By: Steve Grumm

There’s an interesting piece in today’s National Law Journal about a handful of law schools that have established incubation programs for recent grads who want the independence of hanging their own shingle without the insecurity of going it entirely alone:

[The City University of New York (CUNY) School of Law] offers low-cost office space in midtown Manhattan and staff support for up to two years to a select number of graduates aiming to establish themselves as solos or launch small firms. The program offers more than office space; participants have access to a large network of experienced solo practitioners who function as mentors, and they enjoy an internal support network among their colleagues in the incubator, which helps to reduce the isolation many solo practitioners experience.

…

CUNY’s program was the first of its kind when it debuted in 2007, but now law schools around the country have launched solo incubators, and more are on the way. The University of Missouri-Kansas City School of Law unveiled its solo and small-firm incubator last fall, and the University of Maryland School of Law introduced its incubator in January.

The Charlotte School of Law plans to have its Small Practice Center up and running next summer. Faculty and administrators at Thomas Jefferson School of Law, Georgia State University College of Law and the University of Dayton School of Law are among those considering adding similar programs.

CUNY and Maryland both enjoy reputations as being schools with a strong emphasis on public interest work, so perhaps it shouldn’t be surprising that their incubation programs incorporate some aspect of public interest practice.

The few solo incubators that are up and running employ slightly different models. Several have a clear civil justice emphasis, while others are more business-oriented. They vary in length from six months to as long as two years.

At CUNY, incubator participants do a significant amount of what [the program’s director, Fred Rooney,] calls “low bono” work. They earn $75 an hour for providing legal representation to underserved communities throughout New York, paid for by contracts with New York City. The work provides the new attorneys with experience and exposure, and provides representation to people who otherwise could not afford an attorney, Rooney said. Incubator attorneys take on their own cases in addition to the contract work.

The University of Maryland’s solo incubator, which lasts between six and 10 months, also promotes civil justice. Participants work in an office across the street from the law school and assist on grant-funded cases through Civil Justice Inc., a nonprofit law office that serves low-income clients.

By: Steve Grumm

It’s a UVA Law two-fer.  First, the Cavalier Daily reports that the law school’s Innocence Project scored an overturned conviction, first removing a man from Death Row and then having other, related convictions tossed:

Twelve University Law students helped overturn the wrongful drug and weapon conviction of Northern Virginian man Justin Wolfe last week, bringing an end to a decade-long struggle for freedom.

The decision comes more than a month after the students, as part of the Law School’s Innocence Project Clinic, helped convince a federal judge to dismiss Wolfe’s murder-for-hire conviction and death sentence.

…

The clinic, part of the Innocence Network, is an organization which works to overturn wrongful convictions of prisoners in Virginia who could be proven innocent — many of whom are convicted as a result of ineffective legal counsel or flawed police techniques.

Judge Raymond Jackson of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia agreed with a motion drafted by members of the clinic arguing that the jury’s verdict was the result of a flawed trial. He consequently tossed out the convictions and a 33-year sentence, according to a statement released by the Law School.

After an evidentiary hearing last November, Jackson found that the prosecutor had failed to share critical evidence with Wolfe’s attorney. This information helped the clinic work to exonerate Wolfe from involvement in the murder, said Clinic Director of Investigations Deirdre Enright.

Second, here’s a pretty innovative fundraiser for the school’s public interest student group.  As reported by Virginia Law Weekly, UVA Law’s Public Interest Law Association runs a law book sale.

At the beginning of each semester, the Public Interest Law Association sells used text and horn books at greatly discounted prices, and this semester is no different.

Opened on August 23th, the event had already raised over $10,000 within its first four days and, as of press time, was on its way to doubling that figure. The proceeds of the sale are crucial for filling PILA’s public interest summer grant pool, out of which it gives $3,500 to qualifying 1Ls and $6,000 to qualifying 2Ls planning to do unpaid work over the summer.

