Part 1 of the Nontraditional Students series
00:00 S1: Welcome to the Legal Learning Podcast, I’m Jolene, your host and with the Legal Learning Center I help pre-law students and law students with their legal journey.
Today we will hear from Alex , Alex is the first in a 3 part series of interviews with nontraditional students. Alex took about 10 years off before returning to law school. Stay tuned to find out what he did to ensure his reentry to school was successful. At the end I’ll share my top take aways and thoughts but first a quick word from our sponsor. Financially Free Aspiring Attorney is a course with over $300,000 in money saving tips starting in high school and going through law school graduation. Visit legallearningcenter.com/financially-free for more information on how you can avoid law loans.
00:13 S2: I grew up in Orange County, grew up in Anaheim, I went to high school. Afterwards, I wasn’t really sure what I wanted to do, but I knew I was gravitating towards two things, the sciences and the law, I was in debate and stuff like that in high school, but as an immigrant, I didn’t really think that that was something I could attain for some reason, I just didn’t really have a very good understanding of all that stuff, and so I decided to go with what came easy, which was chemistry, and I say that is understanding the statement, the implication. So I went to UCI for undergrad, really loved it, had a really good time when I came out of it, I started working in the sciences and that type of field ended up at the Orange County Sanitation District, and while I was there with my career, I started re-evaluating my life, I started mentoring at UCI, and through the mentors program, I started asking questions of myself, what do I wanna do? What is it? Boredom, passions, and so on. And so I decided at about 33, gosh, I wanna go to law school.
01:22 S2: And it took me three years to get there. And I think those three years is kinda what you’re kind of interested in basically how…
01:30 S1: Yeah. What was that? Three-year there.
01:32 S2: Yeah, so I understood that if you wanna go to law school, you need some things you need to… Recommendations from professors, you need letters of recommendation, basically, you need to study for the LSAT and I wanted to see, can I do it? Can I do it? One of the biggest things that I had was the mental block, this is something that is unattainable, something that I cannot do, and so I understood that I needed to keep working ’cause I just bought a house. And I needed to keep working and I need to go to a nighttime program, so there were only two schools that had that at the time, which was Whittier Law School and Western State and… So I said, Okay, I looked at the program and I said, Alright, you gotta go to school Monday night, Wednesday night, Thursday night, so that’s three nights a week, so I enrolled at… I believe it was Orange Coast Cyprus college, one of those junior colleges, and I took Introduction to Philosophy, Introduction to Logic, Introduction to Business Law, and they were at night staggered, similar to what law school would be like, and I went to work during the day and I went to school at night, it served two purposes.
02:38 S2: One, can I do it? The schedule. Two, I got letters of recommendations from the professors, right, so that was one thing that I did over a year period, and I said, Okay, you know, this is something that I can handle as far as energy wise. Then I thought, okay, well, now I need to study for the LSAT. Just study, put sat. Meanwhile, I’m saving money, right? I’m saving money, saving money too. It’s kind of funny, when I was younger, right after I finished my chemistry degree, I took the LSAT back then, and I got the same exact score, but my score switched where I did really well in the reading this time around, but the games I just kinda froze up, but then before I did really good on the games and where on the reading, so then it took me about a year to put all my package together, my applications together, write my letter of intent, my letter took me longer than anything, I was just so nervous, am I gonna get rejected and all this kind of things that you worry about that now you realize in hindsight, no one even…
03:51 S2: It’s just all in your head.
03:53 S1: Yeah. It’s not quite as big a deal as you think it is.
