Hello Everyone,
I have so much enthusiasm writing
the blog this week!!! The semester has
taught me a lot about myself. What is
even more exciting is that the professors were able to get a hold of Ana. Ana brings a lot of knowledge about law school
and the realities of what it will take to complete the schooling. The reality is that not everyone, who wants
to be a lawyer, may have the knowledge of what a lawyer does. There is not always that fame that is depicted on television. Ana gives a very realistic account that making
a step into law school is not the right direction for some people. She also brought up a very good point that a
law degree is flexible. Often time’s
people are rigid in the pursuit of finding a job within the major from their undergraduate
education. I believe if nothing else can
come from this fellowship, we take away that there are multitude of paths in
the pursuit of helping people.
At CASES, I was able to execute
both the leadership events this week.
The events were both a success, the students want both speakers to come
back. Although the leadership event was
a workshop, the result was many of the students got to network with people, who
I work closely with. Ultimately, this
will build their own network and foster future connections. In addition, this week at John Jay, I was part
of a committee of club presidents, who organized a reggae charity concert and all
proceeds are going to Habitat for Humanity. This week just shows that helping people is
just as simple as having an idea.
I love that Ana gave lots of
insight about the stresses and rewards of being a lawyer. She is truly a voice from the other side. Ana
once sat in a classroom similar to our own and is now pursuing something close to
her heart. We all sat around the table
and many of us were not sure about the future. There are questions I have for the group. Now that
we are at the end of the semester at our agencies and have sometime to experience the social
justice world. What are the differences/
similarities between how the theories /ideologies read about in text compare to
the practicing of the work? Take yourself
back to the first day of the Vera fellowship and think about starting the experience
“What have you learned thus far that you did not know coming in?
J.T.
10 comments:
Hey Jared, thanks for a great post! I have to agree; Ana brought a lot of valuable knowledge about law school.
In fact, I was somewhat of a lost soul during my first few semesters at John Jay (declared a new major each year), but I too was once eager to apply to law school immediately after undergrad. After much research, however, I realized this path may not be right for me.
After being accepted to my first pre-law boot camp at John Jay, I was assigned to read a truly insightful book: "One L" by Scott Turow. He speaks about the process and realities of being a Harvard law student during the first year. Much of what he said was also said by Ana.
After reading this book, I realized I wanted to go to law school for all the wrong reasons. I believe getting a graduate degree in some form is absolutely necessary for this job market, but also for intellectual development. I want to continue to build my human capital, but think it may be best to explore other options before rushing into law school just because everyone else is.
For anyone thinking about law school, I think you should definitely pick up this book--you won't regret it. Hope everyone has a great thanksgiving! =]
Thank you for your post, Jaraed!
Having Ana speak about her experience as a law school student shone a light on a reality many of us may not want to face, which is the debt incurred upon attending law school. Often times, I find myself questioning where I must draw the line between my happiness and the reality of my own financial situation (i.e. student loans). As many of you may already known, I am a BA/MA student and am unaware if I would like to pursue another degree upon graduation. I like to tell myself I have decided the direction of my career path, being international public service - which in turn leads me to think about the reality of paying back my loans (in full). I feel as though I must a choose a career which makes me happy, regardless of the salary and if that means a longer repayment period, I am okay with that.
As Ana stated, if going to law school is your dream, don't let anything hold you back. In life, we must pursue happiness, on top of all else.
I hope everyone enjoys their break!
-Ana Paredes
Hi All,
Thanks for posting this week Jaraed. I agree that Ana's presentation was very insightful and helpful, although I'm still very unsure about whether or not I want to go to law school.
But one thing I have learned from Vera and from my internship is exactly what you said:there are so many different paths to social justice. I want to go to law school but I don't necessarily want to practice law forever. If I do, I think I would just use it as a way to get into international policy or some other social justice work.
One thing I definitely know for sure, though, is that I can't make the decision to go to law school unless im absolutely certain that I would be happy pursuing it.
Thank you for your enthusiastic post Jared.
I to admit that I was also plagued with the constant doubts on whether or not to go to law school during my time at John Jay. I to enjoyed Ana's honest testimony about her law school experience and the prestige factor behind her decision to continue with law school. Still, throughout Thursday's discussion, I did not feel Professor Stein's question was answered by Ana about how a law school will make much of a difference in the community advocacy work she's doing as opposed to say a social worker.
As far as Jared's question is concerned, I always felt that rhetoric compares nothing to the knowledge of actual experience in all fields of study (except maybe medical school). I mean I did do my homework on Common Justice but promotional materials of course do not prepare you for some of the negative obstacles you may face on the job. That I believe is the biggest surprise I confronted about a world I had only read up to now as perfect (thinking back to the first day of course).
Thanks for your post, Jaraed.
This post reminds me of a quote I learned about years ago: What would you do if you knew that you could not fail?
I am delighted to read about how you all have wonderful plans of using your education to change the world. This attitude is in sharp contrast to the commonly held view that an academic degree is all but just a means to accumulate wealth. After Ana’s presentation, I feel as though the immediate challenge is for us to find a balance between our dreams and present realities.
Through this fellowship, I have learned that, as Jared nicely puts it, “there are multitude of paths in the pursuit of helping people.” I believe that a career in public policy will permit me to serve and improve society in the manner that I desire. However, I pursue this belief with a mixture of excitement and uncertainty.
Here’s a question for us to consider: how can we balance our desire to help people with the desire to lead happy lives? Are there ever situations whereby our social justice work can erode personal happiness and fulfillment?
Have a pleasant holiday!
