Some of you may want to eventually be a general counsel or in-house lawyer for a corporation or other business/organization. Many lawyers enjoy the more stable hours and the close relationship with one company that goes along with working in-house as a lawyer.

But you are not going to be able to become the general counsel of a company right out of law school. Most organizations are looking for a certain type of experienced lawyer to fill an in-house role.

So if it is a future goal of yours to work in-house for a business as a general counsel, here's an article courtesy of law.com with a list of the skills and knowledge recruiters look for when hiring a general counsel.

Powered by Wufoo

Do any of the new students have a question about law school in general? How about those of you planning on law school next year?

Fill out the form above and submit you question. We will do the best we can to answer here at the Pre-Law Blog. See some of our previous questions here.

Ann over at lawschoolexpert blog compiled an extremely helpful list of Law School Loan Repayment Assistance Programs (LRAP's).

This is really helpful for those of you planning on attending law school on loans who are thinking about going into comparatively lower paying public service jobs.

More on LRAP's below...

The people in charge of the latest suit against BAR/BRI claim that they are looking to fundamentally change the landscape of bar review for future law students.

• "'The other case sought principally damages for those who had taken the BAR/BRI course and paid too much over nine years,' Disner said of the case that settled. 'This case focuses on the future and posits the view that there are people out there, including the two who are plaintiffs, who will take the bar review course in a few years and want to make sure they have a competitive market in which to choose the right course and pay the right price.'" (From Law.com)

It's still obviously pretty early in the suit, but keep an eye on it because it has the potential to impact the way you study for the bar and how much you pay to do so.

Read more about signing up for BAR/BRI during first year below...

Orientation has started or is about to start for many of you new law students out there.

To those who are just starting out, welcome to the world of law school! Here's are some past blog entries that you should take a look at as a new 1L...

• About and some advice on the Socratic Method.
• About the mandatory grading curve you will likely encounter in law school (with an update here).
• Use CALI Lessons to help master law school.

MORE BELOW...

Mandatory retirement at a certain age has traditionally been a common practice in the legal world.

The ABA isn't a big fan of this practice, however, and recently spoke out against it.

More below...

I took the MPRE on Friday so we will find out the answer in five weeks.

What is the MPRE?
The MPRE is the Multistate Professional Responsibility Examination. It's a 60 question (only 50 are scored) multiple-choice test that basically covers the rules of ethics that govern lawyers.

All but 5 jurisdictions in the US jurisdictions require bar candidates to pass the MPRE before acceptance to the bar. So chances are you are going to have to take the MPRE if you want to be a lawyer.

Passing scores and other rules are state specific so search for information about MPRE that is specific to the state in which you want to practice law.

Here's more on the test from Wikipedia.

Below are my random thoughts and tips...

 (More)

With law school classes drawing closer, if you have not bought your casebooks yet you really should think about buying your casebooks used from online resources.

Here's a link to one of the Pre-law Blog's articles on the subject with more details: Cost of Casebooks in Law School.

Here's a video interview of Abovethelaw's David Lat discussing what summer associates do (from ABC News).

If you don't know, Abovethelaw is the most popular legal blog. Among other topics, it has constant updates on the world of big law firms.

For more information on summer associates see our previous post (Advice for Summer Associates).

For a more in depth view, law.com has an article on the way law firms recruit law students. It also gives a good idea of the on campus interview process. See more below.

Readers actually send the pre-law blog this question a lot, which backs up the theory that the pre-law blog's readership mainly consists of criminals.

Here's the latest:

• I have had an interest in going to Law School and have been encouraged by my professors to do so. However, I have a criminal record. Last March(2007) I was arrested and plead guilty to posession of Marijuana with intent to distribute and in April of 2003 I was arrested for a DUI. Will this absolutely bar me from going to Law School?

The pre-law blog has touched on this subject before: "RQ: Getting into Law School (and Accepted to the Bar) with a Criminal Record". So instead of writing a new post, we just updated that one a bit. Please follow that link and take a look.

I just read this article from the Houston Chronicle and it is exactly the message the pre-law blog tries to convey about starting salaries for attorneys. A summary below:

Going through my bloglines feeds today I found a bunch of link-worthy stuff around the web today.

GOOD NEWS FOR LAW GRADS LOOKING FOR ASSOCIATE POSITIONS
According to an American Lawyer survey, the good news is that associates are generally happy with their jobs at medium to big firms; they don't expect to make partner/don't plan to stick around too long (and the firms could care less about this fact); and, most important of all,:

• Am Law 200 firms expect to bring on roughly 10,000 associates next fall [see "Endless Summer"]. That astonishing number equals about one-quarter of all the students who will graduate from U.S. law schools next year. To put it another way, the top 20 law schools will only produce about 6,500 graduates.

Good news for those looking to become associates at big to medium law firms! Courtesy of Blawg's Blog.

NEW DOCUMENTARY ABOUT LAW SCHOOL

Links to this new documentary about law school, complaints about the bar exam and more below...

 (More)

You may have heard that the US News and World Report will change the way that it measures 9 month after graduation employment statistics in its next published law school rankings.

The general consensus is that change will help eliminate "gaming" of the employment statistics that some say exists in law schools in order to make the school look better in rankings.

Read more about the results below and what it means for Pre-Laws...