From: Greg Burch (gregburch@gregburch.net)
Date: Sun Mar 31 2002 - 11:05:54 MST
> From: Dave Sill
> Sent: Sunday, March 31, 2002 11:10 AM
>
> My son, Andy, is currently a sophomore computer science major
> at a local state univeristy with a good reputation in CS. He
> clearly has an aptitude for computers, but has decided that
> he thinks its more of a hobby than a profession. I couldn't
> pin him down on why he thinks that, but the decision has been
> made. So, we're shopping for a new major.
>
> He likes the idea of being able to see his work directly
> helping people.
>
> He's into future tech like augmentation and nanotech.
>
> He's not hung up on earning big bucks, but wants something
> with a strong job market.
>
> He's thought about law, but he doesn't really have a good
> idea of what's involved educationally, and he doesn't like
> either the high-priced-law-firm scene or the
> public-defender-who-might-have-to-
> defend-a-guilty-client scene. I don't know enough about it to
> help him decide, but I think he's got a good mind for the field.
>
> It may take a crowbar under his ass to get him to leave his
> current school since he's got a comfortable group of friends,
> some of which were high school buddies.
>
> I question his ability--at this point--to stick with anything
> through an advanced degree, so something that would be
> usable/marketable with an undergraduate degree, but with room
> for expansion later, perhaps, might be best.
I'm taking a short (minutes . . .) break from work right now and, since
I recently wrote to the daughter of a good friend who is thinking of
going to law school, the subject is on my mind. So, a few brief
thoughts.
Law school and a career in the law can be extremely rewarding on both an
intellectual and emotional level and also on a financial level. It's
also inevitably stressful and, at times (such as these last few months
for me) all-consuming, since it's more of a life than a job.
Perhaps because I "stopped out" for five years, I don't usually
encourage going "straight through" from undergrad to law school. The
idea of a 25-year-old (the usual age of someone who does go straight
through) practicing law is really kind of ridiculous. Which is not to
say that I don't have many fine young lawyers under 30 in my firm, but
there's a base of life-experience that "second career" lawyers have that
almost always puts them ahead of their peers with equivalent seniority
in practice. There's also the fact that a life in the law is very
consuming of one's "person", and people in their twenties often only
THINK they are able to make such a commitment and often shouldn't, since
they will miss out on a lot of fun if they end up devoting themselves to
practicing law too early in their lives. Given that life is long --
hopefully VERY long -- taking a few years to let one's judgment season
with broad life experience is no real price to pay. Stopping out for a
while after undrgrad school also tends to weed out those who shouldn't
make the commitment to studying and practicing law, as well, which may
address the question you have of whether your son has the
"stick-toitiveness" (as my mother used to call it) that is required for
an advanced degree and the long, long climb to becoming a fully-fledged
lawyer.
One good thing about law school and a legal career is that one's
undergraduate degree really has little or no impact on how well one will
do in law school or in practice. So long as people from the sciences
side learn good basic reading and writing skills and absorb a good base
of "civics" and history (whether in school or on their own), a technical
undergraduate degree is a fine base for a law degree and legal career.
If your son eventually decides to practice law in a field that furthers
the technological agenda we share here, a good technical undergraduate
degree is a good thing. One perhaps irreversible career choice (at
least in the current condition of our culture) is avoiding a graduate
degree in a technical or scientific area: given the unfortunate natural
tendency of the human brain to lose its plasticity for mathematics as
one progresses from one's 20s through the 30s, failing to go straight
through to graduate school in the sciences or engineering probably cuts
most people off from a career in those fields (with the few notable
exceptions on the list here standing as exceptions that may prove the
rule).
A final note about "the high-priced-law-firm scene," which is where I
practice. "Firm cultures" vary a LOT. (I could write volumes about why
and how this is.) Some are indeed stodgy and inflexible -- as they are
ALWAYS depicted in popular fiction and movies. But others -- like mine
-- have astonishing diversity and toleration for creative
non-conformity. Look at me! I'm a partner in one of the largest law
firms in the country and I have a very rewarding career with a minimum
of interference from the kinds of stultifying conformism that is usually
portrayed as the invariant reality in "Big Firms". And being a partner
in a major law firm allows me to do things that I could not do in any
other environment, from a professional and business perspective. So,
please encourage your son to be open-minded on that point and not to
judge what life and practice in a major firm is like from the utterly
misleading garbage that John Grisham writes.
Greg Burch
Vice-President, Extropy Institute
http://www.gregburch.net
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