I know of auctions, charity runs, basketball tournaments, and bake sales, but this is the first I’ve heard of a student association selling law books to raise cash for summer public interest stipends.  If memory serves, the bookstore at my law school had a monopoly on book sales, and they ruled with an iron fist.  So this never seemed like an option.  Maybe there’s more flexibility at other schools.  Anyway, great idea.

NALP is accepting nominations for the 2011 PSLawNet Pro Bono Publico Award, which recognizes the extraordinary contributions that law students make to under-served populations, the public interest community, and legal education by performing pro bono or public service work. 

Eligibility: The Pro Bono Publico Award is available to any second- or third-year law student at a PSLawNet Subscriber School. The recipient will be honored during an Award Luncheon at NALP’s Public Service Mini-Conference on Thursday, October 20, 2011 at the Washington, DC office of Arnold & Porter, LLP. The Award recipient will receive transportation to Washington, a one-night stay in an area hotel, a commemorative plaque, and a small monetary award.

Award Criteria: Law students are judged by the extracurricular commitment they have made to law-related public service projects or organizations; the quality of work they performed; and the impact of that work on the community, their fellow students, and the school. Though a student’s involvement in law school-based public interest organizing and fundraising is relevant, actual pro bono and public interest legal work will be the primary consideration.

Nominations must be received by Thursday, September 15, 2011 at 5pm Eastern Time. View/download the nomination form here.

By: Steve Grumm

Happy Friday/Labor Day Weekend/September, dear readers.  As summer is (unofficially) winding down this week, we wish you all a happy Autumn, and we wish the best of luck to law students, clinicians, and law school administrators who are beginning a new academic year. 

This week: the first months of the Last Resort Exoneration Project; indigent counsel reform in Tennessee(?); USAJobs due for some downtime in October; AtJ news in the Mountain State; a dispatch from the ABA’s oval office; reaction to an ACLU report about Utah’s rickety indigent defense infrastructure; in NOLA, physical altercations and officers of the court and lawsuits, oh my!; unpaid legal internships raise eyebrows across the pond; USA Today presents the short version (as always) of legal services funding struggles nationwide; changes (and hiring!) in the Massachusetts indigent defense system; pro bono on a DLA Piper salary ain’t so bad.    

• 9.1.11 – the new Last Resort Exoneration Project, housed at the Seton Hall University School of Law, is complementing the work of the Innocence Project.  While the Innocence Project operates nationally and primarily uses DNA evidence to free the wrongfully convicted, Last Resort operates only within the Garden State and focuses on cases in which DNA evidence is not in play.  Check out this profile of Last Resort, which began operations this past February, on MyCentralJersey.com.

• 8.31.11 – is change afoot in the way that Volunteer State public defenders are assigned?  The Tennessean reports on a proposal being kicked around by the Tennessee Supreme Court: “To rein in the state’s fast-growing indigent defense fund, the court has drafted an amendment to its rules that would allow the cash-strapped state Administrative Office of the Courts to solicit bids and award contracts to lawyers or firms ‘to provide legal services to indigent persons for a fixed fee.’ The proposal has come under a barrage of criticism from lawyers, judges and state and national legal organizations who warn that flat-fee contracts will put many lawyers out of work, undermine the authority of local judges and deny poor people the effective assistance of legal counsel.”

• 8.31.11 – heads up, federal job seekers!  Government Executive reports that USAJobs will go down temporarily in October while Uncle Sam readies a new version of the website: “The Office of Personnel Management will take the government’s job application platform offline in October to transition to a new system. USAJobs 3.0, designed to make the process smoother for potential hires and federal recruiters alike, will debut on Oct. 13. Agencies will have to close all open job announcements before Oct. 6, when the system will be made unavailable to all applicants for nearly a week. The downtime will allow agencies to transition data to the new platform built by OPM and create a level playing field for job seekers and human resources staff, said Angela Bailey, the agency’s associate director of employee services.”