03:56 S2: Yeah. Yeah, and when I got accepted, I got accepted to both Whittier and Western State, but listen State offered me a scholarship to go there. And so I ended… And not to mention what Whittier also did away with the night time program, so I said, Okay. Well, that’s my only choice. And one thing I wanna go back to real quick, as far as me deciding I wanted to go to law school… When I first went to law school, I didn’t realize that I would be doing what I’m doing today, which is I’m working for the county as an attorney. I had no idea that I’d be in public service. Again, I had already been a public servant working for the sanitation district as a chemist, and I was really in love with interacting with the community. We would give tours all the time, and I was always giving tours, I’ve always been kind of passionate about public speaking and just being with the public in general, and I’m not saying that that’s what all has to be, ’cause you can do transactional stuff, but I wanted to maximize my earning potential, and I believe that law would allow me to do that, and I also knew that I could stay within the sciences because you could be an environmental attorney, you could be a patent attorney, and there were some attorneys at my work, so one thing I would like to advise anyone thinking about this, ’cause I literally spent about a year or more interviewing people at my work that I identified as leaders, and so I would email them, Hey, I see that you’re a scientist who went to law school, I’m interested in pursuing that same path, can I pick your brain about what it was like, and I would email them, they were always very positive and let me come and receptive and I would go speak with them, I would interview them and kinda help me draw on a blueprint of what it is that I wanted to do that
05:41 S1: That’s great. I wish more people would do that.
05:45 S2: Yeah, and so then once I understood that it was a career opportunity that I could take within my own field, again, I remember one of them telling me, Look, he went to law school when Seinfeld came out, and he said that he’s like, he finished law school and then he started watching the Seinfeld and that helped him. By going back, it’s always different when you go back when you’re a little bit older, it… You were a little bit more focused. When I was an undergrad, I wanted to go surfing, I wanted to do all these things. And you don’t realize that going to your lab session and I went, is more important than making sure that you go party that Friday. Yeah, so when I went to law school, once I got accepted, I actually posted a thing on my Facebook that said, This is a count up, this is not a count down until the day I graduated, ’cause I understood that I’m elevating myself and anybody who’s going by the way… I think that if you have any kind of inclination that you want to go into law school, that you should…
06:53 S2: Even if you don’t finish, even if you realize at the end of it, this is not for me, because having that answer is worth more than any than anything, because I don’t believe in living a life of regret, I don’t believe in living a life of questioning. I believe in living your life and really seizing every opportunity that may come in front of you, so when I went to law school, I went to with that mentality, that mindset of, I’m not gonna say no to any opportunity that comes my way, and so generally speaking in law school, I did everything other than mock trial, but my intern at the DA’s office and they let me do a real trial, I guess, and I didn’t travel abroad, those are the only two things in law school that I didn’t get to do it.
07:43 S1: So… Okay, you said that it took you quite a while to apply, do you feel like that extra time it took to apply was maybe going to impact your ability to be successful and hit the ground running when you… In law school.
07:57 S2: The funny thing is, is when I finally applied, the driving force behind me, I’m finally putting all my stuff together, is the fact that I had gotten so many people to write me letters of recommendation, I’ve gotten so many people… I believe in the “put it out there to make it happen” versus keeping it secret. And so there were so many people who were giving me positive energy that I eventually applied for them, if that makes any sense, as well as for me. And so it was something that is just gonna have to do my parents, believe it or not, no offense, Mom and Dad, I love you guy. My parents were not supportive, they couldn’t understand it, they’re like, Look, you’re already making a great… You already have a great career as a chemist, you’re already making a lot of money, and actually it took quite a bit, to get back to the money that I was making before, I was already stable, I had a retirement plan, like I had everything but, I wasn’t feeling satisfied internally as far as my ultimate goals, I loved being a scientist, and I still am a scientist, it’s not like that ended.
09:02 S2: And I love the work that I was doing, but I just wanted to do a little bit more and I wanted to pursue my passion in reflecting on what it is that I wanted to do when I grew up to that… Right, what is it, do you wanna do in five years, in 10 years? I understood that no matter how long my life went, I’m always gonna sit back and wonder, Should I have gone to law school? And I needed to answer that question. And so, in waiting the three years that I waited, it was just… The best way I can describe it is that I turned a dream into a goal into a reality, and that process was very systematic and it was very planned out, and it was good that I followed the plan. I postponed my LSAT exam twice because nerves, you get scared like, Oh God, maybe if I study two more months, maybe if I studied one more, it’s just all excuses. So trust in the process. Put a timeline for yourself and follow it, a person knows themselves best. Like I said, I was still saving money ’cause I kinda knew that there was gonna be a junction or I would have to make a decision, am I gonna continue working and I’m gonna focus on school full-time.
