Reflections of a 3L, Installment One: Put Down That Book and Go To the Gym; or, Yes, You Do Have Time.

As I’m very, very fond of telling people, I am now a 3L.  A 3L in my last semester, no less.  Actually, I will graduate exactly 100 days from today.  (Awesome.)  So I’ve been reflecting a bit lately on my law school career, and I’ve noticed that there are ways I could have managed parts of it better.  As many of you already likely know, I have a general propensity to dispense unasked-for advice.  Lucky for me, Professor O’Hear kindly offered me the opportunity to climb up on my e-soap box here. (Thanks so much for that!)  Thus I bring you…

Reflections of a 3L, Installment One: Put Down That Book and Go To the Gym; or, Yes, You Do Have Time.

The more you move your body, the more energy you have to move your body.  Exercise introduces endorphins into your system that make the daily grind seem smoother.  And my mother swears – though I’m pretty sure she’s making this up – that your body will grow new blood vessels to your brain if you exercise on a regular basis.  As my fellow 3L Staci Flinchbaugh put it, there is just no downside to exercising.  Not that I’ve been doing it much during law school.  Ok, at all.   I haven’t been exercising at all.  There was never a time when I decided, “Ok, absolutely no more physical activity for me aside from pack-muling these books to and from class.”  It just happened by increments.  Not today, I have that brief due.  Not today, I am super far behind in my reading.  Etc.  I even signed up for a Pilates class my first semester.  Alas, my attendance was short-lived.  And it likely resulted in a group of undergrads who still discuss the weird woman who came to Pilates and kept falling asleep on the mat.  

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Outliers and the Health and Wellness Fair at MULS

I appreciated Professor Dan Blinka’s thoughtful post on the book Outliers.  The book begins with a quote from the book of Matthew in the New Testament:  “For unto everyone that hath shall be given, and he shall have abundance.  But from him that hath not shall be taken away even that which he hath.”  Matthew 25:29.  Malcolm Gladwell refers to this quote in the title of the first chapter as the “Matthew Effect.” 

This passage from Matthew always makes me squirm, because it doesn’t seem to square with another famous passage from the Bible that “the meek shall inherit the earth.”  Gladwell’s first chapter similarly made me slightly uncomfortable, because it suggests boldly that such undeniably unfair factors as the month into which a person is born may determine whether they end up as a professional hockey player.  Gladwell may well be right, and his insight is in its own way stunning, but it still makes someone who likes to be in control of his or her own destiny feel suddenly out of control.

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Marquette to Host 2009 Central States Legal Writing Conference

As just reported on the Legal Writing Prof Blog, the law school will host this fall’s Central States Legal Writing Conference.  The conference planning committee (led by our wonderful Alison Julien) met last Friday, and I am already excited for the event.  The regional legal writing conferences tend to focus on ideas for improving our teaching, and the conference here next fall will especially emphasize reaching out to resources beyond the legal writing faculty–the librarians and other law school faculty.  The blurb from the Legal Writing Prof blog website:

[T]he 2009 Central States Regional LRW/Lawyering Skills Conference,”Climate Change: Alternative Sources of Energy in Legal Writing,” will be held on October 9-10 at Marquette University Law School in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Central States is also planning a Scholars’ Forum, which will be held on October 9 in conjunction with the conference.  At the end of the Scholars’ Forum and just before the welcome reception for the conference, conference attendees will be able to participate in an hour-long discussion on getting published and giving effective presentations.

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