I have a relative who started his own firm, but it was only after he had worked for 6 or so years at a large firm developing a specialty and getting clients. At the time he left to form his own firm, he was an associate in the firm with more clients than many of the firm's partners. Most of the clients went with him when he left and he gradually grew the firm into a regional practice with multiple attorneys. He hustles too, giving speeches, joining boards of local nonprofits, etc. I recall him saying that he goes out to lunch approximately 4 out of 5 weekdays per week, meeting with clients or prospective clients or colleagues. Rarely works nights or weekends though, from what I can tell. Starting your own firm definitely isn't for everyone!

To put in very simply, the system in the U.K. requires actual practice as part of the curriculum to graduate and become license. This is vaguely similar to the residency requirements in medical school. The U.S. legal education system should really adopt the U.K. approach but of course that would not be profitable to many of the law school mills since it would deter a lot of potential students given the time commitment.

So to say that a law school graduate in the U.S. can hang his own shingle is really akin to asking a med school grad to open up his clinic less the residency experience.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am the OP, and I am not a lawyer. I was just wondering. It's interesting that law schools are not training lawyers. I wonder what their value added is. Perhaps law schools need to refocus their training on actually training lawyers through cooperative programs or apprenticeships with actual law firms. What stops that idea? It would certainly save firms money and train up lawyers who can do the job out of the gate. You are actually learning a trade, after all.

I'm a lawyer and think that we could shave off a year and a half of law school or, preferably, make that last year into a year and a half apprenticeship time. I think the first year and a half is valuable because it trains you to "think like a lawyer," which basically means upping your critical thinking skills and training you to see the different sides of arguments, etc. But the practical training is very small - some people work in clinics or do some third year practice work, but I think it would be much better to be immersed in working in the law, more like they do in the UK.

But, yeah, I wouldn't hire someone who just passed the bar with no training to take on a case of mine solo. It would be only slightly better than the blind leading the blind.

Yeah, the first two years of law school are valuable. You learn basic legal terminology and concepts, how to read a case, how to structure a legal argument, etc. But the third year should be much more practical--a graduate should have had some practical experience. Some students do clinics or other practical classes, but they aren't required, and most lawyers get a lot of on-the-job training. Some of that is to be expected--there are 50 states, each with their own legal rules, plus federal practice, and you have to learn the ropes of your jurisdiction. But more practical work would help. I still wouldn't hire a solo attorney fresh out of law school, though.

I have friends who did go directly from law school to their own solo firm. They work 80+ hour weeks plus spend every waking moment hunting for new clients or court appointed work. Others are still on the document review circuit while waiting for business to drum up. None of them are really making any money and seem to be solo out of necessity rather than for opportunity or the old "be your own boss".

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Hey OP, why don't you go and open up a bakery? Because you surely know how to bake brownies and shit so why don't you just open up a business where you hold yourself out as an expert at baking everything and make money that way?

IT person here (and person who started a company at age 26). A lot of my friends from college who were in the IT field did indeed start their own companies right out of college. There are fields where it's possible, and tech in particular -- lots of young people in it.

You're missing the point: Law isn't one of those fields. Does your company have a general counsel? Did you hire her straight out of law school with no experience? Facebook's inaugural general counsel had an impressive professional legal career before he assumed the post: federal appellate clerkship; Supreme Court clerkship; partnership at Kirkland & Ellis; assistant general counsel to America Online; associate White House counsel; chief of staff to the U.S. Attorney General. And again, that was Facebook's very first general counsel -- in 2008. Software engineers can go straight from the dorm room to Facebook's campus. Lawyers can't. Maybe your company is different.

+1

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Hey OP, why don't you go and open up a bakery? Because you surely know how to bake brownies and shit so why don't you just open up a business where you hold yourself out as an expert at baking everything and make money that way?

IT person here (and person who started a company at age 26). A lot of my friends from college who were in the IT field did indeed start their own companies right out of college. There are fields where it's possible, and tech in particular -- lots of young people in it.

You're missing the point: Law isn't one of those fields. Does your company have a general counsel? Did you hire her straight out of law school with no experience? Facebook's inaugural general counsel had an impressive professional legal career before he assumed the post: federal appellate clerkship; Supreme Court clerkship; partnership at Kirkland & Ellis; assistant general counsel to America Online; associate White House counsel; chief of staff to the U.S. Attorney General. And again, that was Facebook's very first general counsel -- in 2008. Software engineers can go straight from the dorm room to Facebook's campus. Lawyers can't. Maybe your company is different.

