This is the 4th in our Series of Interviews regarding Nontraditional Students
0:00:00.4 S1: Welcome to the Legal Learning Podcast. I’m your host, Jolene, and with the Legal Learning Center, I help pre-law students and law students with their legal journey. Today we will chat with Lisa Lang, a truly non-traditional student about her path to becoming an attorney and what she does today after I’ll give you my top takeaways, but first, a quick word from our sponsor, Financially Free Aspiring Attorneys is a course with over $300,000 in money-saving tips. If you wanna go to law school but you don’t wanna pay for it, visit legallearningcenter.com/financially-free for more information on how you can avoid law loans.
0:00:52.0 S2: My name is Lisa Lang, and I currently serve as the general counsel for Kentucky State University. I have been there for going on four years now, prior to working for Kentucky State University, I worked in various roles in the state education agencies, and then prior to that, I was with the Attorney General’s Office, and then I did a stint before that in private practice, and I was also in the military.
S1: Okay, so yeah, we’re gonna discuss your experience both before you were an attorney and a little bit after, so let’s start with, where did you go to college?
S2: So I initially went to college in Illinoi.
S1: Okay, what did you do after college? I knew I always wanted to be a lawyer and to go to law school, but after having gone to school with and getting an English degree, the thought of writing another paper or reading another book made me physically ill. And I got married and then I moved to be with my husband. And then he immediately got deployed in Desert Storm, and so I was kind of not sure what I was gonna do at that point.
0:02:18.6 S1: Okay, so did you work at that time? I was a domestic engineer at home. So I did work at home, but what I did do while he was gone, what I thought I would do is I started taking paralegal classes at night, and during the day, I volunteered at the Attorney General’s Office in New York, that’s where my husband was stationed. In the Bureau of Consumer Fraud. So I was doing that for the purpose of becoming a paralegal because I knew that I wanted to do the law, but I was not sure I was ready to become a lawyer, and so I did that, and one night they had a recruiter from the military come to one of the classes that I was taking in paralegal studies, and they had indicated that they were looking for what they call a higher caliber solder with a bachelor’s degree who would come in and be a paralegal, and up to that time, that military occupational specialty was very small and it was closed, they were not accepting any more people into that but they were opening it up for people who had this credential, and at the time…My husband was deployed in Desert Storm, and we knew we were getting out. And he was frustrated with me because the assumption was he was gonna get out, I was gonna be a teacher, and he was gonna go to school, and I kind of blew that. And so I couldn’t get a job. And so when my husband was gone, I enlisted in the military while he was deployed, and when he came home I said, Hey, guess what, I have a job, so when you get out, we’ll be fine… I’m gonna go in the military, and he was fine at first when he thought I was gonna be an officer, but when He found out I went and enlisted. He was like, What are you thinking? But so yeah, that began my paralegal period in the military for six years.
S1: Now, were you ever deployed?
S2: I was, I was deployed to Bosnia-Herzegovina in the late 90s. At the time, I had just had my second child. And we were stationed in Germany. My son was four months old and my daughter was a year and a half old, and they told me that I would be deploying on Christmas Eve, and so I was there for 11 months. So I left my husband and my two children in Mannheim, Germany, and I was deployed for 11 months, and I was attached to the 18th military police force as their legal clerk.
S1: Wow. So with two little ones, just gone for a year.
S2: Yeah.
S1: Wow, that’s pretty serious.
S2: Yeah, it was a lot. I remember my grandmother was saying, we’ll just tell them you’re quitting… It’s a little more complicated. So yeah.
S1: Yeah. Okay, so you were gone for almost a year. What happened when you came back?
S2: So when I came back, I had made a decision prior to being deployed, I really thought that the military and being a paralegal was gonna be the thing that I was going to do, but after that deployment, it made me realize that it was not the life I wanted with children and a family. And what they told me was that, that deployment didn’t count. So when you are talking about duty stations, when you’re in a small military occupational specialty, you get a duty station state side, then you go to some place like Germany where you can bring your family. And then the next duty position is on a company tour for a year in Korea, and they did not count my Bosnian deployment as part of my one year on a company tour, and so they told me the chances are my next duty assignment would be on a company tour to Korea. And I was like, Yeah, no. So I did agree to reenlist to go back to the States. Under the agreement that I would not go to Korea and I could pick a… I could at least request a duty station as close to home as possible, because it was at that point I was going to exit the military.
