Sharadha Sankararaman

Age: 27
Undergraduate School: University of Madras
Undergraduate Major: Computer Science
Hometown: Chennai, India
Status: Part-Time Evening
E-mail: sgsankaraman@mail.txwes.edu

11/18/09 - It is officially legal analysis, reading, and writing week.

With the memo due, printers at home, work, and school were working overtime. Too long or too short statuses were constantly updated on Facebook. After turning in the memo, I don’t think any of us wanted to see another one for the semester.

We also had our practice citation exam to give us an idea of how and what to expect on the real exam which is tomorrow. It was a unanimous conclusion that ICW does not prepare us for this exam. ICW tell us how to do the citation, while in the citation exam you need to know when to cite it. I was informed that this how v. when saga would continue into the next semester.

Next semester I am looking forward to working on persuasive memos that involve independent research. But let us not think about that until we get there…

Now I need to get back to preparing for my citation exam. Ta-ta’s..And wish me luck!


11/11/09 - Aaaaaah….

That is my version of “Oh my God.” Given a choice, this blog entry would just be an echo of my Aaaahh.

Anyways, it is that time of year. We were warned about this from the word go. We tried and tried hard to be prepared for this, but I do not think anyone is ready. Yes, my dear friends, it is officially exam season.

You can just feel the season in the air. You can see sudden growth of outlines and supplements in the bags, locker and bookshelves. Sleepy glazed eyes and frequent panic attacks indicate this season’s arrival.

Most of us are trying to get our family prepared about our possible absence from the traditional Thanksgiving dinner. I wonder how we can make them understand that we are feeling like the turkey being grilled. My brain is so stuffed with rules and exceptions that I tend to forget the more basic stuff.

We have one more TA session left in this semester. This would be a good opportunity to say thanks to Tim - it was fantastic to have him as our TA.

Since I am practicing to respond to short answer questions, this is a shorter blog. Good luck folks. May the caffeine work for you.


11/4/09 - It’s driving me crazy … I just can't sleep… I'm so excited, I'm in too deep …Crazy, but it feels alright…baby, thinking of Torts keeps me up all night... And no, I am not a Britney Spears fan - it has just been crazy this week. Every day of the week I have something important to do.

We got back our Memo 1. It was interesting to see what clicked and what did not. We had our one-on-one meeting with Prof. H regarding Memo 1, as well as the soon to be due Memo 2. It was wonderful! He suggested some key points that are very specific to our individual papers. Hopefully, I can include all these points into the next memo.

It is Contracts central this week for me. I am planning to take the Contracts practice exam this Saturday. In a way, I am looking forward to this exam, since we did not have any midterms in Contracts. I think having a practice exam is a cool way to judge where you stand, and figure out what you need to focus on before the final.

Did I mention that we got back our Torts midterm? In an effort to heighten the surprise, Prof. M proceed to conduct our class as usual even though he had just mentioned about having the midterm results on him. It drove us all crazy!


10/28/09 - My near and dear have known that I need to have a plan for everything. Whenever I mention, “I have a plan,” my husband dreads it. He thinks of it as an equivalent to a tornado siren.

So, thanks to school, “location” has become a thing of utmost importance. I need to sit in the first row in class. I need to sit at the head of the dining table. I need the right side of the bed. My water bottle, coffee mug and my highlighters need to be on the left of my laptop. Interestingly, I need to sit in a particular location in the library (My newest favorite location in the world). So, folks please stay away from my table.

Speaking of the library, I wonder why people talk so much in the non-study room area. It gets very annoying when two or more people talk about their Thursday night at Malone’s while you are trying to figure out the “how and when immunity works as a defense.”

Anyway, it is almost eleven weeks of school. Time has flown by and I feel that my feet just got wet. We had a Torts practice exam this week and Memo 2 is in progress. Heat is up my friends, and if we are getting nasty, there is a good reason for it (at least to us).

10/21/09 - Taaa dam ta dam…taaa dam ta dam…

No, it is not a background score for a wedding, but the situation is a little similar. Like a wedding, this event makes you venture into the unknown. It is scary, you have hundreds of dinosaurs jumping inside your stomach, and you know you can expect the unexpected. It is known as…the Torts midterm exam.

So we had our final midterm (I mean last of the midterms, not any actual finals…I know, I wish). My brain tried to defend itself from the intentional battery of negligence and trespass but since its defenses were weak, it failed miserably.

Midterms introduced us to the nightmare called electronic blue book. We tried to take our exams on it for the first time through this software. Though I was prepared for it to conk out on me (as advised by many upper classmen) I did not expect it to be this big a disaster. I know many in my class who were not happy with it either.

