<p>How stressful is law school compared to undergrad? I've heard of the 1L horror stories (i.e. people who never worked in undergrad having to work 7 hours a day). </p>
<p>also, should someone who is underweight be worried about law school? I started off already underweight in college and am now 5 pounds lighter than I was 4 years ago for various reasons (eating/sleeping habits, walking everywhere, etc.) (My BMI is 17-18.) Will ls take a greater toll?</p>
<p>It's as stressful as you make it. There will always be more studying you could be doing (re-reading, outlining, reading a hornbook or study guide, etc.). How long you study and how stressed you get depends on </p>
<p>a) how quickly you can read
b) how able you are to declare yourself "done for the night" and turn your attention to something else (sleep, hobbies, etc.) rather than worrying about the work you aren't doing. </p>
<p>I have no idea about being overweight. A lot of folks gain in law school (my school often has pizza lunches, some people go out and drink a lot, and you're sitting in one place and reading a lot) but if not eating is how you cope with stress you might lose more. Maybe go see a nutritionist at your college's health clinic about healthy ways to get a proper diet? Some people are just naturally skinny and maybe you're fine the way you are.</p>
<p>it can be stressful, but it can be manageable.</p>
<p>what types of things contribute to the stress? in general as a law student you are someone who has done well in college -- probably felt very comfortable with what was expected of you and were good at meeting those expectations. you get to law school and you find that what worked in undergrad, just doesn't necessarily work for understanding what you are reading in law school and being prepared for class. you read the casebook -- you think you understand it, you get to class and realize you just didn't get out of it what your professor apparently wanted you to get from it. you go back to the casebook, read the new materials thinking you now know how to approach it -- next day in class, you find out otherwise. it can take a good chunk of that first year to feel comfortable with the expectations -- and there is generally only one final exam for you to prove that you really are.</p>
<p>i knew people in law school, myself included, who were used to reading hundreds of pages a week for undergrad courses without breaking a sweat -- plowing through material in law school is just a lot different.</p>
<p>now on top of this add the fact that everyone else in your law school class is probably also someone who did really well in college and are used to feeling like they know what they are doing. and they are just as unsettled as you are at no longer feeling so -- but not everyone can admit it. so you end up thinking that some people have figured this all out, when they really may not have.</p>
<p>then throw in the stress to be at the top of the class and make law review so you have the best shot at the best jobs (the level of stress caused by this will vary by the school you are at and the employment opportunities available to its graduates).</p>
<p>but many people survive and thrive -- its an adjustment. truth of the matter is that being a lawyer is really stressful. if handling stress is a problem, one might want to reconsider the profession in the first place.</p>
<p>as for how your weight will be impacted by this - i don't think anyone here can answer that for you. some people respond to stress by eating; some by not eating. in law school you may be more likely to be cooking for yourself than in college, so that may effect things.</p>
<p>hey thanks for the responses guys. So which classes from undergrad have helped you the most in law school? I.e. history? english? math? Or have none of them helped?</p>
<p>I was just a bit concerned about being underweight because my parents' friends always joke about how I am too frail to be a lawyer, whatever that means.</p>
<p>i cannot think of a single undergrad course that i thought helped me in law school. i will say that i found "law" courses i took in undergrad to be completely counter productive - while interesting, they had nothing to do with how law was in fact taught in law school.</p>
<p>Latin was the most helpful to me--not because of the subject matter per se (it's easy to learn the few Latin terms are used in the law) but because it taught me how to memorize and synthesize large quantities of information and recall them as necessary--especially while being put on the spot. It helped me read for small details and taught me how to study for high-stakes tests.</p>
<p>The undergraduate classes that prepare you best for law school require you to read a great deal, think about what you have read, write about your conclusions in lots of papers, and submit those papers to graders who will subject them to intense scrutiny.</p>