10:15 S2: What am I gonna do? So my first semester in Law School when I started, it was so incredibly foreign just because it’s different than anything you’ve ever done, and I know that a lot of people would think, Wow, you had a science background, how could you even do it in law school? You’re not a political science major, you’re not an English major, is surrounded by those individuals, but you very quickly realize that the study of law is formulaic, there’s a formula that’s built in, that the way that cases are written is formally the IRAC… And the way that the rule statement, when you summarize a case is following that same method, like everything has a method to, and once you crack that method, all of a sudden things click, so I have to make a lot of sacrifices in order for me to go to law school, having a relationship was very difficult in that first year, year and a half, because I owned my house, I had to pay for my mortgage, right. So I often looked for opportunities to rent it out… So when I did that, I had to live with my parents.
11:29 S2: I was now 36, 37, so that’s strike two. And then when you’re in school, you don’t really have an income, because after a year, I decided to focus full-time on school, and I let go of my career. ’cause I was committed and I had to make other sacrifices. I didn’t hang out with my friends because the time demand of developing skills that are so skill set specific to law school was something that was time-consuming, and I just told my friends like I’ll see you in four years… You know what I mean?
12:07 S1: I said the same thing.
12:08 S2: Exactly, I’m gonna have to do this and then the first year and the second year, right around Thanksgiving, the school will give you a few days off and then it’s finals after two weeks of finals, and my brother had just had kids like a few years before, so the kids were… My nieces and nephew were like five or six years old, if that… And they were germ bags, and every year around Thanksgiving they would get me sick, and as a student, your immune system is compromised and everyone around you is sick, and now all of a sudden you’re confronted these three adorable cute bags of germs, and so I would get horribly sick during finals. So for the last two years, ’cause I went to school for four years, for the last two years, I would not see my family around Thanksgiving, I just wouldn’t… I’d be like, Look, after finals, I’m gonna get at least two to three weeks off. Christmas and New Years, I’ll hang out with you guys. You can get me sick all you want, and that’s when I’ll see… You know, so that… That was kind of some of the sacrifices that you have to make when you’re a little bit older going back to school, because we have things that we didn’t have when we were 21, 22.
13:19 S2: We have a house, I had a car that had to make the car payment, so as far as some of the difficulties of going back, there’s a balancing, there’s a balance between… I could have maybe gone one year sooner, but at the same time, I also needed to make sure I had all my ducks in a row, it… I had everything that I needed to have. And that information, what did I need to have? It came from the application process, you live at the application process for law school, and you identify what are some of the things that I have… And what were some of the things that I need? I needed letters of recommendation, I needed to get… Oh, my transcripts. Gosh, just all the transcripts of all the schools that I’ve ever been to it, ’cause I was one of those weirdos who like, Oh, the summer I’ll take a class at this college for fun. Well, now I have to go get that transcript and then figuring out which school Can I go to, so I really do think for those individuals that are thinking like… Genuinely thinking about going to law school, I ask yourself the question, Do I really need to go to school part-time? Because if the answer is no, I can go to school full-time, consider leaving the job that you have before you start…
14:31 S2: And I know I’m jumping around in the story, but I can tell you as far as career-wise, I have to start a new career at 41, and that does hurt a little bit, in the sense that you’re like, Oh God, I could have been retiring 15 years had I stayed as a chemist, but my job satisfaction today is unparalleled compared to where I was 10 years ago, and that’s because I thought about what it is that I wanted to do, understanding that it was a little bit later in age, understanding there was gonna be a lot of sacrifice, understanding that the reward is worth it, having individuals that you can speak to about your path such as yourself is priceless, it’s just priceless because you can have so many doubts washed away, you can have so many questions answered. And the way I would describe it is, if you were to have a GPS and you wanted to have a look, you’re like, This is what I wanna do. You need two points, you need a starting point and an endpoint, and then the GPs can guide you along in your path, and that’s what you are, you…
15:42 S2: Yeah, that’s what you do. And the only way that you can guide these individuals, just by them opening up to you and answering really tough questions, like, Can I go to school without working…
15:53 S1: Right. Now, do you feel like ideally, if you were to go back, do you feel like you took too many years off, do you feel like as far as being able to focus in law school or feel like you maximize your time, do you feel like five years off would be better, 10 years. Two years. Is there some ideal… You see.
