For the third-year law student preparing to transition out of academia into a law firm job, Cornell law school professor Michael Dorf has published some advice at his Dorf on Law blog, well worth checking out.

Ori J. Herstein notes in "Advice to the New Junior Associate in Big Law," that there is very little new associates can do to shape how others in their firms perceive them. "Be nice to people and try to do a good job: the rest is mostly out of your control," Herstein, a visiting assistant professor at Cornell University Law School, writes.

Herstein's advice on interacting with partners:

Partners like to feel that they and their work are of grave importance. Let them. In many ways associates function as a mirror for generating a flattering reflection, a sounding board for ideas and venting, and a sponge to absorb frustrations. It's just how it is.

One's surroundings are also of great importance. Herstein encourages new associates to create "a pleasant work environment."

That includes investing in a decent set of headphones:

Sadly, document review and due diligence will take up much of your time and can be soul crushing. A set of earphones (with a long cord) and a registration at Pandora.com will prove more helpful than you think.

[image via commons.wikimedia.org]

For the attorney mulling a jump into the blogosphere to expand business by trumpeting expertise, a recent ABA article, as noted by The Wall Street Journal, provides a good starting point. In "Memoirs of a Blogger," Mark Herrmann, an attorney and one-time legal blogger, offers tips on how to launch a blog and flags some pitfalls to avoid. As the WSJ article notes, however, Herrmann, who once blogged at the Drug and Device Law Blog, illuminates many drawbacks for launching a blog, such as finding enough topics to write about, carving a niche in a blogosphere that is always expanding and already is burgeoning with hundreds of millions, and keeping and attracting readers.

Herrmann writes:

Be provocative; be funny; be distinctive. Perhaps most importantly, don't be staid. A blog written by a committee of starched-shirt, bureaucratic lawyers might proclaim: "Our firm has the utmost respect for our learned adversaries, whose experience in complex, multi-jurisdiction litigation nearly matches our own." We'd write: "Those clowns couldn't spell ‘FDA' if you spotted ‘em two letters." We might not have much institutional gravitas, but we sure as heck have readers.

See the WSJ article for a link to Herrmann's pointers. 

[image via masternewmedia.org]

In an article for the New York State Bar Association Journal, Gerald Lebovits provides tips on how attorneys can effectively use e-mail. In "E-Mail Netiquette for Lawyers," Lebovits, a judge of the New York City Civil Court and adjunct professor at St. John's University School of Law, writes that "Despite its problems, e-mail is an essential tool. Attorneys must make the most of it - so long as the attorney follows this good advice: ‘Think. Pause. Think again. Then send.'"

Lebovits's article, which was noted by Raymond Ward's the (new) legal writer blog, includes an array of tips for lawyers on using e-mail. For example, Lebovits stresses careful editing, before hitting send. "Editing includes more than reading for meaning. It means checking spelling and grammar," he writes. "Informality like making typos or using only lowercase letters is fine between friends. It has no place in professional correspondence. To ensure credibility and respect, avoid grammar and spelling errors. Use your e-mail program's spell-check function. Editing is necessary because ‘[c]lients often can't tell whether your legal advice is sound, but they can certainly tell if you made careless typos.'"

[image via nassaulibrary.org]

Aspiring law professors should check out postings at PrawfsBlawg where Professor Jack Chin and other law school faculty members are offering advice on landing a job in legal academia. In a recent post, Chin writes:

Candidates don't get rejected from top schools for want of an additional year of law practice, or because they don't look as good look as good as candidates who taught another semester of legal writing. A really good paper is what gives you a shot at an excellent school; if you didn't close, it may well have been because readers (or listeners) weren't sold on your paper. Another year on the market will mean looking for a job, probably in another city, while doing some other job. These sorts of demands may not be conducive to doing a lot of high quality writing.

