Estimated reading time: 19 minutes
The Law School for Veterans series was written by a friend of the site who is a current veteran student at a Top 10 Law School. Going from the military to law school can be a popular option for many veterans looking to take advantage of their GI Bill.
Today, in Part VI, we’re going to discuss what to do starting from the moment you make your final law school decision. I’ll discuss both necessary and optional preparatory tasks. Then I’ll give you a primer on starting at law school.
GI Bill Paperwork
The level of paperwork required to use the GI Bill is surprisingly small in my opinion. The first thing you should do—and this can be done before you leave the military—is make sure your GI Bill rating is accurate. Sign up for, and check, ebenefits. VA websites aren’t the most user friendly in the world, but I found ebenefits to be easy enough to navigate. This can get tricky if you’re deployed or at an overseas location because of two-factor verification issues, so you should do this as early in the process as possible. You can view a current determination of your benefit as it stands currently as well as order a Certificate of Eligibility (COE). Once you have your GI Bill 100% locked up, I recommend you go ahead and order that CoE.
Once you’ve completed that, your next important document is your DD-214 Member 4. This is the form that will be used to verify your military service for the rest of your life, so it pays to make sure it’s accurate before you’ve separated from the military. Once you’re out, you’re out, and all those free services that you complained about while you were still in (deservedly so in some cases) are no longer available.
Question those separation counselors to make sure that all your documents are 100% accurate. This is not a point in your military career where “go along to get along” applies. If your documents aren’t correct, you need to rock the boat until someone who matters will listen.
Once you have your DD-214 and your verification of GI Bill eligibility through ebenefits, you have all the paperwork that you SHOULD need to provide, on your own, to your school’s appropriate financial aid/military benefits administrator. I say “should” because I only know my own school’s counselor. She’s amazing. She helps make sure that everyone’s paperwork is squared away. But you may not have that A+ financial worker at your school. I highly recommend (probably before you’ve accepted an offer to attend, but certainly before orientation) emailing your new school’s financial officer and asking about this process. Here are the additional forms that your school should provide that you will be responsible for submitting before starting school:
- Application for In-State Privileges (state schools): GI Bill users are considered in-state residents, for tuition purposes, at any state school they attend. This usually requires some sort of state-level certification before benefits can be issued. As far as I know, this doesn’t apply to private school attendees.
- VA Form 22-1995: If and only if you’ve previously used the GI Bill at another institution, you will need to fill this form out to change the institution that’s now going to receive your checks.
- Military Education Benefits Request (MEBR): This form needs to be completed EACH SEMESTER that you attend school. If your school has alternate trimester or quarterly or special term administration, you’ll likely need to fill one of these out for each of them. Again, consult your school’s financial office for more information.
There are potentially more documents. I know the Yellow Ribbon Program has had its own documents in the past. As far as the documents above are concerned, this is only accurate as to summer of 2021. The bottom line is that it’s important to get on the phone with someone in your new school’s finance office and ask if/when you will receive a list of the necessary paperwork that needs to be submitted before the VA will cut that check. If you haven’t received this list by July 1, it’s time to start dialing.
Moving to a New City for Law School
This should be old hat for anybody transitioning from the military. You’ve had to move before. You now need to move again. There are moving costs, both financial and otherwise, that must be considered when choosing a place to live. By now, if you’ve read any of the other parts of this guide, you know that I am a believer in cost/benefit analyses. Here we go again.
Aside from the quantitative cost of a living space, there are other qualitative considerations that deserve attention. Do you want to live around or with other law students? Do you want to live around other people your age? Do you want to live out in the country around nobody at all?
Ultimately, your own comfort, safety, and peace of mind are the most important things to consider when choosing a new home. With that said, if you live far from the school, you’re going to have to take proactive steps to connect with your classmates. If you choose to live in the law school apartments, you’re probably going to sacrifice some peace and quiet. Apartments near schools are often more costly as well. Consider your needs here and plan accordingly.
I am married and in my 30s. But my wife and I ultimately decided to live in one of the law school apartments. Yes, there are times where our neighbors can be a bit rowdy. They’re 25. I’m over it. Still, there’s something to be said about the fact that we can invite them over for a nice dinner with some wine or just an evening with couples and they don’t need to do anything but walk across the street. That helps create strong connections that would be a tougher ask if we needed them to drive 30 minutes out to a farmhouse or take a train 45 minutes out to another borough.
