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ApparentlyGradesMatter 2 - 15 Nov 2010 - Main.AndrewGradman
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< | I guess the audience for this post is members of the Class of 2012 who took the class last? Hello, members of Class of 2012. I took this class three years ago. I was a member of CLS Class of 2010 but I'm graduating this December, a semester late. | >
> | I guess this post will be syndicated among various LawContempSoc veterans of the Class of 2012? Hello, Class of 2012. I took this class three years ago. I am a member of the Class of 2010 who will graduate (strangely) this December. With graduation a month away, I've been reflecting on this class's continued influence on my life. | | | | |
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< | With graduation approaching, I've been reflecting on this class's continued influence on my life. Actually, I doubt whether things would have been much different if I hadn't taken the class. I came to law school with the figurative "eggshell skull" -- a head full of intellectual and professional and personal insecurities. These were inevitably going to sabotage my law school performance, under any conditions. So I can't truly be certain about this class's continued influence on my life. | >
> | Messages from this class have followed me constantly. Nevertheless, I feel uncertain about what that influence amounts to. I came to law school with the figurative "eggshell skull" -- a head full of insecurities which were bound to affect my law school performance under any conditions. I was predisposed to make the decisions I made -- to disdain professors and peers and professionals for inscrutable reasons. | | | | |
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< | What motivated me to write is this: I am applying for jobs. I have accumulated three years of terrible grades. And now I am learning that my grades foreclose me from countless paths that would have appealed to me -- clerkships, academia, additional graduate school, government, nonprofits (oh yeah, and private practice). For three years, this horror story has slowly been spreading out and blotting out my future -- a situation of my own making. | >
> | Likewise, I chose how often I would go to class, how much to read, how much to prepare for exams, etc. Believing that "grades do not matter," and acting on it, was something I fell into easily, and of my own accord. | | | | |
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< | I thought it would be worthwhile to supply this information, as an example that challenges the categorical claim that "grades do not matter." In fact, to the extent that you are not capable of detaching your self esteem from society ("the consumers of grades"), grades matter. Also, if you think it's OK to aspire to be comfortable (i.e., to aspire for some configuration in which you aren't "afflicted," either by circumstances or by interlopers), grades matter. Finally, if you don't want to look back on your graduate school experience and remember it as wasted, grades matter. | >
> | But now that I have those grades -- three years of terrible grades, which put me among the lowest percentiles of my class -- I can at least say that I was wrong. | | | | |
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< | "Modern Legal Magic" remains a wonderful essay. But people use heuristics all the time to substitute for precise measurements, knowing that they're heuristics. Grades can be heuristics and still matter. | >
> | Grades, apparently, do matter. My grades foreclose me from countless paths that would have appealed to me -- clerkships, academia, additional graduate school, government, nonprofits, and--yes--private practice. Grades, apparently, do matter -- at least to the extent that I aspire to be comfortable (i.e., not afflicted -- either by virtue of my circumstances, or by people who see that I'm comfortable). At least to the extent that I absorb my society's definitions of success and failure. At least to the extent that I will always regret a graduate school experience that was a waste of time, money, and opportunities.
"Modern Legal Magic" is still a great essay. In light of it, I acknowledge that grades do not "matter," in the sense that a witness's perjured testimony that you murdered somebody does not matter. But in the sense that jurors will nevertheless rely on heuristics to compensate for imperfect information in deciding whether to sentence you to death, grades apparently matter. | | | -- AndrewGradman - 14 Nov 2010 |
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ApparentlyGradesMatter 1 - 14 Nov 2010 - Main.AndrewGradman
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> | I guess the audience for this post is members of the Class of 2012 who took the class last? Hello, members of Class of 2012. I took this class three years ago. I was a member of CLS Class of 2010 but I'm graduating this December, a semester late.
With graduation approaching, I've been reflecting on this class's continued influence on my life. Actually, I doubt whether things would have been much different if I hadn't taken the class. I came to law school with the figurative "eggshell skull" -- a head full of intellectual and professional and personal insecurities. These were inevitably going to sabotage my law school performance, under any conditions. So I can't truly be certain about this class's continued influence on my life.
What motivated me to write is this: I am applying for jobs. I have accumulated three years of terrible grades. And now I am learning that my grades foreclose me from countless paths that would have appealed to me -- clerkships, academia, additional graduate school, government, nonprofits (oh yeah, and private practice). For three years, this horror story has slowly been spreading out and blotting out my future -- a situation of my own making.
I thought it would be worthwhile to supply this information, as an example that challenges the categorical claim that "grades do not matter." In fact, to the extent that you are not capable of detaching your self esteem from society ("the consumers of grades"), grades matter. Also, if you think it's OK to aspire to be comfortable (i.e., to aspire for some configuration in which you aren't "afflicted," either by circumstances or by interlopers), grades matter. Finally, if you don't want to look back on your graduate school experience and remember it as wasted, grades matter.
"Modern Legal Magic" remains a wonderful essay. But people use heuristics all the time to substitute for precise measurements, knowing that they're heuristics. Grades can be heuristics and still matter.
-- AndrewGradman - 14 Nov 2010 |
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