Northeastern just sent me a Perkins Loan application.
That's got to be the same Northeastern I sent a "thanks but I'll be elsewhere letter" to in, gosh, I can't really even remember when it was. Over a month ago, surely. Since then I had received their "sorry you're not coming here but would you please fill out this survey" e-mail and did so.
Why is their financial aid office sending me a loan form to sign?
This past week I’ve been making the blog rounds, reading comments, logging into the GULC admitted student board, etc. It seems as though there’s this bizarre marketingesque language that a disturbing number of people (including 0Ls) are using or buying into – “Success” and “Achievement” and “Accomplishment” (v. “Failure”) and so forth.
Why is it that I just can’t make myself believe these terms mean anything – that they’re not simply clichéd linguistic placeholders for a complex series of personal assessments, or at least are key components of a simple and selfish motivational mantra?
Perhaps it’s because these terms always seem to be used without reference to any concrete thing, used in place of having to explain just what it is you’d want to do. I mean, if you want to help people mend their lives by mobilizing the law on their behalf, by all means, consider that an achievement. If you want to use your brain to direct the resources of the country towards removing nasty toxins from the soil and water and air, please, consider yourself something of “a success” after you’ve “accomplished” that in the real world. There are dozens of examples of people who act against selfishness, possessiveness, and shortsightedness.
But this vainglorious working, this dehumanizing paper-shuffling for the sake of some corporation. Dude – it’s so not an achievement of any kind to blithely grease the merger and acquisitions wheels of some corporate behemoth. Nor is it remotely admirable to surrender your humanity or individuality in the attempt to impress and perpetuate some conservative social institution. It’s not an achievement to make partner regardless of what you do, regardless of the practical consequences that has for the humans, both strangers and those in your life (including yourself.) And the shiny toys don’t impress me either. (Did I just feel as though I had to write that? How depressing.)
**
Tangentially Related Point – my firm just spent a buttload rolling out a “new visual identity,” and although we’re still using the same blithering prose on the new letterhead, this is expected to lead us to a “greater market share” via “branding.” But I have to think – when these proposals are reviewed by the potential clients, would any of them spontaneously remark, “Wow, far more expensive than the other guy, I can’t really follow what they’re saying, and I’m not sure just what they’re going to do for me that anyone else wouldn’t, but take a look at that letterhead!” Ah, to live in marketing with the shiny happy people and admire the cart on the horse’s nose.
I’m in Section 3, Curriculum “B”. Sometimes I wonder why it’s "B"– are the “Bs” somehow lesser than the “As” – are they the second ten percent – the B-sides? You'd think they'd come up with some kind of more dynamic and enticing name for a unique program of study.
Hey – I asked for it, I wanted it, and now I’ve got it.
Fall Schedule:
Democracy and Coercion, TR, 9-11
Legal Process, MW, 11:10-12:25
Legal Practice, T, 11:10-1:10 (w break)
Legal Justice Seminar, MW, 1:20-2:15
Bargain, Exchange, and Liability TR, 1:55-3:20
This might be the wrong way to look at my schedule, but I’m free from Thursday at 3:30 till Monday at 11:10. I like having a large block of time like that – it makes me feel as though I could really invest time in any weak area without getting too spread out. Also, it will be quite tempting to goof off (no TV in the dorm for me – I’m not even going to bring a set). I’ll have to make out a study schedule and stick closely to it.
I need to get my mnemonical bag of tricks dusted off (I just can’t remember where I left the thing.) The poetry helps with that somewhat, but I really need to give myself a few reading quizzes, indulge in a few long conversations with my cat as to just what I’ve been reading. It’s not just enough to take the information in, you have to be able to get it out at will as well.
**
It seems we’ll have a number of 1L bloggers at GULC. In Limine is going to be in Section 1. I wonder about the others. . .
Hmm. Two responses – a single question and another small set of questions – well, it’s a start and a welcome one at that. These are questions I wouldn’t have thought to ask myself or address overtly in the blog. I don’t know if I have permission to name my questioners’ names, so I won’t; but you have my thanks nonetheless.
