I know this is the time of year when many people have tough decisions to make between first-rate law schools. I’ll admit up front that I’m not the best person to give advice on that topic, because I pretty much knew I wanted to be here all along. But for that same reason, I came to Harvard with very high expectations, and hopefully this year’s admitted students will be interested to hear if those were met.
From the moment I decided to apply to law schools, something about Harvard spoke to me. I wanted to walk the same halls Barack Obama and Oliver Wendell Holmes had walked, to take class from Lawrence Tribe and Elizabeth Warren, and to experience the biggest commitment to public service in legal academia today. So when I sent out applications, though I chose many top schools with confidence, I always hoped the most for HLS.
In retrospect, this must have been a dangerous way to approach law school. I could so easily have been seriously let down. But I’m happy to report that I never once have been. I’ve certainly had some surprises so far, like the realization that three years is far too short a time to take every class that seems interesting or important,
especially the ones with famous professors that everyone is competing to take. But it’s also been surprising how much a professor you’ve never heard of can change your semester, your interests, or even the course of your career for the better—Harvard’s bench is just that deep.
In most ways, my preconceptions pale in comparison to the Harvard experience. I expected superb instruction, but assumed it would mostly be Socratic instead of the mix of lectures, workshops, and seminars with extensive faculty contact I’ve mostly chosen for myself. I expected a great devotion to public service, but only really found out what that meant when I first visited the Office of Public Interest Advising (OPIA), wanting to know what missteps I should avoid in hopes of getting summer funding and loan repayment help. Looking confused that I would even ask, my adviser said, “There really are no hoops to jump through. Just do what you’re interested
in, and we’ll come to you.”
Funnily, that statement has proved true in nearly all aspects of my time at HLS so far. Among student groups, which are numerous because of HLS’s size, there is so much active recruiting that it’s nearly impossible to miss an opportunity for work or scholarship in your favorite area of interest, from housing law and progressive politics (in my case) to criminal justice, international law, or cybercrime (in some of my friends’.)
In student affairs, Financial Services once offered to waive my application deadline outright because my hard drive crashed on the eve of a two-week Mediterranean cruise. The Dean of Students Office found my non-student boyfriend his job (a funny story I hope to share on this blog sometime.) And of course, in addition to providing stellar career advising with an outrageous network of public interest alumni all over the country, OPIA is on its way to granting me a second full summer salary in exchange for literally three single-page online forms.
In a nutshell, this is the most student-centered climate I’ve experienced in 18 years of education, and there is not one thing I’ve wanted to achieve at Harvard that hasn’t been available to me.
For every free cup of coffee late at night in the library, every meal or lengthy discussion I’ve had with a professor, every paper I’ve written on a topic of my choice and been proud to turn in, I try to look back on my expectations coming into this place. What were they exactly? Certainly nothing this good, not by far. This thought always helps me at my most tired and stressed, and if it helps anyone make their choice between law schools, then I’m doubly glad.
– Lea