S1: Yeah, it seems like if you’ve left your family behind for a year, it should count for something.
S2: But what I would say is, we are active all over the world, and everybody is putting in those kinds of sacrifices and… You just have to be willing to make those sacrifices, and I just made a decision that it was not something I could do. And part of it is, when you sign up, you agree to make those sacrifices, but you don’t know what that means until you actually start having kids and having a family, and then you realize… I’m not really sure I knew what I signed up for when I signed up for it. So there’s a lot of people who do it every single day. I thank them for their service that I just knew, I did mine and couldn’t do it more anymore…
0:08:03.0 S1: Yes, one of my closest friends in law school while she was studying for the bar, and I can’t remember she was pregnant or she just had twins, I think she had just had twins, and her husband was a reservist and was also being told you may be sent over to Iraq a year and she did not pass that bar because it was a little stressful. Fortunately for them, he did not get deployed and she passed the next time, so… But you don’t realize what it means until it’s your turn, so… Yeah, it’s a big deal. Alright, so what did you do after you left the military.
S2: Then prior to completing my tour at Fort Knox, I found a position in Mobile as a paralegal, and so I went there and I did that position, and I think maybe six months into doing media litigation, paralegal for a pretty big firm, I decided that I was gonna go ahead and give law school a shot, so I applied, and surprisingly enough, I was accepted, and the reason I say that is that my LSAT score was nothing to write home about. I really think part of the reason why I ended up getting accepted, and they told me this too, was I was accepted into the night program, and they said Actually, a lot of the non-traditional students actually did fairly well, and so I was accepted into the program, I worked during the day as a paralegal, and then I went to law school at night. The part-time program was four years, and fortunately, because when I went in the military and I already had a degree, I had a choice between long repayment or the GI Bill, I selected the GI Bill so I could use the GI bill to pay for my law school.
S1: Fabulous. So how was juggling children, job and night school.
S2: It was tough. And so the thing is, I just come up of a deployment from… In the military, so it didn’t really feel all that different than the life I had been leading. I always believe in adding challenges upon challenges, and so I ended up getting pregnant the second semester of law school, so it was a lot. It was a blur. It was hard, it was not easy, but I was fortunate in that I had a very supportive husband, supportive children, and my bosses at the firm were very supportive and I did not study at home, so when I was home, I was 100% there for my kids, or at least I tried.
S1: It is really hard and children, young children like that need a lot of attention, so yes, they want a lot of Mommy time. So how many gap year was that that you took…
S2: 10.
S1: Okay, so you went to law school four years. Now, does the GI Bill pay for part or all of the school,
S2: so it paid for… Really, all of it. Now, what I will say is, all the money that I got did not go towards my tuition because of my surprise… It did go to day care, if I had not had my child, I probably would have 100% paid for it, but it probably took not very many years, but a few years after law school to pay it off because I had diverted the money, some of it on to care for my youngest child. And then I also sent my husband and my three children a few years to places like Disney World, and I didn’t give him a budget and just said, Go, Here’s money, just go, but it was kind of a reward for having to be with me for four years.
S1: Okay, that’s great. I mean, taking out some loans is obviously not a problem, it’s much better than taking out all the loans,
S2: and it was a choice and I made a conscious choice. And my husband and I had a conversation about it. Because your mental health is as important. And I wanted to make sure that not only was I in a good place, that I wanted my family to be in a good… So there were some things that I was willing to go into debt for. But we’re not a… I’m not talking any more than $10,000, that’s nothing compared to what a lot of people had to go through, and I made that up pretty quickly as soon as I graduated because I went from being a paralegal at that front to being an associate… My salary, doubled, that’s always a nice thing. If you have that job before you pass the Bar Exam is suddenly you’re sitting at the desk and then… And especially a lot of people are sitting maybe in a cubicle one day and then the next day they are in an office and are making a lot more money,..