Is H. your girlfriend?
I don’t anticipate writing in detail about my “personal life” on the blog. But no, H. is not my girlfriend – she’s a very old friend of mine from High School. We’re the last two of our social circle left in Connecticut, although T-Rex will be visiting this summer, which will bring the count to three dinosaurs. There’s also a chance Elegante will visit, bringing the count to 4 (briefly). I haven’t written about Elegante yet, but she and I used to be an item in college – afterwhich she and H. lived together as roommates for a long while. Elegante is not a middle of the road person – H. is a goddess and I am (now) a devil. I had thought we were on moderately good terms, but the more time that passes the more devilish I become. So it should be interesting. I may have to surrender H. to Elegante for the duration of her visit.
H. and I have very strong overlapping areas of interest and in other areas we’re more or less completely opposed. This dynamic tends to make our time together very structured. This summer, I’ll be spending a lot of time with H. because she’s interested in doing some serious bike-riding (for several reasons) and I’m also trying to get back on the saddle more consistently than I have these past few years. We drink beer and talk and play scrabble and bitch to each other – for me it’s a very comfortable and valued relationship. We also have a music/poetry overlap (there are parallels) – but this summer I’ll be learning (I should write, I am learning) the cornet, and I plan to draw heavily on H.’s knowledge. She’s a music teacher and a pretty bang-up trumpet/flute player. In August she’ll be touring with a band in Australia, and I’ll be headed down to D.C.
Do I subscribe to any particular theory of jurisprudence?
Not so’s I could be articulatin it. In fact, one of the benefits I hope I’ll garner from the first year of law school is that I’ll gain the terminology to more effectively express my thoughts on the law (which I’m sure will change as I grow in understanding.) I can say that I tend to view political, economic, and sociological issues from a very liberal/leftist end of the spectrum, although my personal conduct ranges between stolidly conservative on some issues and shockingly liberal on others. I can also say that I view American law as a flexible social construct that changes over time and which has core pillars that have been bent nearly sideways at points. But that’s the great thing about American law. It’s a wonderful tool to shape and define society. And I do think society needs to be shaped and defined as it progresses; while I have libertarian leanings, history is filled with too many examples of the strong persecuting the weak, especially in the “grey areas” created by new technologies (“BigFood says DDT is good for you – whoops!”) and political reconfigurations. So I guess it’s fair to say that I see the legal system as the battlefield on which the various political ideologies clash. While a lot of that clashing is tied up in and driven by economic/monetary issues, I think the potentially socially transformative issues/areas are: the war on drugs and the prison population/system, the environment, health care, educational access, labor issues, and the graying of America.
Who's your favorite Supreme Court justice ever?
Well, although I don’t agree with a lot of the stances he took, I do have a soft spot for Holmes, based in large part on his writing style. I’ll also confess that I get all misty over Earl Warren and Harry Blackmun for developing hearts and being guided by a sense of justice and equity.
Who's your favorite justice on today's court?
Tough one. I like Steven’s quirkiness and independence, but I’m closest to Ginsberg politically. I really enjoy Scalia’s histrionics – they’re funny till I remember that his vote counts.
Scheherazade, over at Stay of Execution, has been blogging about change in her usual lucid manner. In fact, it seems like change is the unofficial theme of the small legal blogging universe to which I subscribe. People are moving across the country, exploring new and challenging internships or jobs, and, like myself, attempting to pick through the woods of Error, which seem to lie thickly about the financial aid process. I, however, am no Redcrosse. I’ll be leaving my state, my job, my friends, most of my projecty stuff, my tools, my car, possibly my cat, and perhaps a long standing love relationship.
