Law School Grades, Are They As Important As We’re Led to Believe?

If you are a law student or recent law graduate, read my story below about law school grades.

If this is helpful to you:

💗LIKE this post to share it with others in the legal industry, and
📚BUY my book for more help with your legal career:

➡️Build Your Empire: A Law Firm Owner's Survival Guide to the Private Legal Industry.


-----

I never felt smart during law school.

I had test taking anxiety and hated that our grades rested on one exam.

I studied every day during my 1L first semester, didn't work out, took no breaks, and drank red bull every day to push myself further.

One of my 1L exams, Property, was really short. If memory serves, it had less than 25 multiple choice questions and the text of the exam was cutoff on the right margin. A single test was deciding 4 credits of my GPA and I couldn't even read the questions fully. I got a C.

I was devastated. I got decent grades in my other classes - mostly Bs, as I recall, but the C I got in Property meant I wouldn't be at the top of the class, wouldn't make the good journals, and that all my studying felt like a waste.

From then on, I took classes I liked, and took as many practical courses that I could. I participated in a veterans clinic to gain practical experience.

I got internships at the federal government, and at a private firm. The lawyers at that firm I ended up working for at my second job out of law school, and I made partner at their firm many years later.

I was never asked by a law firm to provide a copy of my transcript.

I networked intentionally with George Mason alumni (where I went to law school) and that landed me my first job out of law school during a recession.

My grades didn't end up mattering for me as much as I thought they would.

If you want to get a clerkship, work for a prestigious large law firm, or go into academics, your law school grades will matter.

But if you are just interested in practicing law, your grades won't follow you around as much.

Focus on gaining practical experience and networking.

Cheers to the average Joe's of law school.

The middle to lower end of the class law students.

When you graduate, you still receive a Juris Doctor.

When you pass the bar, you are a licensed attorney.

Stay focused on that, and be proud of your journey, even if it looks different to others.