Anonymous wrote:Hey OP, why don't you go and open up a bakery? Because you surely know how to bake brownies and shit so why don't you just open up a business where you hold yourself out as an expert at baking everything and make money that way?

IT person here (and person who started a company at age 26). A lot of my friends from college who were in the IT field did indeed start their own companies right out of college. There are fields where it's possible, and tech in particular -- lots of young people in it.

Hey OP, why don't you go and open up a bakery? Because you surely know how to bake brownies and shit so why don't you just open up a business where you hold yourself out as an expert at baking everything and make money that way?

I actually work in legal ethics/lawyer regulation and can assure you that inexperience + solo practice is a bad combo. But since the legal market tanked in 2008, there actually have been many more new graduates or young lawyers going out on their own.

i agree that law schools could offer or require more in the way of practical training. But honestly the primary problem I see is that it's not easy for a lawyer to learn the profession, generate business, and run a business (within ethical rules!) at the same time. Corners get cut, things get fudged, money isn't handled properly, margins are really tight, you start drinking too much bc you're under pressure, then the work truly goes to shit...I'm not sure any law school curriculum could really prepare someone to handle those sometimes competing pressures at once. There's a reason lawyers have extremely high rates of depression and substance abuse. But I guess it keeps me busy, so there's that.

There are some law programs that are essentially making the third year a practicum - I think Washington & Lee is one. It would be very helpful. The amount of time and effort we spend teaching new associates how to actual be a lawyer is staggering for someone who spent three years in an expensive professional degree program.

Anonymous wrote:I am the OP, and I am not a lawyer. I was just wondering. It's interesting that law schools are not training lawyers. I wonder what their value added is. Perhaps law schools need to refocus their training on actually training lawyers through cooperative programs or apprenticeships with actual law firms. What stops that idea? It would certainly save firms money and train up lawyers who can do the job out of the gate. You are actually learning a trade, after all.

I'm a lawyer and think that we could shave off a year and a half of law school or, preferably, make that last year into a year and a half apprenticeship time. I think the first year and a half is valuable because it trains you to "think like a lawyer," which basically means upping your critical thinking skills and training you to see the different sides of arguments, etc. But the practical training is very small - some people work in clinics or do some third year practice work, but I think it would be much better to be immersed in working in the law, more like they do in the UK.

But, yeah, I wouldn't hire someone who just passed the bar with no training to take on a case of mine solo. It would be only slightly better than the blind leading the blind.

Anonymous wrote:I am the OP, and I am not a lawyer. I was just wondering. It's interesting that law schools are not training lawyers. I wonder what their value added is. Perhaps law schools need to refocus their training on actually training lawyers through cooperative programs or apprenticeships with actual law firms. What stops that idea? It would certainly save firms money and train up lawyers who can do the job out of the gate. You are actually learning a trade, after all.

I wonder this too, and I wonder whether there would ever be any changes like this. Just to add a different perspective, I'm from the UK and am qualified both here and in the UK, but I started and trained in the UK. There, it is much more of a vocational training process. There is the academic part of law school (which you can do as an undergraduate, or you can do any undergraduate degree and then a postgraduate in law), then there are very practical courses which are focused on the specific skills of being lawyer (including subject matter expertise depending on your interests but also things like accounts for lawyers, ethics, advocacy, etc. But even the subject-specific stuff is designed to be practical - for example, you might have studied real estate law in the academic stage of law school, but then at the vocational training stage, you'll learn how to draft the leases and sale and purchase documents and about the processes of selling/buying land). These courses are usually developed with firms so firms have a lot of input into what they would find useful for their lawyers to learn. Then once you have completed this stage, you have to work in a law firm for 2 years, rotating around different practice areas (also good because you get significant experience in different practice areas and can make an educated decision after 2 years on the area that you want to stay in). You are basically a first/second year associate (you do the same work that 1st/2nd years do in the US, because it's the most junior level work) but you are not qualified as a lawyer until you have completed this stage. There's no exam at that point, your firm just certifies that you have completed the training period. The obvious advantage for lawyers/clients is that once you are qualified, you have had actual training and experience. The main disadvantage for the lawyer is pay - as a trainee you are not paid like a US first year associate (around half or less)! You get the first year salary when you are qualified (well, probably less because UK firms generally don't pay as well as US firms). But clients are happy paying very low fees for the low level of work that is done by trainees (whereas in my firm here in the US, we often have to write off first year fees because clients won't pay those fees for that kind of work). Of course, law school fees in the UK aren't anything like they are in the US, so lawyers aren't having to spend a lot of their salary paying off debt, which I think must be the reason for the high biglaw salaries here. Most firms in the UK will pay for your law school plus a small stipend, so you don't end up in debt at all when you start. It's not a perfect system at all but I think the practical training is generally a good idea.