• 8.30.11 – two access-to-justice developments in West Virginia. 
• First, the Journal reports on hearings held by the state’s 2 year-old AtJ Commission to explore the problems that low-income West Virginians confront in navigating the justice system: “A shortage of funding for more Legal Aid attorneys [and] the difficulties citizens face when trying to hire an attorney…were among several issues discussed Monday night in Martinsburg during the second of six statewide public forums on the issue of access to the state’s civil justice system. The forum was held by the West Virginia Access to Justice Commission, which was formed two years ago.”  Here’s a troubling statistic (emphasis mine): “There are only 52 Legal Aid attorneys for the state’s 55 counties.”  And of course many of those attorneys are concentrated in population centers, which makes things very difficult for would-be clients in rural locales.
• Second, on a more positive note the Record reports that Legal Aid of West Virginia has launched a LawHelp site to empower litigants with self-help resources.

• 8.30.11 – In a letter to editor of the New York Times, new ABA president William T. Robinson, III offers perspective on a recent NYT editorial which presented solutions to narrow the civil justice gap. The letter supports the Times’s view that LSC funding should be expanded, but takes issue with the Times’s call to deregulate the delivery of legal services.  Writes Robinson: “[A] rush to open the practice of law to unschooled, unregulated nonlawyers is not the solution. This would cause grave harm to clients. Even matters that appear simple, such as uncontested divorces, involve myriad legal rights and responsibilities. If the case is not handled by a professional with appropriate legal training, a person can suffer serious long-term consequences affecting loved ones or financial security. It also could lead to a violation of the law.”  (Personally I’d look at unbundling – i.e. limited-scope representation – innovations before farming traditional lawyer work out to nonlawyers.  In practice, those outfits that market to low-income clients by offering quasi-legal services have patchy records, and are certainly not substitutes for legal services providers.  Although I grant that it’s the people who are over-income for legal services but can’t afford to retain counsel who present a very difficult challenge.)

• 8.29.11 – in Utah, a Deseret News editorial reacts to a recent ACLU of Utah report on the state’s indigent defense system: “This week, the ACLU released an in-depth study of criminal defense for the poor in Utah, and found the state system woefully inadequate. Utah is one of only two states that doesn’t fund public defenders, requiring counties to foot the bill and resulting in a funding rate of $5.22 per capita, less than half the national average of $11.86.  Attorneys [in rural counties] are ‘chronically underfunded and overworked,’ according to the report, receiving an average of just $400 per case…. There are several things the state can do to remedy the situation, and not all of them require money. For starters, public defenders should be granted greater access to the state’s crime labs, on par with that of prosecutors. It should also institute statewide standards for selecting public attorneys, eliminating conflicts of interest, and provide more oversight of county justice systems. But ultimately, funding for public attorneys must increase.”  Here’s a link to the ACLU report: Failing Gideon.

• 8.28.11 – now this is an adversarial justice system.  A New Orleans Times-Picayune opinion piece looks at the recent, bizarre goings-on between NOLA public defenders and court staff.  “Chief Public Defender Derwyn Bunton was getting a bit worried a couple of years ago because his attorneys were coming back injured after appearing before Judge Ben Willard.  First Steve Singer had to have surgery for a torn ligament after Willard ordered sheriff’s deputies to kick him out of the courtroom. A few months later, Stuart Weg also needed medical treatment following a similarly unceremonious departure, and Bunton asked for a Judiciary Commission investigation.”  This quoted passage notwithstanding, it does not appear as if the defenders are entirely without blame.  They seem to take seriously their responsibilities as zealous advocates.  (On a related note, the PSLawNet Blog interviewed Mr. Bunton several months ago.  He struck us as one cool cat.  Let’s hope cooler heads prevail in the Big Easy.)

