Summer ’10 Final Grades
A couple days ago I posted an updated entry on how my 1L Spring grades turned out, and this entry is a follow-up with my summer school grades so y’all will have the “full picture” of how my 1L academic life turned out 
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SUPERIOR COURT MEDIATION
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This 5-day, 40-hour pass/fail class doubled as a CLE for practicing attorneys and is required for all certified mediators in North Carolina.
Tagged by me as “Lobbying for Lawyers“, essentially we learned about various types of alternative dispute resolution and then plowed in-depth into various aspects of mediation, followed by a series of role-playing exercises where we rotated as mediator with other classmates acting as attorneys or clients.
The variety of ages and student-vs-practicing-attorney split made for a different dynamic than the other classes (in a good way). Even though there were some boring moments, I enjoyed it overall and feel like I learned some useful snippets from it. It certainly helped with my ADR Clinic experience
Expected final grade for class: Pass
Actual final grade for class: Pass
Synopsis: Useful topic + free food == #win
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ADR PROCESSES AND PRACTICE
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While Superior Court Mediation focused on teaching the various types of alternative dispute resolution and training people on how to be effective mediators, this class focused on ADR from the vantage points of the advocates.
The first day of class covered some of the essentials on ADR that I had already learned, but beyond that each subsequent class involved reading a chapter or two on negotiating styles, competitive tactics, and so on along with learning a new fact pattern. Then we’d have a mock settlement conference with opposing counsel for each of these sets of facts.
The professor for the course was hilarious and laid-back. I also surprisingly enjoyed the course textbook (even though it was dry in parts).
Final grades for the course were based on a journal maintained throughout the summer session1 and two essays critiquing the results of a negotiation session and a mediation session respectively. I figured I aced the essays but also lost points on the journal because I missed an entry or two. Luckily it wasn’t enough to alter my grade 
Expected final grade for class: A-
Actual final grade for class: A
Synopsis: Good professor + good textbook == #win
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ADR CLINIC
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Most of my experiences in this class already got written about elsewhere on the blog under the ADR tag. Basically every participant had to mediate about a dozen cases, the bulk of which were in Criminal District Court in Wake County. We also mediated cases involving child support, 50(B) protective orders, Medicaid cases pending before the state’s Office of Administrative Hearings, and had to sit in on a session with Wake County’s Drug Court.
Clinic grades were based on performance/professionalism during the mediations, teaching a class on an ADR-related topic of choice, completing three different reflections on various mediations (mine were late), and compiling a portfolio including a résumé and pricing list for use if/when we became real mediators.
The main upside to the class was learning that I’m probably not cut out for mediation. I’m incredibly talented at it, but I’m also accustomed to having an opinion and I’m ill-suited to simply facilitating 
Expected final grade for class: B-
Actual final grade for class: B+
Synopsis: Tangible experience + decent grade == #win
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RACE & THE LAW
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This class was the highlight of my summer 
It’s a seminar course that focuses on the impact race has played on American jurisprudence, through the lens of 5 different groups (lumped together in the casebook as whites, blacks, asians, hispanics, and American Indians). In addition to examining the core case law — sizable chunks of which are still surprisingly considered good law, even though they were based on what we now know are inaccurate perceptions of race — the book then follows with looking at race-based cases as applied to issues such as free speech, marriage/adoption, immigration, political participation, and so on.
As you can probably guess, conversations in the class periodically got emotional but everything was kept at a high level of professionalism. It was engaging to hear the different perspectives based not only on folks’ own races, but also their age, socioeconomic status, sexuality, upbringing, military service and various other factors. I thoroughly enjoyed it, even though my somewhat-outspoken views aren’t exactly politically correct.2
Final grades were based on two different group presentations and two essays. I had to give myself a crash course in constitutional law because all of the essay options included either First or Fourteenth Amendment considerations, but I anchored myself to a desk at the law school until I learned it and wrote solid responses. The effort was worth it 
Expected final grade for class: A
Actual final grade for class: A
Synopsis: Engaging discussion + “A” in a 3-credit course == #win^2
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FINAL SCORE: SUMMER 2010 FINALS
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Expected End-of-Summer GPA: 3.523
Actual End-of-Summer GPA: 3.810
Actual End-of-1L GPA: 2.898 (Law school median: 2.000)
*****
I’ll be focused on the upcoming TYLA regional competition in Charlotte for the next few days so I don’t know when I’ll have a follow-up post, but once life settles down I’ll go through the Fall 2011 semester and I’ll finally be more-or-less caught up with things
Have a great night y’all!
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From the grade-related archives:
- Fall ’10 Midterms: Fall ’10 Status Update
- Fall ’10 Midterm Expectations: TDot: 1, ConLaw: 0
- Post-1L Class Ranks (Detailed): Revisiting class rank
- Post-1L Class Ranks: Learning what I already knew
- Spring ’10 Finals Revisited: Revisiting 1L Spring Grades
- Spring ’10 Finals: Spring ’10 Final Grades (or, “A 2L. For srs.”)
- Spring ’10 Finals Expectations: The wait continues…
- Spring ’10 Midterms: Spring ’10 Midterm Grades (or, “@#$% Ks”)
- Spring ’10 Midterm Expectations: A Temporary Reprieve
- Fall ’09 Finals: Fall ’09 Grades: the Good, the Bad, and the Ugh-ly
- Fall ’09 Midterms: Midterm postmortem
- I hate those things [↩]
- While I recognize actual racism still exists across society — a recognition affirmed throughout the 7 years I dated QuietStorm — I think the overwhelming majority of problems attributed to “race” today are more accurately attributable to class / socioeconomic differences, particularly for people 35 and younger. [↩]