I am the OP, and I am not a lawyer. I was just wondering. It's interesting that law schools are not training lawyers. I wonder what their value added is. Perhaps law schools need to refocus their training on actually training lawyers through cooperative programs or apprenticeships with actual law firms. What stops that idea? It would certainly save firms money and train up lawyers who can do the job out of the gate. You are actually learning a trade, after all.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:A law school graduate who can't get a job and has never practiced criminal law is not qualified to represent criminal defendants. The crisis in criminal defense stems from Defendants who can only afford shitty lawyers or a severely overworked public defender. Adding a bunch of unqualified criminal defense lawyers who are only doing criminal defense because they couldn't get any other job is not going to help.

+1. There is a crisis because many criminal defendant are unable to afford a lawyer and the public defender systems is overburdened and underfunded.

It's hard for a law school grad to even apply for one of these public defender positions.

My mentor and I were talking about this a couple of weeks ago. The Sixth Amendment simply guarantees a right to counsel. But only criminals benefit if that "right" turns into defense attorneys who litigate aggressively for their guilty clients. People lose confidence in law enforcement, and in courts as civil disputes wait for criminal backlogs to be cleared. Yet overworked defenders and lousy attorneys don't know how to put together a quick plea.

We decided that the prosecution needs to step in and decouple regular criminal defense from the Innocence Project and the Barry Schecks. DOJ could take some of the asset forfeiture money and form "plea squads" in every state in the nation. Take jobless attorneys and pay each a retainer of say $10k per annum. The attorneys need to attend a weeklong seminar at the Law Enforcement Training Center in Charleston on how to write up pleas quickly. Then get $500 a pop for each plea, with a bonus for ones that meet a standard for speed to resolution.

Now you need judges to appoint the plea squad to cases, but they'll do so because their productivity metrics will jump. The competition will also force the public defender cartel to put up or shut up. Finally, the criminals will get certainty in their future, and can start earlier on turning their lives around.

I really hope that your "mentor" is your freshman dorm RA because I fear for you both if it's an actual adult. This is the most hare-brained idea ever. The public defenders are government employees who get paid the same amount regardless of how many clients they take on. They have no reason to fear competition. And I can assure you that they are more than capable of evaluating which cases to fight and which to resolve with a quick plea, based on the best interests of their clients. "Plea squads" would violate just about every standard of ethical conduct for attorneys.

-a former federal prosecutor

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:A law school graduate who can't get a job and has never practiced criminal law is not qualified to represent criminal defendants. The crisis in criminal defense stems from Defendants who can only afford shitty lawyers or a severely overworked public defender. Adding a bunch of unqualified criminal defense lawyers who are only doing criminal defense because they couldn't get any other job is not going to help.

+1. There is a crisis because many criminal defendant are unable to afford a lawyer and the public defender systems is overburdened and underfunded.

It's hard for a law school grad to even apply for one of these public defender positions.

My mentor and I were talking about this a couple of weeks ago. The Sixth Amendment simply guarantees a right to counsel. But only criminals benefit if that "right" turns into defense attorneys who litigate aggressively for their guilty clients. People lose confidence in law enforcement, and in courts as civil disputes wait for criminal backlogs to be cleared. Yet overworked defenders and lousy attorneys don't know how to put together a quick plea.

We decided that the prosecution needs to step in and decouple regular criminal defense from the Innocence Project and the Barry Schecks. DOJ could take some of the asset forfeiture money and form "plea squads" in every state in the nation. Take jobless attorneys and pay each a retainer of say $10k per annum. The attorneys need to attend a weeklong seminar at the Law Enforcement Training Center in Charleston on how to write up pleas quickly. Then get $500 a pop for each plea, with a bonus for ones that meet a standard for speed to resolution.

Now you need judges to appoint the plea squad to cases, but they'll do so because their productivity metrics will jump. The competition will also force the public defender cartel to put up or shut up. Finally, the criminals will get certainty in their future, and can start earlier on turning their lives around.

I like the creative thinking, but having defense lawyers paid by the government (and incentivized by the government to seek quick pleas) would probably not fly for a few reasons.