Though our exam was on Monday, we did not feel the aftermath until the next day. Contracts failed to make sense, since it did not have negligence (my pet peeve word for this semester) in it. Words in the book got overlapped and my speech and thoughts did not make sense to anyone at all. I was drunk on Torts and I wished for a day off to get sober.

Anyhow, we have couple of practice exams and a memo to look forward to. Yippee!


10/14/09 - I know this week is all about midterms, memos, outlines, etc. But I would like to talk about how people tend to say things without thinking twice. My English teacher at school called it “verbal diarrhea.”

One of the reasons why people take up the part-time evening program is because it gives them the flexibility to work while at school. There are a variety of reasons behind this decision which varies from “I love my job” to “I need the money to support my education and my family.” Also, there are people who don’t have a day job and their reasons vary from “I would rather focus on my studies, I can handle the loans later once I graduate” to “my family is funding law school so I can focus on my education” to “ I got laid off and I am looking for a job.”

I am bringing up this topic because I realize as the pressure of schoolwork is building up, employed folks are tending to pass nasty remarks about the unemployed. Their employment is being used as an excuse for not being on par with the demands of law school. I do not think that is fair because everyone had a choice when applying to law school. There is no point complaining about a decision that was made by free will in an employment at will state.

I remember the wise words at orientation: “Don’t burn bridges unnecessarily; you never know when you will need to use them.”

 

10/7/09 - The word of the week…no, make that the word of the hour is “crunch.” One of the definitions of crunch by my trusted www.dicitonary.com is “a critical or dangerous situation.” Suddenly, the school caught up with us. It is almost as if it sneaked up behind us when we weren’t looking and crunched us in a big giant hug. You can feel the tension in the air and people are getting very testy.

This week’s list of things we have to do includes the memo, federal and statute assignment, the lengthy Torts reading, the offerings of contract, preparation for the midterms and the outline. Did I mention things are getting a little complicated here? The list seems to be growing every second. Time and energy is an important resource here and everyone is facing the time crunch. On a personal level, I decided to do some stomach crunches. I am finding that exercise is a key to release that pent up frustration that makes you want to throw your book at the person typing loudly in class. Studying law is very sedentary and involves many calories (chips and soda).

Oh! We will be doing the immunity teddy bear today. That should be fun. I know some of my classmates have not completed their reading hoping to pull out the bear if needed. Wonder how that will go…Anyways I have to get back to my memo while crunching on baby carrots for a change.


10/1/09 - This week was supposed to be uneventful. There was nothing major lined up, except for the weekly reading and usual outlines. In other words, it was meant to be the calm before the storm.

However (I know I would write a wonderful court’s opinion once I become a judge), the week seemed to be super long. This sentiment was shared by not only my fellow 1Ls but also my professor. It took forever to catch up with the reading of Torts. I don’t think I fully appreciated the exam review we did a couple weeks ago until now. Prof. M had to modify the syllabus to accommodate the class we lost due to the review. This meant more reading and change of the nice reading routine of Monday, Wednesday to Wednesday, Monday. This threw most of us off since we weren’t sure about how much reading would be enough for the week. Funny are the ways of God, this confusion made us prefer the reading for Contracts!

We got a chance to meet Prof H one on one to discuss the memo draft we submitted. With the amount of exercises he makes us do in class, I guess the structure of what a memo should look like has become second nature to us. Please note that I said “structure” and not “content.”

On the personal side, I had to deal with parents swap, my daughter’s graduation and a bad allergic reaction.

If this is the calm, I think I would prefer the storm.


9/23/09 – On the first day of class, a very wise professor told us that our family would hate us by Thanksgiving. No offense to the wise one, unless Thanksgiving is in September, I think my family already does.

I guess we are so excited being law students that sometimes we think of ourselves as lawyers already. I constantly use the phrases like “says who,” “dismissed,” “affirmed,” “remanded,” etc. Suddenly I don’t believe in promises (because they don’t have any consideration) and I always, always demand restitution.

Last night, I told my six month old when she was kicking around while I was changing her diaper that if we were in the state of Colorado, I would be able to sue her for the tort of battery (White v. Muniz). My mom was informed that her email was not in an IRAC format and being an English teacher herself, I don’t think she appreciated my delightful thought. My girlfriends were annoyed that I kept saying the argument Matthew McConaughey was making in the movie A Time to Kill wouldn’t work in “our” courts.

An excerpt from my conversation with my husband:

Me: So, what am I getting for my birthday?