16:12 S2: No, it depends on the person, and that’s because I had let go of even the concept of going to law school since high school, I never even thought it was something I was gonna pursue until I was much older, had I left undergrad with the understanding that I’m gonna go to law school. I think two to three years is good, maybe five years max, so for those individuals who went to undergrad thinking, I’m definitely going to law school, then I think three to five years is good because it’s a mature a little bit… I can tell you at Western, most of the individuals who were in the top te% of class, we were all older, I’d say more than seven of us in the top 10 had jobs, and I’m talking about careers, not just jobs. Our top student was a surgeon. He literally took away every single excuse that anyone could ever have, he’s married, he’s a surgeon. He would always come to school in class with all the cases ready, all the reading is done, all the outlining is done, all the homework is done, he bring us coffee that he would make, he would bring us treats, he was still a loving husband and he made sure that Friday night and Saturday day were devoted to his wife, he was a loving father, the guy was incredible.
17:36 S2: And watching him made me and at least realize, this is definitely something that I can do, and not only is this something that I could do, this is something that I can excel in, that I’m always gonna say yes to every opportunity… Right. So going back to answering your question. It depends. So I also have peers in my school who were warriors is the only way I can describe it, because these women were having babies while they were in law school, so here I am, you know… Oh, gosh. Such a tough day. Oh, I need coffee. And here she is seven months pregnant, can’t drink coffee, right. Okay, so one of my friends had three kids while she was in law school. These are all things that you have to factor into consideration… So a lot of my friends got married. One of my friends in law school, he got married on the first weekend after the introductory week, every Saturday he’d be at the library Saturday, Sunday, his wife would come and have lunch, and then he would go have dinner sometimes he’d come back and study some more.
18:47 S2: Sacrifices. When you’re done with undergrad and you and your significant other decide, You know what, we’re gonna get married for his career or her career, we’re gonna move out of state, we’re gonna do something or other, and then basically come back and now it’s coming for you to go to law school. So you were establishing his or her career for three to five years after undergrad, now it’s time for you to go back to law school. That’s perfectly reasonable. These are the kinds of things where people need to take to consideration what is your specific situation, maybe you have to take time off to go to care of a grandfather or grandmother who’s not doing so… Families pulling you away, maybe you wanna go explore China and write a wonderful book about cuisine, it just depends on what it is that you wanna do, because law school, unlike any other vocation, it doesn’t matter what you studied for undergrad, I could be a ballerina. You could be in an English major, you could be… It doesn’t matter because when you go there, nothing really prepares you for law school, the LSAT sort of prepares you for law school.
19:54 S2: I genuinely think the LSAT and the bar reflect… The LSAT reflects what a law school is gonna be like, and the bar reflects what going to trial is like, you prepare for months and months, then you have three days, and then it’s in somebody else’s hands. The jurors, it’s out of your hands, and so there’s wonderful metaphors for these exams that really do apply to life as an attorney, but I don’t think there’s an ideal number, but I think so long as the person stays on target… ’cause some of my peers in law school… Came back to law school when they were in their 60s. Because ultimately, the question that you have to ask yourself… And that’s the question that I asked myself. And this is true for anything. You wanna learn how to ride a bicycle. Do you wanna go to law school? The question that you have to ask yourself is this, I’m going to turn 40. That was the question I ask myself, and I was 36. I’m going to turn 40, it’s gonna happen. Do I wanna be 40 and a JD? Or do I wanna be 40 wondering if I should ever go to law school? That’s it.
20:59 S2: That’s the question you gotta ask yourself. Three years from now, four years from now. The time will come. That’s what you learn as you get older. Right, when you’re 20-21, you don’t think that way. You know what you’re thinking about is the weekend… All you’re thinking about it, what are we gonna do, when are we gonna go to the beach? So I understood very quickly when I ask myself Would I rather be a person wondering what if, or would I rather be a person who’s actualized… And again, this is why I said what I said in the beginning, go to law school, even if you fail, because you’ll answer that question once and for all for yourself. Because I had a lot of people who started, and then they said This is not for me. And then they would pursue something else, got a PhD, etc, and this just completely change their entire life and Outlook, it’s phenomenal, what other catalysts can you do that would create such wonderful… Transformation. And so once you understand that you wanna go to law school and this is something that you wanna do, whatever it is that your purpose may be 100% pursue that and pursue it with passion and drive, borderlining obsession in my opinion.