Other New Town Necessities
There are some things that we tend to take for granted in the military. A few that you haven’t had to worry about for years that you will need to start worrying about again follow.
Barber/hair stylist
You’ve probably spent the last few years getting AWFUL haircuts. You may balk at paying more than fifteen bucks for a cut. Get over this immediately. Search around your community for a barber who does quality work. It doesn’t need to be $100 a cut, but you need someone who can help you develop a clean look that suits you. High and tights are not professional in the legal sphere. They make you look like the vet who can’t get past his service. A barber or hairstylist who knows what (s)he is doing can improve your quality of life immensely for a reasonable investment. Get used to “affordable luxuries” right now. They’re huge in the professional world and a great avenue for inoffensive small talk. Barbers are a great start here.
One last point with hair. You may be stoked to grow a full Grizzly Adams beard after years of facial hair oppression in the military. Be aware that older partners don’t always necessarily jive with the liberal facial hair views of your fellow students. That’s not to say you have to be clean-shaven. But if you do choose to sport facial hair, it should be always neat, trimmed, and appropriately shaped and oiled.
Grocery Store:
Bye bye, commissary.
If you’re moving across the country, you should do some research to find the best food/ingredients. I don’t like paying Whole Foods prices, but I also don’t think Kroger is always the best option. If you’re going to Texas, you might want to find an HEB. Out west, Albertsons may be your cup of tea. Southeast has Publix. Where I am, Wegmans is far and away the best place to shop for groceries. Fresh ingredients can go a long way when you’re trying to prepare healthy foods. And you do need to focus on this.
There will be so many opportunities to eat for free at law school, but almost all of these opportunities will be a very small step up from digging through the actual garbage. A diet of pizza and cookies might’ve cut it at 16. You need to start mixing in a lot more fresh vegetables if you want to keep the belly off at 26 or 36.
Gym:
Some schools have their own, some don’t. I am not here to fat shame anybody, but there is real danger in that first year of getting out of the military. I did not exercise particularly hard when I was on active duty, and I still put on twenty-five pounds during my first year out. Subsequently losing that weight was five months of torture. Don’t be like me. Find your gym, keep a healthy schedule, and stick to it. Like it or not, you will be judged by how put together you are.
You don’t need to look like Michael B. Jordan or Halle Berry. You DO need to look like you know how to take care of yourself. In short, you need to present a clean, professional appearance. An extra 20 pounds (or 50 or 100) makes this harder to do. Plus, exercise has benefits for your brain and mental health too, which you’re going to want in spades during 1L.
Tailor:
Suits are a controversial topic these days. As work from home becomes more the norm, and casual dressing becomes more accepted in the professional world, I predict that suits are going the way of the dodo. Still, you need at least one for formal interviews and/or court. Best advice? Avoid the chain stores. Find a 2L or 3L who looks awesome in a suit and ask them where they got it. Be prepared to make an investment. Shoes, too. You don’t need an entire wardrobe, but you need something that you’re confident works for you when the day of the important interview comes.
Aside from the suit, learn what it means to dress smartly and casually while maintaining a professional appearance. Let’s face it, most people in the military have no idea how to dress themselves in anything other than a uniform. It only takes a five-minute walk around the company barbecue to see people in their twenties dressed like retirees and people in their forties rocking their Ed Hardy Ts that went out of style fifteen years ago.
Invest in a budget for a store that makes safe clothes that fit well and are appropriate in case you meet someone that could be of professional help one day. People don’t wear suits to class in law school. But most of your classmates are still well put together. Best advice again is to ask someone you think looks good where they get their clothes. It doesn’t need to be expensive either: $250 goes a LONG way at a Banana Republic sale.
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Starting Law School
The first weeks of law school are incredibly exciting. You’re suddenly surrounded by a collection of high achievers all eager to prove they’re a big fish in their new big pond. During orientation you will be bombarded with advice on how to succeed. You should listen politely to all of it and then immediately throw 90% of it in the trash. There are two things that deserve your focus when you are a 1L: your grades and your network.
Grades
The one thing that almost every law school student has in common is a desire to get good grades.