And it’s funny when you talk about stress. I think there’s stress associated with the fact that, Oh my god, if I don’t pass the bar,… How am I ever gonna find a job? But there is a tremendous amount of stress over… I have a job, but it’s contingent upon passing tomorrow, and I made the mistake of telling one of my friends at my law school, I’m sorry, at the firm, what my number was because they put it on the internet, and the reason I told her my number ’cause it was number two, I was a second person in the room in the morning. And so when I called everybody, ’cause I took the day off, ’cause I thought, I don’t wanna go to work if I fail it, so I’ll go home and I drive to Illinois and I opened it up with my mom and my sister, and so I called work and I said, Okay, good news. I passed and like, Oh yeah, we already know. She’s like, What you told us your number you…
S1: Yeah, I’ve never heard of somebody giving out their number… That is insane.
S2: I was not thinking. Yeah.
S1: But no, it’s very true. Having worked at one place for a long time, I’ve seen people come and go through that process, and it’s very nerve-racking, I’ve seen people pass, not pass, and I’ve had friends who at other firms had to take the bar several times, and it’s just… It’s very nerve-racking when you feel like your employers just relying on you to get this thing done.
S2: So I went to law school and I had a study group, and in my set, there were five of us, and of the five of us that we were all non-traditional, of us, two passed, three did not, and the reason I believe they did not pass was because they did not do the Barbri and… Or they did not do the Barbri and do exactly what they told you. I did it, it was like, I was crazy. I freak out if I couldn’t do one thing they told me to do and my other friends continue to work, and they’re like, Oh, this is easy, I’m good. This is not hard, and I’m like, Okay, that may be the case. And I may think I know this, that I’m doing exactly what they told me, and that’s what they told me later is if they had done exactly what they were told, every single line, they would have passed…
S1: Absolutely agree. My group of three, the one was the Iraq person, so she’s kind of out, but the other one didn’t pass and I would call her and she would be taking a nap, so all I did was Barbri and I passed. I don’t think it’s too hard. If you stick to a slow and steady wins the race kind of a thing, it is hard, but yeah, it’s a good system.
S2: And if you do exactly what they tell you to do, I don’t know anybody who did exactly what they were told to do to the letter that did not pass, most of the people had an inflated sense of confidence that they didn’t have to do everything and listen to everything.
0:16:39.3 S1: Yeah, I absolutely agree, because what I found at my school was a lot of the top rank students actually didn’t pass, and a lot of the average students did pass, and I think that’s a matter of that attitude, so… Yeah, attitude is fear. Yeah, ’cause it can be over-confident and are sometimes, if you harness it correctly, it can feel… They get you through. So I know after you pass the bar, at some point you’ve worked for big law… When was that?
S2: Yeah, so I went to the firm that I worked for as a paralegal, I ended up being an associate for that firm for about four years. Okay, and when I would complain to the partner that I was working for about how tough life was, she wouldn’t have any part of it, because when I was a paralegal, she was an associate, and then when I became an associate, she became a partner, and she was like Lisa, you have no room to complain you knew what you were getting into, and you know what? I think what people need to understand too, when you become an associate, you go into big law… Go into a private practice, they hire a whole bunch of people at the associate level, knowing that not everybody is going to be offered the partnership, and it’s like You give a certain amount of time, and if you do not develop in the way that they think is a good fit with the firm that you’re at, you will be told that you do not have a future here, and that’s what happened to me.You know, and there was a part of me that was a little bit of angry and a little bit of resentment when I had an evaluation and they basically told me that I needed to start thinking about another plan because partnership was not in my future, and that was a really hard thing to hear. And everybody says, when one door closes, another one opens. And I think that that conversation was the best conversation I had, and it caused me to go and look for other opportunities, and I did… And it was because I left private practice and I went to work for the Attorney General’s Office in Kentucky. That job was wonderful, it gave me so much confidence and I had so many positive things that happened and so many wins that were wins. I either was an instrumental part in a group or I went on my own, and so it was… For the first time, it reinforced, ’cause I had this feeling when they told me that I wasn’t gonna… I wasn’t partnership material and I didn’t have a future at my firm that somehow I might need to consider not being a lawyer.
