Competence FTW, Legal Eagles FTW, Money Money Money, NCCU Law, The Atlanta Post
Posted by TDot on Jul 3, 2010 in
Site Stats You don’t have to be one of our long-time readers here at law:/dev/null to know that I like charts.
Facebook + attention-whoring = traffic spike!
And data.
And benchmarks. And tables. And trendlines.
And more charts just for good measure
Grade distributions, tuition savings, site stats — I compulsively sprinkle data and tables throughout the blog. Besides, pictures spice up the text-only entries
That also means I’ve started looking for more ways to spread the word in the hopes of attracting more eyeballs / readers / commenters There was political controversy in March, a new Twitter account in April… and a slight drop in May.
So to continue the outreach effort I borrowed a page from Huma over at TRPLS and created the Facebook page for law:/dev/null
Apparently most of my Facebook friends never knew about this place, because after sending everyone invites the number of unique IP addresses we had visiting the site jumped by more than a third. Average pageviews per day climbed even more, at +37.7%.
Over a quarter-million pageviews!
And the really nifty thing for a guy who loves benchmarks? This past month we served up our quarter-millionth pageview!
I put together a chart (of course) that shows the cumulative number of pages viewed over time. For a blog visited mostly by spambots in its first few months, having real honest-to-goshness live bodies reading over 250,000+ pages is pretty doggone cool
Anyhow, enough on the statistics — I know the main reason y’all read these entries are for the search terms
***
On the search query front, here are 20 of the 140+ unique search terms that brought folks here in June:
- rick ingram sbp: I don’t know if this is the same person doing multiple searches or what, but this was our #2 most-frequent search result last month with a dozen queries (along with “rick ingram unc” and “rick ingram dth”). It’s a little peculiar since he’s only mentioned in one entry about his endorsement by the UNCCH Daily Tar Heel. Odd or obsessive? I’m not sure which…
- when is 1l orientation for nccu school of law: Orientation for the night program starts on Monday, August 9th. The day program starts the next morning on August 10th. Double-check the start time the night before. Trust me.
- cute bunny: nom nom nom
- nccu law academic calendar 2010 2011: Can be found on TWEN at the Law School Registrar page. If you’re a pre-L, you’ll get your WestLaw registration info at Orientation. If you’re a 2L/3L/4LE, you should know to check there first before checking Google
- when does nccu school of law give refunds from financial aid?: Around August 30th for the Fall, January 15th for the Spring, May 28th for Summer Session I, and July 9th for Summer Session II. Those dates change slightly based on the calendar and when financial aid actually hits your account with the University. Sometimes refunds happen early but don’t count on it.
- ex con mother gets law degree: I’ve never been a fan of the adjective “ex con,” but yes I know one — she’s much cooler in person than you can tell from the news story
- nccu law grading: Sparked some controversy among the blawgs when I declared my support for NCCU Law’s strict-C model. It’s not all that great for getting a job, but I still think it contributes to making more competent attorneys compared to the alternatives
- nc central law reputation: Depends on where you’re looking for a job. I’m not familiar with our national reputation (outside of HBCU’s), but within the state NCCU Law is known for producing highly-talented litigators. It’s one of the four key reasons why I made NCCU Law my first choice for law school — and I suspect it’s one of the reasons the NCCU Law 1L trial team excelled against dozens of teams from neighboring law schools
- what are acceptable 1l grades?: Whatever is high enough for you to get a job? ::shrug::
- how long 25 page paper: 25 pages…
- greg doucette myspace: MySpace? Eww
- has anyone received an acceptance package from north carolina central state university school of law: NC Central State University School of Law? No. NC Central [notice there's no extra word here] University School of Law? Yes.
- opening statement competitions: Are much harder than closing argument competitions
- received a rejection letter from nccu law stating to try again later: Assuming that language wasn’t part of the standard NCCU Law form letter, you probably should try applying sooner since we use rolling admissions like most law schools.
- wanted one piece: Sounds like a challenge for the Reasonably Prudent Law Student
- the pornstars in winston salem: I know the political hacks over at the Pope Center wanted UNCSA and its film school to be privatized, but I don’t think that’s what they had in mind…
- it’s been a month and i still don’t have my law grades: You get no sympathy from me — welcome to the club
- nccu law now tier two: Someone lied to you. The amount of $$$ the school would have to spend to climb to T2 would totally defeat the point of getting a T1 legal education at a T4 price
- dennis jansen birthday: Happens every year. When? You should probably ask him instead
- nccu law section 103: Is the best section in the school, hands down. And if anyone tells you otherwise you tell them they can kick rocks. Then tell them TDot said they can kick rocks. Then send them to me so I can tell them in person they can kick rocks.
I really get a kick out of the different search terms people use to get here each month…
***
And finally, here are the Top 5 most-viewed posts for the month of June 2010, with a heavy leaning toward grades and cash:
- On Spring ’10 final grades: Spring ’10 Final Grades (or, “A 2L. For srs.”) (06/08/10)
- On saving money: TDot’s Tips: More $$$-saving ideas (06/13/10)
- Also on saving money: TDot’s Tips: Tips for the pre-L’s on $$$ (05/29/10)
- On the legal effects of political cowardice: Unsolicited commentary on the legal clusterf*ck facing homosexuals (06/11/10)
- On my impatience: Where are my @#$%ing grades?? >:o (06/07/10)
Many thanks to all of you for supporting the blog, including the new folks who got here as a result of my shameless attention-whoring on Facebook I truly appreciate all of you!
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Past Site Stats entries:
Tags: "Real" world rants..., 1L, 2L, Blawg Love, Damned Lies and Statistics, Exams, Law Grades, Legal Eagles FTW, Money Money Money, NCCU Law, Orientation, Tips, UNCASG, UNCCH Daily Tar Heel
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