2L in a Nutshell

I learned alot during my first year of law school. But I also had alot of unanswered questions as well. Motion for directed verdict? Summary Judgment? Interlocutory Appeal? Do these sound foreign to you? They did to me as well.

In my opinion, second year answered alot of the questions I had at the end of first year. Two of my classes, Evidence and Civil Procedure, were more of a practical or "hands on" approach. Rather than focus on pure legal concepts (like torts on contracts), they attempted to detail the "How to" approach in dealing with legal problems. For example, learning the minimum requirements for filing a lawsuit in federal court, what a pleading is and the minimum information it must contain, how to serve summons on a defendant, and so forth.

Second year seemed to last forever when compared to first year. All 4 classes meet throughout the entire year. While none of them particularly struck my personal interest, and I held no disdain for any of them, as I did for Criminal Law during first year. Personally, I hated Criminal Law. It's just not for me.

On the other hand, second year flew by. Perhaps the "nervousness" of first year was replaced by a confidence based on the fact that I had already conquered year one.

Time was extremely hard to come by this year. With a full-time job, a part-time weekend job, a wife, and a baby, I had to fight for every second of studying. I will gladly sacrifice a few hours of sleep to make sure I read all the cases.

But a new enemy somehow snuck in this year that I hadn't anticipated: distraction. I would be focusing on studying when a thought entered my mind about a TV show I always wanted to watch, or a movie I just had to see, or a new videogame that I just had to play.

I'll admit, I walked the line this year. I tried to see how much free time I could give myself and still do well in school. Going into the gauntlet of finals now, I moved past this practice. I've invested thousands of dollars at this point and it's simply not worth it. For the next 3 weeks, no distractions....