| 
To Have
What It Takes: Essays about Character (back
to contents)
Law school—and
the profession in general—is demanding. No admissions
officer wants to admit students who are simply enamored
of a career in law from watching the current hot lawyer
show on TV. Law school means spending hours and hours, night
after night, reading obscure cases written more dryly than
your tenth-grade algebra text. It is not glamorous. It is
rarely fun. Law school requires hard work, self-discipline,
and a high tolerance for tedium and exhaustion.
If you have
endured before, and done so with humor and good nature,
by all means tell your story. Don’t be a martyr, though.
Whining complaints about all your hardships are tiresome.
The reader will just think: If it was so bad, why didn’t
he do something else? Miserable students—even smart,
hard-working, miserable students—can make everyone
else miserable, too. No professor wants a classroom full
of bright but depressed legal scholars.
High spirits,
on the other hand, are infectious. In Thomas Kelly’s
essay, the playful tone makes you think he really enjoys
living in the squalor of the West African bush. Since he
can laugh about his fly-infested food and the battle to
acquire it, a long night of study or a stressful trial should
be a cakewalk to him.
The writer of
the next essay does a good job of turning the problems she
faced (some of which appeared on her transcript) into a
story of personal victory. By itself, a low grade in sophomore
French might have hurt her application. But with this essay,
she was able to convince the admissions officers to overlook
that lapse.
The third essay
offers an authentic voice and an effective presentation
of the applicant’s skills and motivations. However,
it’s probably too long, and the recitation of GPA’s
is redundant.
The last
essay presents the character of a young southern woman
as she developed her own goals in the shadow of a strong
and successful mother. By describing moments of her life
in a well-written, exciting style, she revealed traits that
made her a successful student at one of the top law schools
in the country.
(back
to contents)
|
