U of R Visit

I used my second to last half-day Friday to pay a visit to Richmond Law. I really just wanted to ask somebody in admissions a few questions, but when I called to set up the appointment they offered to let me sit in on a class. Well, why not? I sat in a Civil Procedure class. They were discussing Pennoyer v. Neff. I have to say that I was pleasantly surprised. Of course I had never heard of the case before sitting in the class (and I can't remember the last time I was in a class where there was nothing written on the board. The chalk board is critical to a chemistry lecture), but I had the gist of things by the time I left. I felt bad for the kid (and they are kids, by the way) who was called on to start the discussion. He had read the case, but he didn't understand it (I'm sure he will now though). I can see why they make such a big deal about faculty in rankings and such. Running that discussion would not be easy. I will read the case later just to get an idea of how long it takes to get through one of these things. I might have a bit of a head start having heard the important points of the case, but I found the text of the case through a link on Wikipedia. The site had a decent synopsis of the case, at least it looked that way from what I was able to gather from the class. I will just start there when I start reading these things for real.

I had a tour too, which was pretty uneventful. It's just one building after all. They were having OCI with some firms so there were plenty of nervous looking people walking around in their Sunday best. There were some interesting points raised in the few minutes I talked to an admissions rep. The most relevant thing she mentioned for readers of this blog was what her response to my question about my GPA. They have to look at it because that is what gets reported to LSAC and the ABA, but for somebody like me, and this is her word, it's basically irrelevant. I will be evaluated based on what I've done since graduation. She basically told me that I would be admitted with my LSAT score. I'm glad I asked about my GPA before I told her my LSAT score.

Given that there was OCI going on today, she also had some interesting views on how employers view U of R. Keeping in mind that she is trying to get me to think seriously about her law school, she told me that employers in Richmond see the Virginia schools on par with one another when evaluating applicants. She also noted that any employer would rather see somebody from the top 10% of a U of R class than from somebody who is an average student at UVa. I agree. It's all about what you do, not where you do it.