How To Prepare Yourself The Summer Before Law School

How To Prepare Yourself The Summer Before Law School

The summer before law school is an exceptional time. You are on the precipice of an incredible journey towards your goal of becoming an attorney. This will require a lot of hard work, dedication, and energy. You might find yourself wanting to start studying the law or famous cases to get ahead. Perhaps, you have no idea what is expected of you as a new law student and are worrying if you are doing enough. Either way, you are in the right place!

Here are our suggestions for how to prepare yourself the summer before law school.

How To Prepare Yourself The Summer Before Law School

Relax

You are going to be experiencing a lot of stress and anxiety in law school. And although there are ways to manage stress in law school, you may still find yourself feeling overwhelmed. For this reason, you should focus on relaxing the summer before law school. You want to be at your best when you walk into (or log onto) your first law school class. That means having a clear mind and a rested body. You will soon learn that relaxation does not come in large quantities while in law school, so take advantage of your summer. Spend some days at the beach, get lots of sleep, stay hydrated, watch your favorite shows, play video games, whatever gets you feeling at ease. Trust us, you will be thankful for the self-care in September.

Earn Some Money

There is no denying law school is an expensive endeavor. You will always need to consider the cost of going to law school. Furthermore, being a full-time student often means you won’t have a lot of time to work and make a living. If you already have a job, we recommend maintaining it through the summer. If you do not have employment, try finding part-time or full-time work that will be manageable throughout the summer. This does not need to be a legal internship or related to law at all. Save money where you can and work through a fall budget plan. You want to rely on student loans as little as possible and saving money the summer before law school will help you do that. Just be sure you remember our first suggestion and find time to relax!

Travel

If you have some extra money available (and time), consider planning for a trip during the summer before law school. This doesn’t necessarily mean heading straight to the Great Wall of China or backpacking through Europe (and COVID-19 probably won’t let you). Instead, take a day trip to a lake or a weekend away to another part of your state to give yourself the feeling of adventure that you may crave. During law school, you will not have much time for a getaway.  So, use the summer before law school as an opportunity to journey one last time before all your hard work begins!

Read

Come September, you will be reading more than we suspect you ever have before. For this reason, build your reading and retention skills throughout the summer before law school. We suggest working through some non-fiction books to prepare you for the nature of reading you will be doing throughout law school. However, reading fiction is better than nothing at all! The point is to condition yourself for continuous reading and strong comprehension, so start with whatever you are going to stick with. This will put your summer before law school to good work!

Get Organized

The moment your law school classes begin, the grind doesn’t stop. You must keep yourself well organized to remain on top of your workload and succeed in law school. This means being well organized on day one. Take time during the summer before law school to set yourself up for success. Designate a study area at home and set it up to minimize distractions. Get a planner and schedule in all your non-law school appointments. Once you receive your syllabi for classes, schedule your readings, outlining, and review. Set up a daily law school checklist and a weekly study schedule. If you are writing your notes, make sure your notebooks or binders are organized and ready for day one. If you are taking notes on a laptop, get your note app ready and organized by class, topic, and subtopics. Put together folders on your computer for different courses and organizations you will be a part of, so everything has a place to go. Anything and everything you can think of to best prepare yourself for school, do it! Getting yourself sorted during the summer before law school will ensure you start your legal education with a system optimized for efficacy!

Discover Study Techniques

Last but not least, do some research on study techniques for law school. Just like with organization, you want to be ready to go on day one of law school. Search for law school study techniques that can help you succeed in all your courses. You want advice on everything from reading, to review, and, most importantly, outlines. Outlines will be your most valuable tool for law school exams, so be sure to use an in-depth guide to create a law school outline. Creating your study plan during the summer before law school will ensure no time is wasted once the semester begins. The planning will not take a lot of time and will pay off tremendously!

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