Dean Satan's Halloween Carol

It was a dark and stormy evening when the cheery blond Lacey Manx fell onto the sofa and turned on the television to find a world of ebola and terrorists and extremely unattractive people.  "Ugh," she said, quickly changing the channel to... Bravo?  Food Network? Some type of frivolity.

She was twenty-four and freshly married to a healthy accountant.  He had flown off to a Flagstaff or a Spokane for an audit and left her to her own devices.  She relished the brief moment of domestic liberty.  She had worked all day in the human resources department at the bank and wanted nothing more than to order a pizza and eat, like, a whole third of it.

Lacey pulled up her cell and ordered a pizza with pepperoni, olives, and extra bubbles.  In twenty minutes of idle texting and whatever, the doorbell rang.  She grabbed a wad of cash and skipped with joy towards the door.

But there was no pizza.  Instead, there was an impeccably dressed man with thousand dollar shoes, bright red horns, a shimmering pitchfork, and a bag of intangible excellence.

"I'm Dean Satan," he crooned like sexy butter.  "You must be Lacey."
"You're not the pizza guy!"
"Hey, kiddo, with intellect like that, I can see why you got a 152 on your LSAT!"
Her eyes wide with wonder:  "How did you know I took the LSAT?"
"I'll let you in on a secret.  I've got magical access to the LSAC database."
 "But what are you doing here?"
"I think there's been some mistake, as you haven't applied to law school yet."
"Oh, I decided against it."
"I'm sorry," Dean Satan said, mockingly.  "I'm not sure I heard you correctly.  You decided against it?"
"Yes," she said.  "Now, if you'll excuse me, sir, I have a pizza coming!"
"Walk that cute little ass into my car," he said, suavely.  "I won't ask twice."
"But..."

The next thing she knew they were racing down the freeway in his silver Jaguar with the torrential rain pouring down and Dean Satan was delivering a well-rehearsed monologue about the importance of law and social justice and owning Egyptian cotton.  "Consider aliens," he said.  "If aliens show up, we have to have a legal framework in place that can accommodate intragalactic commercial transactions and intraspecies divorce and such."
"Where are you taking me?" she groggily asked.  "Did you drug me?"
"Objection, compound!" he snapped back.  "See, that's a lawyer trick!  I think; I haven't practiced in years.  Anyway, are you familiar with Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol?  Of course you are, you liberal artist, you!  Well, kiddo, welcome to Dean Satan's Halloween Carol!  I'm taking you to three stops that represent your past, your present, and your future."
"Can you please take me home?"
"Can you sign a master promissory note?"

The car slammed to a halt.  To the right, Lacey saw a modest house in observable disrepair.  Inside, a family of six huddled around a small table two sizes too small.  The driveway had a surplus of junky cars, and the backyard had a chainlink fence.

"Lacey, this is your past.  The so-called working class.  They're eating macaroni and cheese for dinner!  The father is a butt-fucking carpenter and the mother is an unstable hairstylist.  I read your personal statement, and your psychological profile.  Do you want to have five babies and wind up back where you started?"
"We're going to have two," she said.  "Then we're getting fixed."
"Speaking of getting fixed, these folks need a lot of things, but nothing is more important than legal services.  In any event, without an advanced degree, you run the risk of being right back here!"
"We're doing very well for ourselves.  While I like the law, I don't see that it adds to my career or happiness.  Please," she begged him, "can you please take me home!"
"As you wish!"

He sped down the empty roads and pulled into another subdivision.  Lacey looked quite confused as he dashed around the unfamiliar terrain and pulled to another hard stop in front of a two-story house.  She really, really wanted her damn pizza.  In the front window of the house, even through the rain, they could clearly make out a young couple sitting down for a piping-hot dinner.