<p>There was a requirement at Cornell that you take two semesters of freshmen seminars that were designed to subject you to that sort regiment. I actually took five of those classes in two years. That resulted in an unusually heavy workload, and may have lowered my GPA somewhat. But it forced me to become a much more discerning reader, and a much better writer.</p>
<p>There's a reason most law students are alcoholics.</p>
<p>It's not alcoholism until you start working. At least, that's the justification I hear most often here in undergrad.</p>
<p>you want to know one of the reasons why law school is stressful? read the posts on this forum for awhile. see how many prospective students want to be at the top schools and want to go to work making the big bucks. see how many assume that they can be the best of the best. see how many are focused on doing whatever they can to gain whatever small advantage they can in law school admissions.<br>
now imagine them as your classmates.</p>
<p>I agree with everything the above posters have said. What I found was that the first semester of law school was the highest stress situation I have ever been in--and looking back, it was because I didn't have enough faith in myself, and I looked around in class every day and thought that from what people talked about, they were much smarter than I was. Then the grades came out after first semester--and I found that the types of answers people gave in class discussions, and their perceptions about themselves in general conversation--bore NO RELATION to how they did.</p>
<p>Also, don't believe the hype about study groups--in college I always studied on my own, but I felt peer pressure to join a study group in law school. Two weeks before exams, my 2 study mates told me they didn't want to study with me any more for no discernible reason--but I endedup doing much better than both of them!!! AFter first semester, you know you can do the work, that it's just a matter of putting in the time. The work load doesn't lessen, but the stress level does.</p>
<p>Read that book, One L ... or do an honors major in Philosophy at a top school; either one might give you an idea.</p>
<p>Numerous sources have told me that "One L" is outdated.</p>
<p>"Numerous sources have told me that "One L" is outdated."</p>
<p>I've heard the same about the Bible, the Republic, Shakespeare, the Simpsons...</p>
<p>Good and insightful writing never gets outdated. If what you are looking for are (inconsequential) details, such as professors names or expecting the author to name the most recently built auditorium, or some cool gossip, then, yes, your "numerous sources" might be right. Otherwise, I'm inclined to (safely) take your sources' opinion for granted. </p>
<p>The first year of law school hasn't changed much in the past decades. At some schools, however, there seems to be a somewhat recent predisposition against the Socratic Method--but even to Socrates' dishonor, the workload remains the same, that is, scary and overwhelming.</p>
<p>Ps. And I hope that the OP is smart enough to adjust for salary differences (they have gone up, just in case) and other similar, basic, (and easily obtainable) information.</p>
<p>I've been told specifically that the book it outdated in that: people, especially faculty, are friendlier, the workload is heavy but not nearly as heavy as the book tells, and the Socratic Method is actually used to teach, with humiliation being relatively rare.</p>
<p>"I've been told specifically that the book it outdated in that: people, especially faculty, are friendlier, the workload is heavy but not nearly as heavy as the book tells, and the Socratic Method is actually used to teach, with humiliation being relatively rare."</p>
<p>non-sense.</p>
<p>Humiliation rare? Ha. Think of it like being in the Marines. They need to break down your old ways of thinking as a 1L, before they can teach you new ways of thinking. Humiliation is one of the tools that forces 1L students to realize that they aren't as smart as they think they are. (It's part of the process, not necessarily personal unless (and there's one in every class) the student decides he/she has the right answer and the Professor is wrong.) </p>
<p>Might as well get used to it anyway, since whether you're arguing a case with other lawyers or presenting it in front of a Judge -- or giving a business client an unpopular decision -- being a lawyer means that you're facing a lifetime of people telling you in polite or less-polite ways that your opinions are defective. Opposing counsel is NEVER going to say, "Wow, good argument -- better than mine -- so you should win." Humiliation may be too strong a word for it, but you need to get used to people telling you that you've missed the point. Likewise, you get to tell other people the same thing! Sometimes stressful, sometimes fun, but it's all about being challenged either way.</p>