• 8.29.11 – a little legal internship hullabaloo across the Pond.  A piece in the Guardian laments the increased number of unpaid legal internships in both public interest and for-profit law firm settings.  The author argues that some “employers” may be skirting regulations that distinguish paid employment relationships from volunteer learning opportunities, and that blossoming lawyers are too vulnerable at this early stage in their careers to raise a stink.  The author further contends that the entities charged with regulating the legal profession are not paying sufficient attention to the issue.  It’s hard for me to draw parallels with the U.S market because it seems that our labor regulations may be a bit more permissive, particularly in allowing government and nonprofit entities to take on unpaid interns. Nonetheless, it’s an issue worth watching in the U.S. given the glut of law graduates looking for practice experience.

• 8.29.11 – a piece in USA Today highlights the deteriorating condition of the nation’s civil legal services infrastructure, especially as the Legal Services Corporation is threatened with a 25% funding cut by congressional appropriators.  Some notable data points:
• “The House Appropriations Committee has proposed slashing…$104 million [from LSC’s budget] for fiscal 2012, rolling back funding to $300 million — a level not seen since 1999.”
• “The number of people eligible, based on income levels, for LSC programs across the country has gone up 27% since 2007. About 64 million people qualify [according to LSC president Jim Sandman].”
• “Idaho Legal Aid Services has started unpaid monthly furloughs, and offices are closed one day each month. Several employees have been downgraded from full-time to part-time status.”
• “Legal Services of New Jersey plans to lay off 100 employees by the end of the year.”

• 8.28.11 – big news on the indigent defense front in Massachusetts, including some new public-defender hiring.  From the Milford Daily News:  “Leaders of the state’s public defender system will soon detail a plan to hire more staff attorneys to represent the poor and contract less of that work to about 3,000 private lawyers across Massachusetts. The cost of defending low-income people came under the spotlight on Beacon Hill this year when Gov. Deval Patrick proposed hiring about 1,000 new state attorneys and ending the use of private attorneys altogether….  After lawmakers offered less sweeping proposals of their own, Patrick ultimately signed a state budget last month that makes less ambitious reforms. It requires at least 25 percent of cases with indigent defendants to be handled by state attorneys by next July, up from about 10 percent now…. Lisa Hewitt, the committee’s general counsel, said the plan will likely require hiring 346 new full-time employees, including attorneys, support staff, social workers and investigators.  A final number is still in the works, she said. The state now has 252   public defenders on its payroll.”

• 8.26.11 – DLA Piper creates a pro bono immersion program of sorts for public-interest minded associates.  From AmLaw Daily: “DLA Piper unveiled a program…that creates what many first-year associates might call a dream job–the opportunity to work on pro bono cases while taking home a six-figure salary unheard of at most public service organizations.  Starting in January, two incoming DLA Piper associates each year will be selected to do exclusively pro bono work for a year as part of the firm’s DLA Piper/Krantz Fellowship Program.”

Autumn being my favorite season, I leave you with this pop music gem from one of the most unlikely songwriters to write a cartoon movie soundtrack.

By: Steve Grumm

Happy Friday, dear readers!  This week’s Bulletin goes to press as we East Coasters are besieged by Mother Nature, who is showcasing her full arsenal of Weapons to Remind People That They Are Not As in Control of Things as They’d Like to Believe.  Best wishes to the folks who will take the brunt of this weekend’s hurricane.  I have followed the practices of my elderly Aunt Mimi by purchasing 6 gallons of milk, 4 dozen eggs, and enough bread to feed all the birds in Rock Creek Park for a month.  Thus I envision a lot of rain and French Toast in my immediate future.

As for public interest news, this week: the ACLU comes down hard on Utah’s patchwork indigent defense system; slow-but-steady progress toward establishing a public defender’s office in a central Texas county; difficult funding cuts have compelled New Hampshire Legal Assistance to close offices and reduce staff; the NYT’s interesting editorial on closing the civil justice gap; $1.4 million in grants from the South Carolina Bar Foundation; dealing with IOLTA shortfalls in DC; Topeka’s district attorney battling against a county budget cut; checking in on the new Texas Office of Capital Writs, a watchdog tasked with ensuring fairness in capital proceedings.  