"This is not my house," Lacey said, with a tone straight out of Lacey in Wonderland.
"It might as well be," Dean Satan smoothly retorted.  "Mediocre steak and mashed potatoes.  This is middle class torpor at its finest."
"They look happy," she said.  She had no idea what torpor meant. 
"But are they?" Dean Satan said.  "Somewhere in that house, there's a fireplace, and above the fireplace, a mantle, and that's where they keep their dreams.  She, in particular, has always wanted to be a lawyer who helps children as a form of vicarious motherhood.  But she toils away fooling herself in human resources.  Ghoulish!"
"Sir, I know you're trying to convince me that law school is a good idea, but I have thoroughly researched this and decided that for me and my goals in life, law school is not a good idea.  Many people who go wind up horribly in debt, and the legal job market is like trying to trying to play musical chairs with double the people and fifty pound weights on your ankles in a room that smells like dead fish."
"But you can make a difference as a lawyer!  Fight for justice and international peace treaties!  Don't tell me a pretty girl like you is all about money?"
"I'm not, and I'm mature enough to know that my self-worth is not defined by how much I can claim to help people through my education or career.  Now, please, can I finally go home? My pizza is probably cold already!"
"Alright," he said, "but I need to take a detour."

Dean Satan, indeed, took the long way back to the Manx household.  He turned into ever-deeper subdivisions, higher-numbered circles of suburban hell.  His Jaguar handled turns excellently.  It was at this point, for no reason in particular, that Lacey realized that she totally had a porn name.  It was little wonder that the pizza guy giggled a bit when she said her name.  Indeed, the pizza delivery scenario was straight out of an adult movie.  Still, she wanted her fucking pizza.  Hunger was making her stomach ache, and she started looked around the floor for mints? gum? toothpicks with residue?  But Dean Satan's Jaguar had the satanic spotlessness of the upper middle class.

...Dean Satan was rambling.  "...So that's my scholarship offer.  Speaking of scholarship, people say that legal scholarship is worthless and doesn't help the practicing bar, but those people are Negative Nellies.  Legal scholarship is cited regularly by federal judges, and more importantly, 97% of major courts subscribe to, and presumably read, our law review each quarter.  Do the Judges cite the Bible or Romeo and Juliet?  No, but you know they've probably read it!"

The car slammed to another halt in front of an imposing mansion, New Georgian style with tailored shrubbery and a three-car garage and a glass conservatory-like sitting room that she had always dreamed of one day having.  He put his hand on her shoulder.  She felt its icy claminess through her sweatshirt.

"This could be you," he said.  "This is my house.  And yes, there's a heated in-ground pool in the back with a tropical-themed cocktail bar."
"Sir," she said, desperately, "I think you've kidnapped me!  I just want to get back home and eat my dinner!"
"If you come to law school, you have an 87% chance of being employed in a job that makes $160,000 a year if some other dominoes fall.  I know you think you're happy now, but when you're old and gray and feasting on virginal souls, you will look back and say, my God, I could have had that lifestyle..."

The rain and lightning and thunder increased dramatically, as if ordered by a wicked deity.  A gremlin scratched at the side of the car.  A thumping was heard in the trunk.  Violins screeched.  Freddy Krueger may have been involved.  Dean Satan had a glimmer in his eye and smiled.  He was ready to close.

"All you have to do is come to law school and get on the open road of greatness.  Take out a modest loan.  Give law school a chance, and you, too, will understand the splendor of representing people at their lowest lows, when they most need a lawyer, while raking in cash like a crack dealer at a rehab facility.  And all you have to do is sign the master promissory note.  ...and the application  ...and the background check form.  ...and these other disclosures required by federal law."

Like magic, the glove compartment opened to reveal a stack of eerily-glowing papers, and she found a pen in her hand!  It was a silver Montblanc!

"Won't you take this Faustian bargain?"
She looked at the papers.  She really wanted to get back to her pizza and her night of peace and solitude, just letting her brain relax in front of the television in a haze of nothingness.
"Have I mentioned that the JD degree is versatile?" he added.  "Employers in all sorts of fields are rushing to sign JDs for their helpful knowledge base."
She knew this to be a lie.  "It's our company policy not to hire JDs in non-lawyer positions."
"Is it really a hard and fast policy, though?"
"There's a sign on the wall."

This stumped Dean Satan.  He was equally stumped when she placed the pen down on the stack of papers.  "It's flattering, but I'm really not interested," she said.  "I'm happy with my life, and don't need a law degree."

The pen began smoking, flaming, burning through the smoldering paperwork in a bonfire of charred dreams.  Dean Satan's face turned even redder, but he tried to keep his cool amidst the fears that his law school would have to renegotiate its bond payments if this scenario played out too many times.  My God, he thought, he might have to take a pay cut.