Maybe I should chalk up my current mood to the rain or to nomadic weariness – since 1990 I haven’t lived in the same set of rooms or apartment for longer than a single calendar year. In fact, given the renter’s overlap, it’s safe to say I haven’t lived in the same set of rooms or apartment for a single calendar year. I have moved for my education, for my sanity, for a job, for love, and out of despair. At times I think I have moved out of habit, or been pressured by the shifting world of roommates and lovers. I have given away beds, cars, desks, plants, cats, clothing and the greater part of a small but impressive library of poetry and theory. I have given away cities and regions, summers and oceans. I have no fixed place, nowhere to return to, no place I can store things without checking every so often to see if they’re still there.
In saying, “yes” to my life, I have said, “no” to countless things – and in this way, I am no different than anybody else. I think overall that I’ve done well enough – that I’ve in the main made choices which I respected at the time and which I’m able to feel good about now. I’ve pursued something in which I think I have a gift, and I’ve been very happy doing so despite the demands it placed on me, despite the poverty, despite the scorn and dismissal, despite the misapprehensions of what (and how) I do.
I think one of the more noticeable side-effects of my nomadic life is a lack of trust, a strong suspicion of other people’s motives. Relatives and acquaintances who heartily congratulated me on my tooth-skin acceptance into Georgetown (and poo-pooed my excitement at getting into UConn) are the same ones who don’t remember/care where I did my other graduate studies. People who now make pro forma offers to do, “Whatever I can to help,” well, I have to wonder where these concerned folks were when I really needed them. I’m just glad that I have a few friends who have been around though the lean times, a few honest offers of support that goes beyond name only. They’re the ones who matter to me.
In some ways I feel that LS is going to husk the peripherals of my current life off of me. Granted, I’m pressed for time now, and I’ll be folding up my charity poetry projects to focus on my own education and subsequent legal career, but I’m simply not going to have time for the casual acquaintances, much less those people who are trying to elbow themselves back into my life. It makes me feel like a bit of a selfish bastard though, and I’ll sure I’ll hear that term directed at me from plenty of these recently interested individuals. In some ways I have sympathy for those who lost faith in me, for those who pushed me out the door and expected I’d linger at the stoop, or those who thought I erred by pursuing poetry and would someday "see the light," "come crawling back," or (how often I have heard this!) have, "decided to give up poetry for the law!" (I can assure you nothing of the sort will happen.) How I’ve lived and the goals I've pursued in my life aren't easy for some to understand. For example, some older relatives want to reestablish their relationships with me now that I seem to be doing something “worthy” – but should I make time for these people? Can I? I think not.
Perhaps Longfellow is closest to how I feel today, which is strongly laced with something of the labor and cost of poetry:
Mezzo Cammin
Half my life is gone, and I have let
The years slip from me and have not fulfilled
The aspiration of my youth, to build
Some tower of song with lofty parapet.
Not indolence, nor pleasure, nor the fret
Of restless passions that would not be stilled,
But sorrow, and a care that almost killed,
Kept me from what I may accomplish yet;
Though, half-way up the hill, I see the Past
Lying beneath me with its sounds and sights,--
A city in the twilight dim and vast,
With smoking roofs, soft bells, and gleaming lights,--
And hear above me on the autumnal blast
The cataract of Death far thundering from the heights.
I had a fairly good but draining weekend, during which I did little actual ruminating on the LS decision. Sometime on Sunday, after the silent, non-language half of my brain had time to send its little smoke signals across my corpus callosum, I was asked where I was going (by someone to whom I’d never given the option breakdown) and I unhesitatingly said “Georgetown.” It’s the program I’m most attracted to, it affords the greatest post-graduation opportunity for me, and (although I’ll have to scrape) I can go.
**
It’s amazing how the little things impact your body – I feel like some kind of dried and processed meat product this morning. Nothing particularly hedonistic happened over the weekend. Just no biking, lots of car-driving, a few donuts, a handful of beers, some fatty food, and an average night’s sleep of about 6 hours.