There are folks who don’t want prestigious high-paying jobs. There are folks who aren’t demon workers who never sleep. There are folks who don’t have huge egos about their ability to succeed in school. But rare is the student who doesn’t have at least one of these motivators. Face it, everyone is trying, for one reason or another, to be on top when grades are released. But not everyone in law school can get good grades—all students are graded on a mandated curve—and someone will inevitably land at the bottom. So how do you maximize your chances of being at the top?
Since almost all 1L courses are entirely evaluated on one final exam, I’m going to proceed as if that’s the case for you. If this is not the case at your school, you’re going to have to adapt your strategy. But most of us are slaves to the final and I’ll proceed as such.
Earning points on your finals is ultimately the only goal here. There is only one way to do that: apply law to fact. That’s it. You learn a mountain of rules and patterns while reading cases all during the fall and then on finals day you’re presented with a new set of facts and expected to apply those rules and patterns properly, thoroughly, and better than your competitors.
Notice what I didn’t say. Case briefs don’t get you points. Raising your hand in class (almost always) doesn’t get you points, having the best outline doesn’t get you points. You get points by applying the rules you’ve learned (the law) to a new scenario (the facts).
Maybe an analogy will help. Let’s say, instead of law school, you decided to attend “Cabinet School.” At the end of your first semester, you will be graded solely on your ability, in a small amount of time, to build the best cabinet possible. How would you prepare for the cabinet exam? You would certainly spend some time during the fall learning, sharpening, and preparing your tools. You would attend builder lessons. You would ask questions of expert cabinet makers. You would make sure you walked into your final with the appropriate plans to build a cabinet. But none of that will be judged by your evaluator. They simply want to see the finished product. You will only be graded on that finished product.
In law school it’s very easy to waste time over-sharpening your tools (creating case briefs) or formulating proper questions for your meetings with the expert (preparing for cold calls) but is that what’s going to matter in the end? At Cabinet School you’re only judged on the finished product of your build. It’s therefore not controversial to suggest that the most important thing you can do is to PRACTICE BUILDING CABINETS AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE.
It should be obvious where I’m going with this. If you have not spent sufficient time practicing taking final exams before exam day, you’re going to be miles behind folks who have. Most professors provide their old exams for practice and often even a “best answer” that was submitted by a student for that exam. You should treat these resources as the most valuable possession you have in your pursuit of good grades.
Taking these practice tests under timed conditions and manufactured pressure is the single most important task you have in earning grades. You’ve also got to be humble enough to share those answers with other people. Ideally four of you would all take the same practice final, all present your answers to one another, and then each person can take the good from others and learn to minimize their own weaknesses and blind spots.
Though everyone wants to score well, I promise more than half your classmates will get caught up in preparing case briefs and outlines and will not take enough (or even one) practice tests. Making case briefs and preparing outlines are SAFE things to do. It makes you look smart and diligent every day. But on finals day, you’re only scored on your finished product. Don’t fall into the trap of thinking that case briefing and outlining means you’re succeeding. You HAVE to practice.
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Preparing by taking as many practice finals as possible is not the safe route. Sometimes it makes you look stupid because you were preparing for or reviewing a practice final and you don’t know the answer to some unimportant detail question the professor asks in class. You’ve got to shrink your ego to the point where you don’t let the little things like this (the things that don’t matter for grades) bother you.
And yes, some of the folks briefing every case and trying to sound smart will inevitably still score well. Those people are probably just naturally really good at taking law school finals —unfortunately there are always people who are more talented naturally than you or I are—but you can’t let that dissuade you. You can out prepare most of your class by working smarter, not harder.
Prepare your materials so that you can take practice tests as soon as it’s pragmatic. Before the six-week mark you probably don’t know enough law in any subject to effectively practice, so don’t. You don’t want to waste valuable material. But by the middle of October you should be starting. Take a practice test in each class in October. Take another at the beginning of November. Then at the end you should take at least one more for each class during the reading period. AT MINIMUM you should have taken three practice finals FOR EACH CLASS before finals.
There are more thorough guides on exam taking that are more granular than that which I’ve provided here. Different methods work for different people. But if you internalize what I’ve written here on day one, you’ll recognize when the safe methods are overtaking your time and, more importantly, understand the need to refocus on taking practice exams.