0:19:28.4 S2: The Attorney General’s Office, made me feel like, You know what, I am a good lawyer and it’s a business, and if I didn’t sit with them, that didn’t… That didn’t… That was just not… I didn’t fit their need, but that didn’t make me less of a person, a lawyer, but it’s hard when you’re going through it …
S1: For sure, it was like a break up. And then you wonder, What am I good for? But no, there’s so many different types of legal jobs out there that… Yeah, there’s private, There’s government, there’s in-house, and I know you’re in-house now, so what’s the difference with in-house?
S2: So what I really love about what it is that I do now is that when I worked for the Attorney General’s office, it was litigation just like I had done at the practice, and while at the Attorney General’s office, I developed an expertise in the area of education. And I left there and initially went in-house at a state agency, Kentucky Department of Education, and I did… Part of the work I did was litigation. Part of what I did was as an assistant general counsel, and so I think what I…
0:20:40.5 S2: And over time, and now I work with the Kentucky State University. Over time, I began phasing out the litigation practice and doing more what a typical in-house lawyer does, which is advising the organization on a whole variety of matters, and what I enjoyed about it is having been in litigation, I could work with them to solve problems and to prevent problems or to position themselves when problems came up, that the problems would not be as bad or maybe we could handle them without having to go into litigation. So I love working in-house now because I say it all the time, I’m a strategic partner, and I help solve problems, and I really enjoy it, and I enjoy… It’s an intersection of Business and Law, and I love the intersection of business and law, and the reason I was able to go in-house was because I developed an expertise in an area in the law.
S1: I love that because it also sounds like there’s a better work-life balance there too…
S2: You know what’s so funny about that? What I have learned is that it has nothing to do with the job that you do. It has everything to do with you as a person, and you set boundaries, because I work now for a university, and this university has students who are on campus 24 hours a day, so there are days when… It feels like there is no such thing as work-life balance because… And especially with covid, there was so much that we had to work through to figure out… So in some respects, I feel like I work just as hard as I did when I was in private practice. In some ways, I feel even less in control of my schedule than I was in litigation with court orders and knowing to some degree what I had to do in order to plan for a trial, but what I would say is that experience has taught me how to… Create boundaries, and I like to think as the supervisor… And I posted about this the other day on LinkedIn, is asking the question, does it have to be done now, and before, my instinct was someone say this to get done, and then I would just put everything aside and do it, but sometimes I think it’s worth asking the question does it have to happen now, or can I take off.
0:23:18.9 S2: Because it will be there when I get back. And the nice thing is, yes, I have job security because then that matters taken care of, there’s gonna be something right on the heels, so you have to learn to create the boundaries. Rest, relax, recharge. Now, when you’re more junior in your career, it’s a little bit harder to do because you have somebody else who’s setting the tone and creating the culture, and so I think there’s something to be said for… You don’t find a job, you find a good boss because that boss will allow you to do that, but being a lawyer in general, that work-life balance, to me, you don’t always feel like you’re out of balance, and it’s always about trying to figure out how to get it back.
S1: I know that you said that your university is actually working on a new program that will benefit students interested in law. So what’s that program?
S2: So we call it a three-plus three agreement, and so we’ve got law schools in Kentucky, none of which are at my university, but what we’re doing is we’re working with these law schools to create a program whereby they come to our school for three years and then on the fourth year, they go to the law school, and so the fourth year is essentially your senior year of your undergrad, and it’s the first year of your law school experience, so theoretically, you can get it done in seven, but let’s say you do it in six years instead of seven.
0:24:45.4 S1: So it’s a year off… That’s great. How much money does a student who does a three plus three program end up saving in general.