The themes of the weekend were travel and communication. Normally I don’t see that many people – a function of my temporary stay in my town, gearing up for LS in various ways, and my writing habits. So this weekend I saw the parents, the younger brothers (Youngest Brother graduated from his undergraduate college), a poet/lawyer friend from North of Boston (more on that in a bit), H., Rockstar J, The Guy of the Odd Forgotten Name and further chatted on the phone with 3 other people whom I don’t regularly call. If you look at the numbers my circle of actual friends is rather small, but my circle of strong acquaintances keeps growing with age. To do all this I had to forgo my usual weekend and domestic activities, which means this week will be something of a scramble of sending out papers, writing, cleaning, errands, and attending to a looming internet problem that is growing into a frustrating monster.
Overall things went very well during the weekend except that I inadvertently offended Rockstar J by stepping on a large invisible toe. I won’t go into detail, but it’s one of those things where you cast yourself as “the idiot making a stupid comment which should be obviously foolish (and hopefully funny via irony.)” Except my comment landed on one of Rockstar J’s 3 buttons (which I learned about afterward.) Personally I was fascinated to find out these buttons existed – as they lie in areas which she’s quite strong in. Apparently that wasn’t always the case though and she’s dragging some past weight around with her. I think we’ve partially made up, but I'll probably have to do something gallant in compensation.
Youngest Brother’s graduation was fun and there were no family hijinks. Youngest Brother is very happy to be done. I also talked with Younger Brother about his possible law school interest and he’s going to take it slow and gather some more information during this upcoming round. He’s very focused about what he’d like to do (educational policy + hands on activism), but is uncertain if a law degree (even a dual degree program) is the best route for him to take.
Although my weekend was filled with good points one particularly high point was meeting up with. . .it’s really tough to come up with a moniker for this guy. He’s a PI attorney who came to poetry while at Law School, and who has fashioned himself into quite an impressive young poet. He’s something of a humanist – quite intelligent, very personable. I’m at a loss - there's too much there. Hmm. I’ll call him “The Third Son” – hard to explain, but I think it fits.
Anyway, TTS and I spent an enjoyable afternoon in a seaside town, chatting about poetry, music, and the Law. I also got a packet of his recent poems, which will give me some great reading material for the week. Although we didn’t talk exclusively about poetry, it was nice to spend some face to face time with an actual poet. I do spend a fair amount of time corresponding with people about poetry, but, oddly enough, the page is a poor substitute for a nuanced voice.
**
A coworker of mine just had her daughter operated on – ear tubes to relieve pressure. This (and something TTS told me about isolation) had gotten me thinking about sensation and compensation. As a child, about 4 years old, I had debilitating ear-aches, which resulted in my tonsils and adenoids being removed and ear-tubes put in. This wasn’t noticed until after I had been deafened by the swelling and had learned to read lips to compensate. I had lost all of my hearing in one ear and over 80% of my hearing in the other ear. I remember the school hearing tests, which I cheated on, probably worried I’d be sent off to a camp somewhere or something. Eventually a very perceptive teacher noticed that I was lip reading and couldn’t hear a damn thing. My hearing eventually came back (I’m told it’s rather sharp now) but I started loosing my eyesight shortly after that. It’s odd for a little kid – I just didn’t understand how other kids did things. They all seemed to be able to pull their classroom answers magically out of the air (they were reading the blackboard, I was memorizing the example patterns and guessing), they always (impossibly!) seemed to know just where the soccer ball was, while I got to the ball by listening for it and following the changing direction of the shapes around me (travel and communication). After doing this for a year or so I was finally diagnosed and since then I’ve had lenses and later laser surgery to correct my eyesight. As of today I have very good eyesight and very good hearing. Go Western Medicine!
I just think it’s completely fascinating – how people adapt to things and how quickly those adaptations are lost. I very much doubt I could effectively lip read today, at least no more than your average adult could, nor am I particularly good at navigating in dim light, which suggests my nearly-blind skills are also most likely completely gone. I also wonder how many kids there are out there, who, like me, spent a good chunk of their mental energy on various “coping” strategies instead of on the schoolwork itself.
You do catch more flies with honey, but you know what – they’re just flies. They still taste bad. Even with the honey residue.