Networking at Law School
For the first six weeks or so, all your networking efforts should be focused toward the people with whom you are starting law school. Most schools break their 1L student body into “sections” who take all of their classes together. These people are, whether you like it or not, your first opportunity at developing your new professional legal network. Doing so is, in my opinion, just as important as doing well on your exams at the end of the term.
There are no hard and fast rules about developing a professional image while you’re in law school. As a military professional though, you already understand how your reputation in your industry develops almost overnight but paradoxically takes forever to change once it’s been established. The basics are simple: be kind, be helpful, work hard, and take time to reach out to other people in your class. You absolutely do not have to make close friends while you’re in law school. Many people choose to remain almost invisible. Law school is short—but careers are long.
You don’t know when you’re going to need help down the road. Investing in your most immediate future network, your classmates, is an investment that will likely produce large returns. Whether it’s helping to go over notes, attending a study session, or just having a few beers, it’s important to start early. Everyone is new in August. It’s inevitable that small groups will form. But you have the first month or so to develop some small, one-on-one friendly relationships with people before those groups develop. Having fifty professional contacts with whom you would enjoy having a drink is a reasonable goal leaving law school. You can probably get close to that number during 1L year if you choose to make a small effort during your first semester.
There will also likely be opportunities to attend functions sponsored by student organizations that allow you to converse with practicing attorneys. These aren’t necessary by any means, but any chance you have to make a positive connection with a current attorney is a valuable opportunity. I’ll speak more on this process, and hiring in general, in the next part of this series.
Drugs and Alcohol
Finally, we have to talk about drugs and alcohol. It was no surprise to me that people in law school would reach for alcohol to deal with stress. In many ways, law school is very similar to the military in that way. I was surprised, however, at the amount of law school events that had open bars. Whether it’s firm networking, student group mixers, dinners with your professors, or parties on the weekend, free alcohol is everywhere in law school. It’s imperative that you know your tolerance and that you regulate yourself accordingly.
First of all, a DUI is a serious crime. It’s doubly serious for a law student who is a few years away from facing a state bar character evaluation. The last thing you want is more stress leading into bar season. Make sure you budget for ride shares. This is especially important if you choose to live far away from the school. If you’re drinking, don’t risk it. Don’t drive.
Furthermore, if you’re an overly friendly drunk, an angry drunk, or simply a drunk who does some less-than-smart things when sauced, your drunken behavior will be something by which people will define you as a professional. Remember the fool’s behavior that you observed at your military ball or dining in? You will see and hear of people doing similar things at official law school functions. The difference is, where it’s kind of understood in the military, it most certainly is not at law school. You don’t want this reputation.
While I was 100% prepared to see alcohol in law school, I wasn’t as prepared for the drug use. People in the military smoke cigarettes or chew. Law school culture doesn’t particularly work well with cigarettes and/or dip. Gen Z students don’t seem to jive with them. Instead, I’ve noticed a huge amount of recreational marijuana and prescription drug usage.
I don’t think it’s a stretch to say that half your classmates will be regularly using one of, or some combination of marijuana, adderall, and/or benzos. It’s just the culture of high-achieving Gen Z’ers. And to be fair, every generation has their own drug. The 80s had cocaine. The 90s had heroin. 00s had speed. So in a way, I guess this is a normal thing.
If you have any designs in working for the government, especially for an arm of the government with only three letters in its name, just stay away. Full stop. Consider this like the military. You want to work for the government, so you don’t take any drugs, even if they’re legal in your state.
Even if you’re not looking to go the government route, be careful. Addiction is a real thing. Excuse my language, but this shit, improperly regulated, can and will hurt you. Mental health is not something to take lightly. Self medication is a pathway to some awful outcomes. I would highly advise that you avoid recreational drug usage altogether. If you think you might benefit from an antidepressant or a stimulant, please go see your doctor first.
Conclusion
Hopefully this is helpful in getting you through the summer and fall of your 1L year. If you take nothing else away, take these points: You must be kind and helpful to everyone. You need to do what you can to develop your professional network. You should avoid irresponsible consumption of drugs and alcohol. And, maybe most importantly, you must take practice exams to prepare for finals.
In Part VII, the final part of this series, we will discuss how to find a job while you’re in law school.
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