"Well," Dean Satan said, "I wish you the best of luck."  He opened the car door and stepped out of the car.  "Word of advice, though, refuse to drop urine if they ask."
"Aren't you going to take me home?"
"Shit, no," Dean Satan said, setting up a punchline.  "That's not my car!"

A tremendous bolt of lightning crackled overhead with a thunderous roar.  Terror washed over Lacey's eyes.  Before she could even think of what to do next, the rain and thunder was replaced by sirens and the red and blue of police lights.

Lacey suddenly understood the demand for attorney services that just a few moments earlier she had refuted with the temerity of a half-informed journalist.  "I need a lawyer!"

Lacey hated the striped jumpsuit, and she had only slept a few hours in a constant state of fear.  The whole place smelled of urine.

She was hauled into the bright, sterile courtroom and looked like ass.  She had never gotten her pizza, although she had remembered later on that she really did not like olives as much as she thought.  Her name was called, the bailiff snickered, and the elderly female judge read the charges:  grand theft auto...intent to sell...driving while intoxicated...criminal fraud in the false ordering of a pizza...transporting a minor across state lines...Sarbannes-Oxley...

For a moment, she thought about explaining everything to the judge.  "It was the law school dean," she mumbled.  Then she realized how utterly insane that was.  I mean, really batshit crazy.  Unfathomable.  Jesus on roller skates, who the fuck would believe a law school administrator would do anything untoward to get a student in the door?  The idea seemed so ridiculous that she thought about setting up an insanity plea (if only she could think like a lawyer!).  Law schools are non-profits that exist for the public good.  They don't do things like commit consumer fraud and ruin a perfectly good evening.  No one would believe her that Dean Satan was actually, like, you know, satanic.  It was totally outside the bounds of acceptability in a modern, civil society that values education and journalistic integrity.

"Ms. Manx, how do you plead to these charges?"
"I should have gone to law school!" she cried.
"I find you guilty of stupidity," the judge quipped.  Everyone laughed.  "If you had gone to law school, you could easily contest these charges like a boss. But you did not, and so you are fucked sideways."

The judge laughed maniacally.  Lightning and thunder.  Rueful tears as her peers went to law school and were almost entirely gainfully employed within nine months after graduation, many even as lawyers.  Frivolity no more.

And, somewhere, Dean Satan was resting his pitchfork against a podium at a chamber of commerce meeting, a bar association luncheon, an elementary school, working ceaselessly to turn the nightmarish dreams of commoners into the lollipops and sunshine of happy-smiley justice and investment returns.  

If only Lacey had listened...

Don't let Lacey's fate befall you, kids.  Remember, this Halloween weekend:  stay safe, don't drink and drive, and for the love of all that's holy, accept a Faustian bargain when presented to you!

Law Student Not Screwed

Not all "millennials" are singing in minor keys.  Check out this proud young law student who is destined for a 40-year tour of paradise.

Michelle, who is a twenty-three (23) year old 2L at Northwestern with a summer associateship lined up (as almost all law students have), was saddened to read an article about her generation in Crain's, which she has "delivered to [her] apartment on a regular basis in order to stay up to date with business news in Chicago."  Would hire!

I, like many of your profiled young millennials, have a discouraging amount of student loans that I will have to begin paying off upon graduation.

I knew going in to law school that I would be taking on this type of debt, and I did not allow that to discourage me. I did not give up to be a bartender or a nanny. I followed my dream. And I find it very disappointing that none of the millennials you chose to interview were able to offer an inspiring story of following one's dreams, like many of my classmates and friends have chosen to do.

The title of this article is literally "I'm a millennial, and I'm not screwed."

Three cheers for student loan debt and the inspiring dream-chasing it enables!  I'm so inspired by Michelle's unfinished story, I'm going to go out right now and sign myself up for an LLM or maybe even a PhD in legal studies philosophy or something.  The good news is that I've got hundreds of schools to choose from and a friend in Uncle Sam who's more than willing to hook me up with the good stuff. 

My dream, after all, is to chase the educational dragon.  If you ever see me on skid row, don't shed tears of pity.  I'm actually experiencing the economic reality of the lower-class individual to better understand the personal consequences of our deleterious socioeconomic policies, an elaborate form of performance art/graduate school research.  Go ahead, ask me about John Rawls.  I dare you.