S2: I’d have to take a look at it ’cause I’m really not sure how much it costs to go to law school now. But it is pretty significant by shaving off one full year of law school, because in the 20 years… And I can’t even believe it’s been 20 years since I’ve gone to law school. The debt that so many students take on has skyrocketed, so when you think about it, and that’s partly because of the cost of tuition has gone up so much, so now for this three plus three program, do you have to enroll at a certain point, so… Yeah, I think we’re working through the terms, but I believe that you have to give notice by your junior year. As a freshman, I do think what they’re trying to do is we will try and promote the program and encourage people to participate in events relating to the program…
0:25:56.5 S2: Because I think what’s so very important for all of potential law students to do is to do everything you can prior to making the commitment to the law school and going to law school. To make sure that is what you want. And so if you can do internships that you can be closer to the law to make sure it’s what you want…
S1: That makes sense. Okay, so you come into college as a freshman, probably already kinda have that idea of, I’m kind of interested in law or something like law, so start looking in that program, participating in internships or things of that nature, and then by junior year, commit to the program and then your senior year you would go to the other university and two… Three years there. Okay,
S2: yeah, and we’re talking about doing a lot of mentorship programs, and we have a pre-law society, so I can see 10 students join the Pre-Law Society as a freshman or sophomore, and then they’ll be given the opportunity to participate in programs that we are partnering with with the Law School, to include maybe a boot camp, we’ve talked about doing a boot camp with the schools we’re partnering with, where they’ll teach them writing and legal analysis and doing all sorts of things that will help them to make the decision that they want to be part of that program because we don’t want anybody in the program that is not committed to it and is not willing to put the time or effort into it,
S1: and now those students would not need to take the LSAT,
S2: that is under negotiation, but at this point the three law schools that I’m working with are gonna all require the LSAT and I would offer that prep too.
0:27:52.5 S1: Is there a certain GPA that these schools are requiring…
S2: Yes, yeah. Okay, and that is the thing too, is when you go into the program, the law school can reserve the right to not accept you, it’s not guaranteed. But yeah, we want to be able to provide our students with the money that it takes to take the LSAT, so they don’t… It’s not an expense they have to pay, so there’s other things that we are working on, benefits or trying to help create for them, but… Yeah, you’re still not gonna get around the GPA, you’re still not gonna get around the LSAT score, and until law schools come up with a better way of identifying candidates who are most likely going to be able to complete the program… Those are the measuring sticks they use, and what we all have to remember is that law schools are rated and evaluated based on their ability to get people through the program, and they’ve got metrics that are not going to look good for accreditation purposes or for promotional purposes, if it looks like the students that come here go and get the program, but then can’t graduate… Or can’t pass the bar?
0:29:28.1 S1: Right, that makes sense. Yeah, I definitely see the benefits of this program. I know for someone like myself, like you said, you have problems memorizing, I needed some time, you know, I needed some time off to take a brain break, I needed time to improve my GPA my senior year, I think I just needed that time to study for the LSAT, aside from school, I’m so impressed with students who add the LSAT on top of their studies, I just… I knew I wanted no part of that, so I took a gap year so I could do that separately. But it’s a lot of work, and so it’s great ’cause those who are kind of already on that trajectory of they can do anything, especially those who… College comes super easy for them, this is a great program, it just gets them right through it and save the money,
Yeah, and you mentioned that you post on LinkedIn, I know you have a series on LinkedIn, why do this not that? Which I have been loving. Where did you come up with that idea?
0:30:51.9 S2: So many people were getting conflicting advice on certain areas, and so what I wanted to be able to do is to say, You know…There are some people who believe that this is the way you do it, but this is the way I want to tell you that I think is a better way to do it. And more importantly, why is it better for you to do it this way? Because there’s a lot of noise out there. And so I was hoping to use the series, especially for in-house lawyers, and I’m trying to write it in a little bit more of a general manner so that it can be transferred to other professions.
