Worried about Those First Year Law School Grades?
Students choose to attend law school for a wide range of reasons, but find later that dealing with law school grades can sometimes be harrowing. You may have had a lifelong dream to be a lawyer, to help people, and see justice served—or you may be interested in taking on a fast-paced, challenging career, especially if you are studying to be a trial attorney. Today, many individuals take on a law degree as a second career, often later in life too. You may be studying at a conventional law school or perhaps taking the progressive route of distance learning, but there is no escaping the fact that the first year can be difficult.
Even if you were at the top of your class in high school or college, or both, the first year of law school has the potential to hit you like a ton of bricks—putting many students in their place quickly! And while finishing all four years successfully can be a formidable task for any student, the good news is that you should get much better at mastering your studies after the first year if you are dedicated.
Like the California Desert Trial Academy College of Law, your law school should have numerous resources in place to see that you are able to graduate successfully, along with pointing you toward student support as well. Older students can usually give a wide range of advice for survival beyond the first year, especially in terms of how to study better and cope with the shock of some initial failure. Classroom style and methods of teaching and learning may be so different from your previous education that you may feel like you have landed in a foreign—and exhausting—land. Undoubtedly though, if you speak with many of your peers, they will be going through the same experience.
Your studies may be rigorous, and the grading curve may be extremely strict, forcing you to accept some less than stellar grades at first; hopefully most of these are on sample exams, allowing you to learn fully from your failures. Study groups can be extremely helpful (if they aren’t too distracting, taking you off track with other social topics or activities), and you may find new applications and techniques for retaining information after taking in enormous amounts of reading. You will not have much extra time on your hands during that first year of law school but do make the effort to form bonds with other students who you can study with, discuss classes and subjects you don’t understand with, and learn from overall.
Be aware that your ego may take a major hit during that first year, no matter how hard you work. It is important to understand that you are not alone in an extremely competitive atmosphere, and enormous challenges may be normal initially. What sets you apart is how steadily you keep on working, watching your GPA improve, and sending you off to take the bar eventually, with success.
At the California Desert Trial Academy College of Law, we realize that ongoing support from professors and other students is vital to your success during your four years of law school. You will find that CDTA students and alumni form a family-like bond and share their experience, study tips, and advise on balancing school, work, and home life. Our mission at CDTA College of Law is to educate, train, and develop extraordinary legal advocates. Call us today at (760) 342-0900 or find out more online here.