Santa Clara and Pepperdine: Better Than Sex, Georgetown, and Harvard Business School

Curious whether you'll be able to afford that Audi as general counsel to a hot new start-up?  Go to this link:

http://www.payscale.com/college-salary-report/grad

and readily see just how much bank you'll make at many American law schools.

Look at the glory of it, particularly numbers 3 and 6, just look at it!  Really puts things into perspective, doesn't it?  With all the naysaying going on, people lose track of just how much money a graduate of a school like Santa Clara or Pepperdine can make when you just totally ignore the negative-nancy bad outcomes.

Even the much-maligned Thomas M. Cooley School of Law has its graduates over six figures, and is clearly a better option than many master's programs.  Go ahead and get your masters at Penn or Harvard, asshole.

Other law schools that kick ass:  Hofstra (29), Brooklyn (43), American (47), Pace (49), JMLS (62), Baltimore (63), and Seton Hall (85).  All of these fine institutions are clearly better than getting an MBA or PhD in virtually any other program.  And how!

Even graduates into so-called "public interest" fields will make $60,000 a year.  How can you lose?

Still spots available for spring semester, kids.  Still spots available.

T14? Try T169.

Lots of "scambloggers" think there are only a handful of schools in the top tier.  Princeton Review - like, a professional publishing company - knows better.  Their most recent tome is aptly entitled "The Best 169 Law Schools."  Those of you scambloggers who thought that official publication book titles couldn't get more absurd were yet again wrong.  WRONG.  Wrong.

My favorites would include the "most competitive students" list and the "most chosen by older students" list.  Of course, the greatest thing about this is that it assists the idea that there are 169 law schools that are worth going to in the United States.  Granted, they're like 30 short, but they're WAY ahead of the morons who wouldn't go to Boston U. or Texas and pay sticker.

And of course it allows some of our most unique law schools to properly boast their status as a top law school.

I'm off to go buy a copy.  I plan on putting it between "142 Best Days of World War I" and "195 Smartest Women Meth Addicts."  Alphabetical order and such.

Elon's Turn to Revolutionize Legal Education

Elon is a fairly new law school, which means they aren't behold to stodgy ideas stuck in the 1960s like all the other law schools.  Dean Luke Bierman (formerly of Northeastern) understands that now is the perfect time to become the next school doing radical things to try to connect student debtor to market wealth.

Elon will adapt a seven-trimester schedule, which means law students will graduate in 2.5 years instead of the traditional three.
...
The revised curriculum will emphasize real-world experience. Elon says it’s the first law school in the country to require all students to serve a full-time faculty-supervised residency during the academic year rather than during the summer.

Viva la revolucion!  If I wasn't so greedy with all the money my law firm is raking in, I'd sure as shingles hire someone who did an academic-year faculty-supervised residency.  No way would I instead hire someone with a "summer associateship" at some hole like Skadden.  Legal business is clearly better during the academic term than in the summer, when everyone stops working to take month-long vacations to Dubrovnik or Mallorca.

Also, tuition is reduced, so Elon students are going to have an unhealthily-high amount of debt instead of a total shit ton of debt.  That's progress!

Meanwhile, long-time readers will remember that just last week I noted the rise of hookups among law schools with single undergrads.  Lo and behold, the rabbit orgy continues.  Florida State went for a convenience relationship and now has a six-year undergrad/JD deal with West Florida.  Indiana, on the other hand, scored with Vassar for a unique scholarship-nomination program.

As pointed out in the article, Indiana has various relationships with Rose-Hulman, Wabash, Grinnell, Georgia Tech, Knox College, and Princeton.  Just like its graduates who ace the employment market, Indiana knows how to play the field.  And just like other types of noble whoring, Indiana is clearly more likely to get positive results.

Vermont Gets Its Own Delaware Connection

On their mutual love of environmental law, the University of Delaware and Vermont Law School have decided to hook up.

The agreement provides that UD students who have earned bachelor’s degrees and who meet the Vermont Law entrance requirements will be guaranteed admission into its juris doctor, master’s or joint juris doctor/master’s programs.

Guaranteed!  More and more, we're seeing law schools make love connections with undergraduate institutions, sealing their devotion with a promise of guaranteed enrollment at the law school for special certain students.  Everyone wins, particularly the students who, like children of a happy marriage, grow up to be rich.