• 8.24.11 – as reported by the Salt Lake Tribune, an ACLU report is highly critical of the Beehive State’s indigent defense system (to the extent that it even has one).  “Utah’s public defender system is failing to protect citizens’ constitutional rights as Utah remains one of only two states that do not provide state funds or oversight for public defense services, a new report from the American Civil Liberties Union of Utah claims. The report released Wednesday, titled ‘Failing Gideon: Utah’s Flawed County-by-County Public Defender System,’ addresses the state as a whole, but focuses specifically on nine Utah counties: Box Elder, Daggett, Duchesne, Iron, Kane, San Juan, Sevier, Uintah and Weber.”  Here’s a link to the ACLU report.  (Incidentally, to my great dismay the other state that doesn’t provide funding for indigent defense is the otherwise glorious Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.)

• 8.24.11 – according to the River Cities Daily Tribune, a political squabble has been impeding progress toward establishing a public defender’s office in Burnet County, Texas.  The disputes have come to a resolution, although it is somewhat uneasy.  “A clash of ideologies seems to be simmering down as local trial judges and the Burnet County Commissioners Court reach a compromise on how to create and maintain a proposed public defender’s office.  A four-year state grant will fund the office as a county department, allowing the commissioners to say they’re saving taxpayers’ money while making sure those who can’t afford an attorney are still guaranteed a legal defense…. The catch? The commissioners and other non-lawyers want a say-so in the oversight of the department.”  This doesn’t sit well with the trial judges. 

• 8.24.11 – a compelling Nashua Telegraph article documents the closure of New Hampshire Legal Assistance’s Nashua office on the heels of a state funding cut, as well as larger cuts affecting the whole organization as other funding sources have diminished.  “In 2008, New Hampshire Legal Assistance had a statewide staff of 53, according to its executive director John Tobin. Between the recent state cuts and a loss of charitable funding from the New Hampshire Bar Foundation, NHLA’s staff now numbers 28, he said.”  Tough times for a very strong legal services program. 

• 8.23.11 – this New York Times editorial on narrowing the justice gap is thought-provoking, if a bit scattered.  Right after noting that “[t]here is plenty the government, the legal profession, and others can do to improve this shameful [justice gap],” the piece notes that with so many un- or underemployed law graduates looking for work, there may be ways to situate them to serve the poor.  So it sounds like we’re moving toward a sweeping proposal. But then the piece, after correctly calling for increased LSC funding, proposes a set of admirable-but-not-sweeping solutions: mandatory reporting of attorney pro bono hours in states that don’t already require it; allowing nonlawyers to do more process and form work; more firmly integrating public advocacy into the legal education curriculum; and expanding law school LRAP programs.  All of those proposals are worthwhile.  But even combined, they’ll do only so much (little?) to narrow the gap separating the have’s and have-not’s when it comes to meaningfully accessing the justice system.  (But I do love the NYT’s support for LSC funding!) 

• 8.23.11 – the South Carolina Bar Foundation is raining down money upon grantees, according to Bluffton Today.  (We like that name by the way.  It’s all well and good for a newspaper to be a “Sentinel” or an “Argus-Leader”, but Bluffton Today is just saying, ‘Hey, here’s what’s happening today, in Bluffton.’)  Where were we?  Oh, the total pot of money was $1.4 million, and grantees include South Carolina Legal Services (which took the lion’s share: $1mil.), the South Carolina Center for Fathers and Families, and the SC Access to Justice Commission.

