My Journey to Law School

A look into my journey to becoming an environmental attorney

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When I was in high school, I originally wanted to be a an environmental scientist. I had taken AP Environmental Science and was so fascinated with the subject. I quickly learned, however, that I was TERRIBLE at math… and chemistry… and a lot of other subjects I’d need to become a scientist. Around the same time, I had joined the mock trial team. I joined because it sounded interesting, I liked the teacher who coached it, and some of my friends were on the team. My role in mock trial was to testify as an expert witness for this made-up art theft case we were assigned for our competitions. I liked mock trial, especially how competitive and fast-paced it was. I wasn’t much of an athlete in high school, but to me, mock trial felt like sport. Trying to figure out the other side’s legal theory, thinking fast and objecting, formulating answers that benefit your side… it all kept me on my toes. This was definitely the point in my life when I began to think law school might be the route for me. So much so, that I actually applied to most colleges under a political science major (and a few as environmental science since I still hadn’t let that dream go).

In 2015, I graduated high school and started college at UC Davis as a political science major. To be honest, I grew tired of reading the Federalist Papers and learning about democracy in my political science classes very quickly. After a few quarters of college under my belt, I discovered UC Davis actually had a major that was more in line with my interests– Environmental Policy Analysis and Planning. The EPAP major combined what I liked about political science with the basic levels of environmental science. I would need to take chemistry and biology, but they wouldn’t be as tough as what an environmental science student would deal with (and I would still get a B.S.!). I would also get to take some awesome courses like environmental law. I switched immediately, even though I was worried the science classes would tank my GPA.

My junior year of college, after a few years of some good college fun and a quarter abroad in the U.K., I began to start seriously planning out my law school admissions process. I had been actively participating in the university’s pre-law society (doing the annual practice LSAT they hosted and sitting in on law school classes on campus when the organization offered us the opportunity) but I hadn’t done much in the way of deciding when to actually apply or where.

I decided that I wanted to go into law school straight after college without taking a gap year. I knew some people took gap years between college and law school to either get work experience, build up some savings, or just to chill out before a grueling three year program. Personally, I just wanted to keep the momentum going and keep going with school. Fortunately, finances weren’t an issue for me and I had (some) work experience, as I detail below. This meant I’d need to get my shit together to apply during my senior year.

The first thing I did was start applying to internships. Before my junior year, I had only worked on campus while in college. I wanted to have something on my resume that was related to law in one way or another, and a supervisor who could write me a letter of recommendation when I needed it. In February of my junior year, I began as an undergraduate intern at the county’s public defender office, filing papers and scanning documents. It was pretty boring stuff (and criminal law was not remotely related to what I wanted to do) but it gave me exposure to the legal field and gave the opportunity to interact with real attorneys. Shortly after, I added on a part-time job as a student assistant at the California Environmental Protection Agency. There, I worked on waste management and recycling policymaking. I LOVED working for CalEPA, especially because it gave me the opportunity to take what I was learning in my major and apply it to my work. (I eventually got the opportunity to write a small blog post about being a student assistant for the office, which can be found here). I took every opportunity I could to interact with the legal department while there, even scheduling some informational interviews with the attorneys.

The next thing I did was sign up for the June LSAT. I spent the three months leading up to the exam in complete study mode. I enrolled in some pretty easy units for the spring quarter and focused on getting ready for the exam. I went from my internship(s) to class to my Testmasters LSAT prep course on campus every day and said no to every social invite I received. I spent ten weekends doing full length practice exams to simulate the real deal. I ended up taking the LSAT just the once, satisfied with my 164 and traumatized at even the thought of having to sit through it again. (Side note: if you can afford Testmasters, I highly recommend their in-person prep course.)

After that, I spent the summer before my senior year drafting my personal statement for applications. This was easily the hardest step in the application process for me. Coming from a privileged background, I had no real hardships to detail in my statement. I didn’t know what to write about, what tone to use, or how to structure my essay. Supplemental questions were also tough to answer for me. Luckily, I had some help. A college friend of mine was in his first year of law school at Berkeley and offered to send me his personal statement and supplemental essays for inspiration. I got a better sense of what tone and structure to use in my personal statement from reading his. I also tried to read up on personal statement advice online and consulted my friends for proofreading help. I made a few visits to the internship and career center on campus to consult the pre-law advisor on my personal statement as well. (you can find a copy of my personal statement here). After that, I began thinking about which schools I would want to apply to. At that point, I wasn’t touring any schools because I figured I would do that when I had some acceptances. I decided to set a goal of sending in my applications by the end of December (of my senior year of college) even though most of the application deadlines weren’t until February. From what I had read on law school admissions, the earlier you sent them in, the better. I asked for letters of recommendation from professors and supervisors at the beginning of December (my full post on LORs can be found here) and ended up sending in my applications by December 18th.

When I was applying, I didn’t have the best GPA (a 3.38) but my transcript certainly reflected my lower grades were from the harder science and math courses I had taken (and I was getting a degree in something other than political science, law schools love to diversify their student body). In total, I think I had applied to about 12 schools and only one or two of them were out of state. It was pretty easy to determine where I’d get in and where I’d get rejected. I could tell by looking at each school’s median accepted LSAT score and GPA, which almost all of them provide on their website. I used those two statistics to figure out which schools were my “safety” schools, which ones were right at my level, and which ones were more of a stretch but that I would apply to anyway. In the end, each schools’ figures turned out to be quite accurate predictors for me.

Then, the waiting game began on the admissions offers. Some results showed up in as short as a few days (safety schools accepting me, mainly) and some took much longer. I got accepted to UC Davis Law on January 25th. Strangely, it didn’t come as an email at first. I received a text message from a random number at four in the morning congratulating me on my admission to the school and it was from the Dean! I went onto the admissions portal and confirmed I was in. After that, I didn’t need to tour or decide on anything, I was going to UC Davis Law. I was already familiar with the town as I was in my fourth year of living there, and I was already familiar with the law school because I had taken a seminar in the building my first year of college. I waited on a financial aid offer (which turned out to be the most generous one I’d receive) and a few more admissions decisions before accepting the offer to attend UC Davis Law.

And now i’m here, studying to become an environmental attorney! Happy to answer any questions or provide advice on any part of this process, and follow on instagram for more law school content 🙂

Some helpful links to other blog posts for pre-law students can be found in my pre-law guide.