In the olden days, these types of relationships were mostly local affairs that made intuitive sense, like Suffolk and Wheelock College.  But now, law schools are making connections at places in other states!  This is sort of like when you're in high school and the clique-based relationships make intuitive and predictable sense, and then five years later, people have discovered all sorts of ways to surprise with their love lives, and then when they approach 40, it's like "wait, what, you're marrying THAT?"  And it's always beautiful, because that's what love is.

With law schools facing increasingly-difficult times, it's reassuring that Vermont is still a hot option for Delaware, and that in the age of the internet, these two institutions were able to find each other.  Also, thank God that academia is polyamorous.

With hundreds of undergraduate colleges out there, I can imagine that law schools are working through their little black books to find all sorts of new potential mates.  Could we see a Tufts - Tulane linkage based on alphabetical proximity?  Dakota Wesleyan and Southern Methodist on their shared faith?  Will Full Sail place into Southwestern for a shared destiny of entertainment law?  Could Angelo State and Fordham "ram" each other?  Thomas Jefferson University and Thomas Jefferson Law School?  Baker University and the Cookie Monster Law School (California accreditation pending)?

Someone should make this into a game show!

A hot young undergraduate school with massive...enrollment...blindly asks lurid questions to handsome law school suitors with massive...seats to fill.  It's The Matriculating Game, brought to you by FedLoan Servicing.  Here's your host, Wink Elsac...

I would watch.

22 (!) Reasons to Go to Law School!!!

Given the general (and misplaced) skepticism towards the value of legal education, many of you may only be able to come up with 2 or 3 good reasons to go to law school.  I, being of superior stock, could likely come up with fifteen or so.

But the good folks at College Magazine* have come with a whopping TWENTY TWO!  That's the type of creativity America's business leaders are looking for!

Just look at the lead-in:

Suits and Legally Blonde convinced you that you want to be a lawyer. Will you get to argue a high profile case during your three years? Probably not. But law school offers rewarding experiences you won’t find anywhere else.

"Probably" not.  There's still a chance, SuperLemming!

I don't want to spoil all the reasons for you.  But some of my favorites include:

2. Contest a Ticket Like a Boss ("You’ll no longer have to groan when you see that white slip neatly tucked under your windshield wiper or panic when you see flashing lights in your rearview mirror."
10. Know How to Act When Disaster Strikes ("Being a law student prepares you to plant both feet firmly on the ground while the walls are caving in around you....Keep calm and get a law degree.")
16.  Get a Leg Up in the Job Market ("Law school provides the confidence and credentials for any job, even if a law degree isn’t required.")
22.  Ease into the Real World ("Law school provides a transition from the wild world of college to the wild world of life.")

This is all topped with a list of upcoming LSAC forums at the bottom.  Of course, the list omits the best reason to get a law degree, but I guess 22/23 ain't bad.

*Is College Magazine like Seventeen where it's actually read by a half-generation lower than the target audience?

Widener May Join New Identity Club

It's been a trend lately for law schools to find a new identity, like when Snoop Doggy Dog became Snoop Dogg became Snoop Lion, or when Jefferson Airplane got a hyperdrive and became Jefferson Starship.  With each iteration, better and better.

Phoenix School of Law became Arizona Summit
Thomas Cooley Law School became Western Michigan Cooley Law School
Earle Mack School of Law became Thomas Kline School of Law

More prestige, more glory, more life of luxury and splendor.  Like a new haircut or pair of sneakers, they all look hotter and way more worthy of reaping the harvest of student loans.

Now Widener might be joining the club!!!  Don't get me wrong, the name "Widener" has evoked the most estimable virtues of the bar for some time now, and their employment rate is easily the best in Delaware for said campus.  But a new coat of paint never reduced the resale price.

Let's help out that marketing firm, shall we?

Versatile Bi-State School of Law*
John Marshall College of Law
Ronald Reagan School of Law
Prestige Law School
Advantage School of Law
Excelsior School of Law
Money Law School
Didn't I do this same list when Phoenix changed its name?
Elle Woods Law School
Olivia Pope School of Law
Suits Legal Academy
New Crap Law Show College of Law

Any better ideas?  Most of my readership are dumb attorneys, so please feel free to ask more creative folks, like the co-workers of those of you who got JD-advantage gigs at marketing firms and in entertainment compliance.

*I realize the name change is designed to help the campuses splitting into two awesome law schools, but why not tip a cap to the school's legacy?