People are hired based on a prediction of how good they will be as mature scholars. That's based on an extrapolation from how good they are now. Two or three years at a lower ranked school may provide the opportunity for scholarship, mentoring, conferencing, etc. that will let you write the best paper you can, a paper that will let hiring committees think you are under-placed, and fantasize about how great you will be in the years to come.

A boatload of debt awaits the average 2008 law school graduate, the Daily Business Review reports, citing a nonprofit group, Equal Justice Works.

Beth Kobliner, author of Get a Financial Life: Personal Finance in Your Twenties and Thirties, tells the Journal that it may be easy for graduating students to "feel overwhelmed, but the best thing you can do is to educate yourself about your options."

The Journal's article, which appears at lawjobs.com Career Center, provides information for the debt-ridden law school graduate, such as:

Find out if you qualify for income-based repayment. William Hoye, director of financial aid at Duke University Law School, said this new program for government-backed loans is one that every law grad should know about. The program offers especially attractive repayment terms for those who take public interest jobs.

In another Practical Advice installment, law students, especially first-years or 1Ls, should take a little time to read Professor Orin Kerr's "How to Read a Legal Opinion: A Guide for New Law Students."

Lukegilman.com includes a link to Kerr's 2007 article as well as other helpful posts on succeeding in law school. Kerr, a professor of law at The George Washington University Law School, writes that his guide "is designed to help new law students prepare for the first few weeks of class. It explains what judicial opinions are, how they are structured, and what law students should look for when reading them." Kerr's article guides students through gleaning information from cases and provides tips on what law professors are looking for from reading assignments.

In explaining why professors rely on the "case method," Kerr writes that there are historical and practical reasons for doing so:

To understand the law, we need to study the actual decisions that the judges have written. Further we need to learn to look at law the way that judges look at law. In our system of government, judges can only announce the law when deciding real disputes: they can't just have a press conference and announce a set of legal rules. (This is sometimes referred to as the ‘case or controversy' requirement; a court has no power to decide an issue unless it is presented by an actual case or controversy before the court.) To look at the law the way that judges do, we need to study actual cases and controversies, just like the judges. In short, we study real cases and disputes because real cases and disputes historically have been the primary source of law.

If you're a first-year law student, you're undoubtedly already overwhelmed with reading assignments, but Kerr's guide is likely worth finding some more reading-time. 

Public interest lawyers, law students and law professors should be alert to ACS ResearchLink. ACS ResearchLink, now in its third year, is an innovative on-line resource for the legal community. The project leverages previously untapped resources to generate and shares new ideas about important legal issues, while engaging the next generation of lawyers in addressing vital law and policy issues. In a nutshell, the program works by having public interest practitioners submit legal research topics for law students to write on under faculty supervision for academic credit. The topic authors receive copies of the resulting articles and the best papers are published in the searchable ACS ResearchLink e-library. Law students using ACS ResearchLink are also encouraged to have their works published in printed journals. ResearchLink papers have been published in journals including the California Law Review, the Oklahoma Law Review and the San Francisco Law Review.

Public interest lawyers can get involved today by visiting the ACS ResearchLink Web site and proposing research topics for law students to explore. Law students eager to make connections with public interest lawyers and for their legal scholarship to have a real world application should search the database for available topics. Students can also help promote ACS ResearchLink by making sure their classmates, professors and law review or journal editors are aware of the resource.

If you have questions, are able to help spread the word about this unique opportunity or have ideas on how to promote it, please contact Virginia Adams Marentette at vmarentette@ACSLaw.org or send an e-mail to ResearchLink@acslaw.org. 

Today ACSblog is launching a new feature that will periodically provide practical advice for law students, lawyers and others in the legal and policy community. The inaugural post highlights efforts of The University of Chicago law professor Brian Leiter in helping students and graduates pursue careers in legal academia. Though Leiter's information for "Academic Job-Seekers," contains some Chicago-specific advice, it offers a great deal of general information for those interested in legal academic careers. See here for a handbook containing information, created by Leiter, on the academic job market.

We hope you enjoy the new ACSblog "practical advice" feature.