Thanks for your post, Jaraed.
This post reminds me of a quote I learned about years ago: What would you do if you knew that you could not fail?
I am delighted to read about how you all have wonderful plans of using your education to change the world. This attitude is in sharp contrast to the commonly held view that an academic degree is all but just a means to accumulate wealth. After Ana’s presentation, I feel as though the immediate challenge is for us to find a balance between our dreams and present realities.
Through this fellowship, I have learned that, as Jared nicely puts it, “there are multitude of paths in the pursuit of helping people.” I believe that a career in public policy will permit me to serve and improve society in the manner that I desire. However, I pursue this belief with a mixture of excitement and uncertainty.
Here’s a question for us to consider: how can we balance our desire to help people with the desire to lead happy lives? Are there ever situations whereby our social justice work can erode personal happiness and fulfillment?
Have a pleasant holiday!
To echo something I mentioned in an early blog, the most valuable thing I have taken away from this fellowship experience thus far has been the new knowledge of the variety of opportunities out there for us to pursue careers in which we can do legitimate good in the world. We all came in to Vera wanting to do some form of good, some of us had a specific idea of the populations we wanted to work with, and the type of work we wanted to do, while others were a little more lost when it came to the details.
I am sure many of us came in to this fellowship with an idealized vision of what it meant to work in social justice; a vision where we help our agencies participants on a one on one basis, the participant thanks us and we then go home with a smile on our face. One thing I have learned in particular has been that much of the work that is done in the social justice field does not fit this vision. That is not to say that the work is not good work, but the impact we are having is not always as obvious as we would like it to be. When we get down to the nitty-gritty work, the work that doesn’t necessarily deal directly with participants, such as the researching and the compiling of reports, it becomes easy to lose track of just how important that research or report is. There are many ways to change the world, and many ways to do good. We don’t always have the opportunity to see the immediate impact of our work, but one of the major things I have learned throughout my internship this semester is that the impact one can have doing the behind the scenes work can be just as important, if not more so, than one on one work with participants.
Thank you Jaraed for your exciting post.
I completely agree with Michael when he said "the impact one can have doing the behind the scenes work can be just as important, if not more so, than one on one work with participants".
One of the many things that I have learned is to keep my options open. I have been so adamant that I am not interested in juvenile justice, now I'm more open to the idea. I still prefer to not work in that field but I am more open to the subject now. I have also learned about other non profit organizations that are aimed at making a world of difference.
It was very nice to hear from Ana about her law school experience. It is very encouraging and honest. Sometimes I am anxious about going to law school and I have mixed emotions, then within a day or two something happens to cause me to rant about injustices to "the little person" and I wish I could fast forward to having a JD. I want to earn a law degree but now I also want to start a non profit organization.
Hopefully, I am more open-minded about everything. To answer James' question about keeping a balanced life
between our desire to help others and living a happy life. I think that can be difficult to do but do-able. I think one of the things we have to accept is that we are limited by what we can do. But as long our consciences are clear that we are really doing our very best, that's a start. We have to know when to stop. Also, it is important to separate or at least try very hard to separate the two, try not to be consumed by your work to the extent that you don't know where one stops and the other begins.
Best of luck to you all. I am truly honored to be part of this cohort.
Happy Thanksgiving all.
Great questions, Jaraed.
Reflecting back on my own education, I have found the connection between theory and practice to be multilayed and bi-directional. In other words, there are all kinds of relationships between theory and "real life" that go beyond how closely they match or diverge, even though that is a fine starting point.
In the early days of working in forensic mental health settings, I was heavily influenced by the theories I had learned, so much so that I may have seen things that weren't there, merely because Freud (or some other theorist) told me that I would see it. Sometimes this became a self fulfilling prophesy, as patients, following my interpretation, began to behave as I expected them to behave. In this way, clinicians can actually create mental disorders in patients; we call that iatrogenesis.
Later, I began to use my experience in the real world. Through research, I began to modify theory to more closely align with what I saw on hospital wards and prisons. Sometimes people call that "grounded" theory because it starts from experience instead of from an intellectual inference. I became more attracted during this period to theorists like Harry Stack Sullivan, who never pathologized patients but thought that they, like everyone else, just had problems in living. His theories grew out of patients' narratives while most theorists at that time (1940s and 50s) were supposed "experts" who imposed their own beliefs on patients.
Today, I still love theory, but see it very differently than I once did. Rather than being completely authoritative, I know it is just one tool that helps us figure out what is happening. Good theory can be a bridge between disciplines. It may illuminate things more strongly than data points on a spread sheet... in the same way that a sculpture of a woman may reveal truths that a live woman cannot. Theory can be a guide toward understanding or can bring together understandings of disparate phenomena. The important thing is that theory not be static. It has to be changing forms, morphing, expanding, and contracting. Like the U.S. Constitution, for example, it has to be a living thing in order to be useful.
The biggest takeaway I got from Ana's experience and advice to those of us who are thinking of law school is this: as long as you are passionate and happy with what you are doing, it is worth it. In this day and age, where a higher education costs your soul, you have to make sure that you're doing what you love to do.
“Choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life.”
― Confucius
To answer Jaraed's questions, I think that the ideas and theories we learn about are always going to be different in application. It is always important to learn and be aware of these theories, but equally as important to keep in mind that these theories might not play out as expected in the field. We all bring our own experiences and perceptions that we bring to our work that affect how we translate these theories into practice. We are constantly learning and evolving as a result of new information and ideas; we have to remain open and able to change.
I won't wish you a happy Thanksgiving, because no, but have a great long weekend! :)
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