S1: One of your posts really resonated with me, which was, get out of your seat and talk to people, talk to accounting, talk to whoever, and I can tell you there has been several times in my career where doing something like That has been so beneficial. I had one time, I was a newer attorney, new to my corporation, and I was walking by an empty office and there’s a guy working in there, and it was just like… He doesn’t belong there. Who is he? And so I just said, Hey, who are you? And we just chatted for a minute, and then I went back to my desk and I did my work, it turns out he was someone in the corporation that was traveling.
0:32:06.2 S1: Okay, no big deal. A couple of days later, my boss comes into my office and he’s like, So that was our regional manager, and he’s really impressed with you, and I’m like, I just said, I hi… Didn’t even really talk.
S2: what he probably saw in you and in that interaction is that’s who you are as an employee, and it doesn’t matter who it Is you’re speaking with… You are friendly, respectful. So I think it’s kind of like, you know, that show where it talks about The Undercover Boss, where you go in and do that, you are going to treat everybody the same way regardless of who they are. Now from where I love about doing it is there are so many things that I have been able to fix with the help of my internal partners, I like to call them, and I’ll give an example, when I’m reviewing contracts, there is… I’ve got a checklist of what I’m working through, but there’s long provision that I never looked at, and that provision is that you have to pay your bills in within 30 days, and when I came to find out in talking with our purchasing director is that we were getting dinged in late fees, because the way our accounting system was set up, you had to do it in 30 days, if I was approving contracts with net 10, it’s important to reach out and be like, Hey, who are you? How can we work together more, you know? When we all are part of the same system.
0:33:40.8 S2: Yeah, and what’s so funny is all these posts are born out of me doing what I say not to do, so most of the time, it’s because I have personally done what I’m saying not to do, a lot of my experience, I think was valuable because it helped me prepare for the job that I had and it has helped me from not making some missteps some other people have because I made them earlier in my career… Not as a lawyer.
S1: Yeah, well, Lisa I really appreciate your time today. If people wanna get into contact with you, where can they best find you?
S2: LinkedIn is probably the best thing.
S1:I’ll make sure to link that up in the show notes, but… Yeah, thanks so much for joining us today.
Before we get into my top takeaways, a quick word from our sponsor Jino. if you need to take out student loans. Check in with Juno First. Juno can often offer law students 1 to 2% less in interest rates below the federal government, and not only would no cost to the student, but often times cash back as well. Visit joinjuno.com/p/legalLearningCenter for more information.
Alright, so my top takeaways from this chat with Lisa first, I think the overall theme for today is, life is not linear, I see so many students who are in a rush to get to the finish line, but there is no finish line. You need to take it day by day and enjoy the journey. Now, don’t worry about how fast others are going. Lisa took a few twists and turns, but in the end, she had law school paid for… She has a nice job. She’s enjoying life. There were definitely some pros and cons, I’m not gonna say there weren’t, but… Look around. Take your time and figure out what works for you. All right, so number two, with respect to the military, there were definitely some pros and cons, right, so she got law school paid for, but she had to leave behind her babies, it’s really hard to understand what’s being asked of you when you sign up with the military, until you actually have to do it, and then that one year didn’t even count.
0:36:07.8 S1: So check it all out, it may be something that you’re interested in to help pay for college or law school, but heavily weigh the negative side of that too. Alright, and then she also is the author of the Why do this, not that series on LinkedIn, which is super helpful. It provides valuable tips for lawyers and for law students, so you don’t wanna miss out with that, make sure you follow her or connect with her on LinkedIn, so you don’t miss that series. And then as a side note, she mentioned the three plus three program that they are beginning to implement at her school, we will have a guest in a few weeks on the show to discuss the three plus three program in more detail, so stay tuned. Alright, that’s it for this episode. All the tips, links and so forth will be in the show notes. The full transcript will be available as well legallearningcenter.com/Lisa, and next week we will chat with Lindsey of World Wise Tutoring, she’s going to explain how executive functioning can help you do better in law school. if you learn something today, please like share, comment, subscribe, so that more people can see the show and it can help those who may need it.
Be sure to check out episodes 7-9 for other nontraditional student stories.
