Thales

For my credentials, I attended (and completed) both graduate school and law school. I'm now a corporate lawyer helping big companies get richer. Feelsogoodman. Hate to break it to you, but if you want to "help people", don't go to law school. Legal education and the legal profession generally have little, if anything, to do with "helping people". Also, as an aside, if "disparities" and "social injustices" really get you riled up, you might feel more so once you're looking at a six figure debt load and dismal job prospects after obtaining your legal education. And yes, if you think you're going to be spending a ton of time in court and arguing the philosophical minutae of caselaw, you're completely off-base about what it's like to be a lawyer. I can only think of one exception to this statement, and that's criminal law. Good luck subsisting largely on legal aid certificates for the first 5-10 years of your career though. ETA: Ignore all of the above if you come from a wealthy family and simply want to "explore" your "interests" with a law degree. Money isn't an issue for you, and you can afford to spend the rest of your life as a staff lawyer at a legal aid clinic. Congratulations and enjoy that $30K a year salary.

I'm glad to hear that there are more people who are interested in organized crime studies. When I entered my MA some years ago, the field was still quite small and niche -- so it became rather easy to make a name for yourself and contribute something new. To answer your question: look into Frederico Varese at Oxford's Department of Sociology. He's probably regarded as one of the top minds in Organized Crime studies internationally.

I appreciate the feedback surefire. To answer your question: the truth is, I've always enjoyed the theoretical rigour of academia. I also think the life of an academic is better suited to my lifestyle tastes -- albeit, I've long had reservations about the job market for humanities and social science academics. In fact, I had acceptances from both UofT and McGill to pursue a PhD in Criminology and Sociology - respectively - which I had foregone for law school. While law school is fine (and a unique challenge in itself), I found that part of me regretted the choice not to do a PhD earlier. I have found that I prefer writing papers and thinking critically about issues to the rote application of legal principles to hypothetical fact patterns (which is characteristic of most of the law school pedagogy). But again, I still find myself hesitant to enter academia wholesale because of my lingering reservations about the employability of most PhD graduates. I guess I was just trying to get a sense of what people thought about this.

Hi everyone. I'm not certain if I'm posting this question in the right place. I understand that this forum is intended for "professional students" in law and that "graduate law students" are something of a different animal. First, a bit of background: I already have an undergraduate and graduate degree from a Canadian university. I am now in the process of completing my Canadian JD (entering third year). I'm writing here to solicit some opinions from current LLM and/or doctoral students about the prospects of a graduate law degree (employment, etc) and consequences otherwise of pursuing one. I'm worried that further graduate degrees will make me totally unemployable to any area but academia, and I have some doubts about the virility of Canadian legal academia. I'm mostly concerned because I've listened to some disparaging commentary about the legal academy from non-law academics during my time as a graduate student. Thanks!

I'm only completing an MA, but I quite enjoyed my graduate program. I will be finishing up my thesis this summer and off to law school. Of course, there were times when I felt a little discouraged, inundated with work, or etc. However, I believe that these highs and lows are normal. There is no shame in admitting them. I believe what is most important is that the pros of your program should far outweigh the cons, and I believe that for most graduate students (or at least, among those I have met) this is the case. Take care and good luck in graduate school.

There will likely be a few dickish members of your cohort also. I never realized that grad school was a bit like elementary school until I got here.

Haha, sounds exactly like my situation. My advisor fully expects that I will be pursuing doctoral work in my future, but I'm mostly decided against doing it. However, I think you should at least give the opportunity full consideration. Of course, though, that is your choice. If you know that you never wish to do a PhD, then the choice is pretty clear. What I told my advisor is that I intend to work for a year or two before entering a doctoral program. I also made it clear that I was only considering the possibility of doing a PhD (along with other options) and wasn't get committed wholesale to the idea. This will allow me to come back to the opportunity without much difficulty explaining why I want to do doctoral work (after all, I was "considering" it for a year or two), but also allows me enough time to distance myself from academia (and my advisor) if I choose not to pursue that route.

No offence, but most of these sound like really bad reasons to spend another 5-7 years in university (i.e. to have the prefix "Dr." appended to one's name, to avoid the labour force, etc). These are reasons that I am trying to avoid propelling myself to making this kind of choice. A "love of research" sounds reasonable, but how many undergraduates (or MA graduates, to be fair) have legitimate experience conducting research? Is there anyone here that truly loves their field and never once doubted the prospect of pursuing a PhD for its own sake? Perhaps I'm being naive.

I envy those of you who attending institutions that were a bit... shall we say, "loose" with grading. I had to work hard as hell for As at my undergraduate alma mater (course averages are C- to C+). This is part of the reason for my curiosity about graduate grading.

Re: uselessness of student evaluations -- agreed. These things tend to correlate almost perfectly with the sort of marks you award your students.

In my experience, much of your student ratings will depend on your evaluation techniques. Make your expectations clear, do not rely too heavily (or at all) on student-led presentations, and give every student an A (ha!). You should see a drastic improvement in your ratings.

Wow. This is really more common than I expected. I think my situation is in large part due to my uncertainty about the future and because I am still waiting on the results of my current law school applications. I remember having a similar loss of motivation in the final semester of my undergraduate degree.

Thanks guys. Any more thoughts?

Is it true that the MA is "more work"? (at least, the "day-to-day") The PhD students in my department seem surprisingly lax in comparison to the MAs.