• 8.21.11 – five years ago this would have been a cash-cow for the DC legal services community.  Nowadays, not so much.  The Washington Post looks at a 2010 change in the District of Columbia’s IOLTA system, making it mandatory.  While the number of IOLTA accounts grew by almost 10% in the change’s wake, IOLTA revenues are all but flat, and well down from what they were before the recession’s impact was fully felt.  “2011 [IOLTA] revenue is down dramatically from the $2.4 million in IOLTA funds generated in 2008. That’s largely because participating banks, which until mid-2008 had been paying interest rates of up to 4 percent, are now — with a few exceptions — paying no more than 0.25 percent, in accordance with the federal funds target rate.”  With rates expected to remain flat for a while, the DC Access to Justice Commission has tried to make lemonade, instituting the Raising the Bar program “that asks law firms to set aside a portion of revenue from their [DC] office for legal services providers.  Eighteen law firms have agreed to donate between .075 and .11 percent, and the commission is recruiting more.”

• 8.21.11 – the Topeka Capital-Journal reports that Shawnee County District Attorney Chad Taylor is strongly opposing a proposed 10% cut to his budget by the county.  (Topeka sits in Shawnee County.)  “A weary-looking Taylor said he had lost sleep thinking about how the 10 percent cut…would force him to reduce staffing in his office, where more than 92% of the budget goes to pay salaries and benefits.”

• 8.21.11  the Houston Chronicle checks in with Brad Levenson, who “heads the year-old Texas Office of Capital Writs, an independent state agency tasked with scrutinizing capital murder trials to ensure they were legally proper.  The Texas Legislature created the office two years ago after repeated embarrassing instances of shoddy legal work by appeals attorneys representing capital murder convicts. The agency now handles the state appellate process for nearly all new Texas death penalty cases…. More than a dozen states have similar operations, but Texas was the largest without a public office to address death penalty appeals. None of the other states with capital punishment executes people as frequently as Texas…. Levenson directs a team of attorneys, investigators and staff working out of quarters just a few blocks north of the capital building in Austin. Working with an annual budget of about $850,000, they focus on habeas writs, essentially trying to determine if mistakes were made at the trial.” 

By: Steve Grumm

On the public interest job hunt?  Law student registration for interviews at the Equal Justice Works Conference & Career Fair opens today!  Learn more over at EJW’s career fair web page.   

Here’s are some important dates from their website:

August 16 – September 12:		Student and law school professional registration open
September 14 – October 6:		Student registration only for those not seeking an interview (can attend conference workshops and Table Talk)
September 14 – September 28:		Employers view applications and choose interviewees
September 30 – October 6:		Students accept or decline interviews
October 6, 5 p.m. EDT:		Last day to cancel student registration with full refund
October 21 – 22:		Equal Justice Works Conference and Career Fair

NALP is accepting nominations for the 2011 PSLawNet Pro Bono Publico Award, which recognizes the extraordinary contributions that law students make to under-served populations, the public interest community, and legal education by performing pro bono or public service work. 

Eligibility: The Pro Bono Publico Award is available to any second- or third-year law student at a PSLawNet Subscriber School. The recipient will be honored during an Award Luncheon at NALP’s Public Service Mini-Conference on Thursday, October 20, 2011 at the Washington, DC office of Arnold & Porter, LLP. The Award recipient will receive transportation to Washington, a one-night stay in an area hotel, a commemorative plaque, and a small monetary award.

Award Criteria: Law students are judged by the extracurricular commitment they have made to law-related public service projects or organizations; the quality of work they performed; and the impact of that work on the community, their fellow students, and the school. Though a student’s involvement in law school-based public interest organizing and fundraising is relevant, actual pro bono and public interest legal work will be the primary consideration.

Nominations must be received by Thursday, September 15, 2011 at 5pm Eastern Time. View/download the nomination form here.

By Jamie Bence

In my last post, I talked about back to school shopping for the thrifty law student. Today’s topic deals with all the day-to-day stuff.  The more you can lower your monthly base expenses, the less stress you will feel when your car breaks down, your computer crashes, or you have a medical emergency. In law school as in life, these things happen, so it’s important to pace yourself during a time when you might not have any income.