I called the aid office today - ugh. I got the soft cold shoulder. Very polite, very courteous, clearly down with the memorized analogies for “their side” of the argument, but very short on information. I asked if there was anything I could do to increase the award, if there were any discrepancies in the figures, etc. Essentially I got a soft “no, no, no, no” response. Then (kicker) I had to specifically ask about the self-supporting/Perkins loan option for the “helpful” person on the line to say, “Oh, yes, you can do that.”
In one sense, the blog is sort of an open letter to myself.
Here’s one open statement. If I am in a position to repay Georgetown for their grant money (in full), I will certainly do so and thus “replenish” the funds that they have offered me. Beyond that amount I will not give them one red cent, ever. If (as the plan goes) I use the LRAP program, and have, at some later date, the opportunity to pay back those funds, I’ll do so (putting back in what I’ve taken out.) However, again, I’d draw the line there.
Loyalty begins at home, kids, and it’s predicated on a sense of helpfulness and respect. It does not arise from an adversarial approach or via misguided parochialistic paternalism.
Well, off to run the "final" numbers and do some more thinking.
I wanted to publicly thank everyone who wrote into the blog or sent me e-mail on the subject.
Back from biking.
Although I can’t say that I feel much better, I do feel as though some of my angst has resolved itself into a contempt for my recurring credulity. I don’t think it’s optimism, per se, that leads me to somehow picking up that one thread of probability that’s sure to disappoint. I mean normally, I’d have discounted Georgetown until actually I had the letter in hand (aid, not acceptance) that said “you can go.” I think my mistake was in using the aid calculator , which I was referred to by the financial aid office.
With this calculator, no matter what set of parents I plug in (or for that matter, if I combine them all into one fictional (the brain reels) “family”) I get a minimum grant amount that’s twice as much as my actual offer. Even if I pad the financial numbers upward (which would depress the grant), which, of course, being me, I did.
Also, since the calculator lists the 04-05 budget, and single year Stafford awards, I just sort of assumed that the figure the calculator produced was a yearly grant amount. (If it is, my actual award isn't less than half the calculator's total, it's more like one fifth or one sixth.)
I based some of my mental projections on the calculator.
Stupid boy.
I’m looking at the award letter from GULC and I’m thinking, “Is this a joke?”
I mean, it’s got to be a joke.
Compared to every single other offer this is absolutely appalling.
Looking at the accompanying “helpful advice letter” I have to wonder if this is just an institution-wide thing, or the figures have been mail merged for me alone.
Among such useful bits of advice for making sense of this “budget” (which makes no sense) is “If you have credit card debt, pay it down, or better yet, eliminate it entirely.” Oh (Light Bulb goes off above Scoplaw’s Head) that’s a brilliant fucking idea. Why did I never think of it? I’ll just click my ruby slippers together and eliminate my credit card debt entirely! The medical debt will be the next to go! Then those pesky student loans!
Other gems (which prompted the institution/merge wondering):
“We estimate that your loan debt upon graduation from GULC will be $55,000 in Federal Stafford and Unsubsidized Federal Stafford loans and approximately $18,000 - $45,000 in commercial student loans. Monthly loan payments on these loans will average $975-1465 over ten years under the current federal and Law Center repayment requirements.”
and
“Live like a student while you’re in school so you don’t have to live like a student later.”
Let me show off my literary training. The above is known as “irony” both on the face of it and given the following:
1) Those of us with existing undergraduate and graduate debt (perhaps I’ll just “eliminate that entirely” – what a great idea!) are going to owe way more than that.
2) The GULC figures are very conservative, given that their own total budget is $48,000 per the Nine Month academic year.
Perhaps aliens will come down from the mother ship (currently somewhere above Mexico) and suck up the time and cost difference – God knows they’ve already made off with the brains of whomever devised this mysterious and undisclosed “Grant Eligibility Index”.
The condescending and out of touch tone of the whole thing suggests that the author missed their true calling as one of Bush’s economic advisors.