22:11 S2: Okay, that’s just my opinion. That’s what I have to do. I have to be obsessive about it in order to be successful about it, for me, I’ve had other friends who are just brilliant and who didn’t have to work as hard, who still pass the bar on the first try, and they had a much easier time in law school, maybe they had outlines from people, I don’t know, you know what I mean? But the point is, is that they had a much easier time going about law school in general, but the way I envision what you’re describing to people going back to school, people who have an undergraduate degree ’cause he… Not on California, you can go to law school with only a high school degree, as long as you’re 19, you don’t need a Bachelor’s degree, so I’ve met some people like that too, but you finish your schooling, you’re either getting married or having kids or starting a career that you think you’re in love with. And what you very well could be… And life happens three years ago by… Six years go by. Oh my God, I just turned 30. All my friends are doing this.
23:12 S2: All my friends are doing that. What am I doing? When I was 28-33, I traveled. I just traveled, I spent… Every other year I would go wonderful, beautiful places, ’cause I had a wonderful career and I was traveling, and then there will come a point where for me, it was working with young adults and realizing, Wow, I’m getting these people mentorship, and I’m wondering what it is that I don’t wanna do it on… And going back to law school and the longer it takes, the harder it will be for you to make that decision, and it’s certainly not impossible. I think it’s okay to take a break. It’s perfectly okay to come back later, there’s really no limits unless you put them on yourself.
23:51 S1: I think you are so inspiring, Alex, you are just full of this positive message, and it’s something I think a lot of returning students or wanna be returning students really needs to hear, and I definitely agree, I felt more focused after taking two years off that I would have been going straight through, I was much more dedicated to the purpose to myself, and so I 100% agree with what you’re saying that there is a sweet spot between… I think, I wish I had taken maybe one more year off, so three to five years, I think is absolutely perfect. So is there any last tip you have for anyone that is thinking of returning… I know you’ve given us so much already… Yeah.
24:35 S2: So the main thing, and I know this is not the subject, but when you do go to law school, when you do get accepted, ’cause it will happen if you apply, you will get accepted somewhere and you go, go somewhere, literally release all the limits, you’d ever put on yourself. And just go full throttle. Okay, my first semester, all I thought about was, Don’t get kicked out. I just don’t get kicked out, second semester, just keep the scholarship was my main focus in the beginning of my third semester, I was literally sitting in the cafeteria, I was looking around and I’m like, Wow, I’m surrounded by really intelligent human beings. I don’t have to hold back and just go full throttle… Okay, every opportunity that comes your way… Take it.
25:20 S1: Okay, thank you so much for joining us today.
25:23 S2: Sure, it’s my pleasure.
Alex is so inspiring, isn’t he? Before we get into my top take aways, a quick word from our sponsor Juno. If you need to take out student loans, check in with Juno first. Juno can often offer law students a lower interest rate on their loans than the federal government not only with no cost to the student but also with cash back. Visit joinjuno.com/p/legallearningcenter for more information on how you can save money. Okay so my top take aways and thoughts.
First, night classes at the local college helped Alex with letters of recommendation and peace of mind, knowing that he could work and go to school. #2 he conducted several informational interviews. I highly recommend that everyone do this as much as possible. #3 He recommended you go to law school even just to determine if it’s right for you. Now if you’re going to do that, I recommend you try to pay cash for that year so you’re not followed around by debt for many years but to find out whether or not it’s right for you rather than wonder for the rest of your life, that’s what Alex recommends. Next tip, he returned with more focus. Taking that time off helped him do better. Alex recommends about 2-5 years of gap years to help you mature a bit and finally he says make a plan and stick to it. Delays are just excuses. Okay, that’s it for this episode but be sure to check in next week for part 2 of our nontraditional student series when we talk to Tina who will tell us what it’s like to be a mom while in law school. And if you learned something today please like, share and subscribe so this show can help those who need it. Thanks.
If you enjoyed part 1 of our Nontraditional student series, check out part 2: one mom’s story at http://legallearningcenter.com/tina and part 3: learn more about students with disabilities in upcoming episode 9.