Food:  Before law school started, I thought the grocery store was the only store I could go to and get anything I wanted without thinking much about it. After all, food is essential! However, there are many things you can do to save, including thinking carefully about where you shop. Law school might be the time in your life where you shop at a less exclusive store, clip coupons and watch sales for items that you really like. It’s hard to think about these things when you’re cramming in assignments, but once you get the hang of it, coupon-ing can be pretty easy.

Lunches during the week are another opportunity to save. You probably won’t have time for a nice lunch anyway, and most cafeteria options aren’t exactly healthy. I ate a lot of sandwiches and leftovers. It wasn’t always delicious or fun, but I saved a lot of money by packing. On the downside, it takes time in the morning or evening, but if you’re making dinner anyway, it’s not too hard to box up some leftovers. However, sometimes law school feels like a long time without much to celebrate. So it can be fun to mark special achievements- the end of a semester, procuring the summer job- with a nice meal out.

Utilities:  It was not my favorite way of cutting back in law school, but I did not subscribe to cable. I don’t have enough free time to justify paying for it, and when I had free time, I wanted to spend it out with my family and friends, not sitting around more than I already was. When I want to watch something, I just use Netflix, which is considerably less expensive. Think about how much free time you really have before committing to costly subscription services, from magazines to online subscriptions.

Staying healthy is incredibly important law school, so I make this suggestion with the caveat that if you need a gym membership to work out, then you should probably keep it. However, while your membership fees might have just seemed like normal monthly expenses before, on a fixed income they are a substantial cost. You will probably get membership to your school’s gym with your law school tuition, and if it’s feasible to use it, you might try to use that. There are also home work out options that are far less expensive than a monthly membership.

Also, when thinking about the cost of rent in your building, don’t forget to check whether utilities are included or not, and whether there is a suitable gym on site.

Travel: Car pool can be a great way to get to law school. If your school is near where your spouse works, you might also consider commuting with them. Gas and transit costs are incredibly high right now, and even if it’s only a few days per week, getting up early or staying late at school might be worth the savings. Plus, it might help make you more accountable- if you know you have to leave the library by 6pm to commute home, you may be more likely to finish your assignment.

You should also consider the cost of your commute with reductions in rent. While it might seem smart to take a long commute in favor of a cheaper apartment, the cost of getting to and from your destination each day might outweigh the reduction in rent. As boring and tedious as it is, when you consider apartments, also look at the transit costs you will incur each day.

Fun: When I started thinking about my law school budget, I felt like it would be three years where I wouldn’t be able to enjoy much. However, you will have time and money to go out and have fun, especially if you plan well. It could be as simple as looking for inexpensive happy hours, or nurturing an interest in free activities, like hiking. Today, there are also mass discount deals that are available on everything from movie tickets to salon services.

As long as you know your budget and choose your purchases carefully, you will be able to enjoy life, even without the benefits of a full time job.

Our good buddy Heather Jarvis is hosting a webinar this Thursday, 7/28, at noon Eastern.  “Public Service Loan Forgiveness in Five Easy Steps,” will offer a step-by-step review of how public interest and government lawyers can take advantage of the College Cost Reduction & Access Act’s Public Service Loan Forgivenes provisions.

Short version: Work in public interest for 10 years, get your loans forgiven.  Yay!

Go to Heather’s webinar page for registration info.

Our friends at Equal Justice Works are putting on a student debt webinar next month.  “Plan Before You Borrow: What You Should Know About Educational Loans BEFORE You Go to Graduate School” will be webcast on August 10th and 24th.  For more detail, including registration info, visit this Equal Justice Works webpage.

Interested in government or public interest work after graduating? This webinar will help you plan ahead and make sure you can take full advantage of the College Cost Reduction and Access Act, the most significant law affecting public service in a generation.

 The webinar will focus in detail on:

• The importance of taking out the right kind of loans
• How to consolidate or reconsolidate your previous student loans
• How the College Cost Reduction and Access Act can free you to pursue a public interest career