***
I’ll be calling the aid office on Monday, obviously, and will gently and politely massage whomever I get to review my file.
Perhaps there’s a glitch somewhere (the divorced parent situation always bites me in the ass – schools like to count all the income but not all the individuals and expenses in the actual households). But while we’re on that subject (parent’s contributing), I have to say, I’m over 30, have lived apart from them for 10 years and legally, I’m pretty sure I’m considered a separate adult. I mean, if I can’t take them to court to collect their “contribution” to my education, does Georgetown have any grounds for expecting it will be produced? Let’s say it’s a shaky moral leg the parental contribution rests on – what if my parents abused me? Does Georgetown have a right to demand I interact with them, that I beg them for money?
Grr.
***
In other mail news, UConn just offered me another scholarship. This makes the cost of a year’s tuition at UConn come within two thousand dollars of my entire 3 year grant offer from Georgetown. Or to make another comparison, UConn’s total tuition costs would be less than one year at Georgetown.
***
I don’t want to sound like an ungrateful brat or anything (which I probably am, but that’s beside the point) – but I’m just going on the assumption that schools overcharge on tuition then repeal it in various ways for needy students. In this case my sense of. . .what it is really? Not outrage over, nor anger for, nor disgust at, nor embarrassment for, nor being spurned by, but something rather like all of them. In any event, my emotional response is probably due to the fact that the Georgetown offer is so completely out of line with the offers I’ve gotten from all the other schools that accepted me. I expected it to be the least. I didn’t expect it to be only nominal.
Obviously all schools must have a similar system of need assessment, given their published figures for aid awarded and their public statements of equitable need-based distribution. Brothers and Sisters, I kid you not – I am needy and it seems all the other schools had no problem realizing this and offering fair packages. So either Georgetown didn’t (glitch), or they did and sent me a “fuck off” offer, in which case they could have simply typed that and given me the conversational distinction of not receiving any school based aid.
This kind of stuff gets my fighting blood up. It all goes back to economic class and the winnowing of social (or should I say “civic” or "civil"?) opportunities.
I need to take a deep breath and think about the LRAP (the great equalizer). Or go biking. Biking it is!
I’ll be all smiles and politely concerned graciousness by Monday (or would be this evening, if I had to be). But right now I’m just going to indulge the dark side.
Although I haven’t made a final choice (still waiting for the GULC numbers) it looks increasingly likely that August will find me in D.C.
GULC offers two different curricula for first year law students: Curriculum A and Curriculum B.
Curriculum A appears to be the “standard” first year spread of courses as taught by nearly every other law school in the country (CivPro, ConLaw, Contracts, Torts, Property, Criminal Justice, Legal Research and Writing, plus one elective).
Curriculum B is presented as an alternative approach to the same topics. From the webpage linked to above:
The "B" curriculum, available to one section of full time students, requires seven courses different in emphasis from those in the "A" curriculum: Bargain, Exchange, and Liability; Democracy and Coercion; Government Processes; Legal Justice Seminar; Legal Practice: Writing and Analysis; Process; and Property in Time. The "B" section emphasizes the sources of law in history, philosophy, political theory, and economics. It also seeks to reflect the increasingly public nature of contemporary law.
From the materials they’ve sent me, it seems that Curriculum B was designed to provide an overview of the law which might not be as easily generated through the traditional first year courses. Specifically, the materials suggest that Curriculum B was developed to address “the emergence of the regulatory state,” the erosion of “doctrinal boundaries” (say between torts and contracts), and the influence of other disciplines, economics, poli-sci, etc.
My initial response is to go down on my knees and say, “Sign Me Up, Please.”
Any thoughts on why that might not be a good idea? The obvious boogey men would be a) more inter-disciplinary reading, b) less commercial products designed to help one study, c) lack of a “tradition” of advice to draw upon, d) skittery “traditional” employers, e) perhaps some isolation from other law students who are not covering the same materials as you are.
On the other hand, all those could be seen as positives.
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