Husband: I just paid your fees this semester, what more do you want?

Me: Well...If you don’t pay my fees, you will end up paying alimony and child support, either way you have to pay; at least this way you will have a wife and a child.

Husband: But wouldn’t the fact that I paid for your education count in this case.

Me: Nope, a promise made between a husband and wife is considered gratuitous.

Hence proved.


9/16/09 – Rain, rain, go away…Come again after the exams are at bay…Truly, imagine being cuddled with a non-law related book inside your comforter, drinking hot tea in this nice rainy day...Not going to happen…

We are finished with our Torts midterms. Our group collectively decided not to discuss the exam when we went for our TA support group right after the midterm. We were all looking like zombies ready to collapse. Even with Monday being a holiday for Labor Day, the week was extremely long.

Faced with the possibility that he may have to explain all the questions and answers 48 individual times during office hours, Prof. M decided to review them in class yesterday. It was discussion galore! We even gave up our break for this sake.

The memo draft is due today. I don’t know a single soul in my section who is happy about their memo. I understand that there is no right answer, but come on! The common pain points are the format, the length and the content. Either we have too much to write or too little. Which is a better format? A, B, Hybrid, None?  But the good thing is that it is not graded. I guess we are all expecting our drafts to be bleeding green ink.

Next week we should be starting on our outlines. We got a fair idea of what goes in one, thanks to our TA support group. Basically it is going to be a cheat sheet of the information based on your textbook, which you use to study and prepare for exams. The catch is, you may end up making an outline of an outline, and to some extent an outline of an outline of an outline. On that very confusing sentence I shall bade good-bye.

9/9/09 – I hope everyone had a great long weekend. I know we deserve it (at least some of us do). How was my long weekend, you ask? Hmm…Let’s see…

Like most of my fellow 1L Torts scholars, I was busy cramming for the midterm this Wednesday. Most of us felt like our brains have been assaulted and battered. The trespass of our grey matter caused severe emotional distress. It is outrageous, I know!

Heads up folks, it is cold and flu season. Cold decided to raise its nasty head at my household. Luckily, we had no plans for this long weekend anyways. I must say cold and midterms makes a very interesting combo. You never know what to blame that annoying headache on.

Adding to this perfect weekend was the fact that school was closed this Monday! I found this out after a fifty-minute drive to school. I was bummed, but luckily I had my books with me and not safe in my locker (I am trying to see the bright side of life here). This actually helped me do my good deed of the day when I called couple of my friends who come from far off places to warn them about the school being closed. I know I got some good karma.

Anyways, it is back to studying for me. I will keep you posted about how I did. Wish me luck!

9/2/09 – The heat just got turned up a bit. Suddenly I realized that I am a law student. I have known this for a while now, but I went into full blown panic mode when it really sunk in. I guess this is where all the breathing exercises I learnt in child birth classes helped. So, after a couple of deep breaths and a good portion of my poor husband’s brain, I realized I needed a plan to stick to. Now is where everyone wishes me good luck.

Any hoo...Things got pretty exciting this week with all the battery and considerations. My professors are great. Their teaching methodology reminds me of kite flying. They let you talk about a particular topic and just when you start getting astray, they pull you right back in.

I joined my study group and we met this weekend. It is helpful to bounce your thoughts off people who are in the same “place.” We will probably be meeting every week from now on. I did my first three Interactive Citation Workstation (ICW) exercises this Saturday. I never realized the value of space and periods until I did them. So while I was working on them, I wrote to Prof. H. and he wrote back within 10 minutes!

I also really have to thank my TAs from Academic Support. These guys are wonderful. It makes a difference when someone who has been there and done that can tell you how and when to do things. I don’t know if all the schools have this kind of program, but I am ever so grateful that ours does.

8/26/09 – I survived the first week of classes! So far so good, no injuries, no bruises, maybe a slight dip in the confidence level.

Orientation went very well. I am extremely thankful to the school for letting me know in no uncertain terms what to expect ahead. The gist of it was, it is going to be a rough road ahead but you will love it. I guess the motto is “Be prepared…Always!”  The food was great during the orientation. I love it when vegetarian food is available, but like Deborah said, we are getting tired of pizza already. I got a chance to meet some of my fellow 1Ls. I honestly feel quite intimidated by some of them. They already speak like lawyers. 

I have Torts, Contracts and Legal Analysis, Research & Writing (LARW) this semester. All my professors are great - they have great senses of humor, which keeps classes interesting. I am really enjoying Torts, compared to Contracts; I guess it is because of the textbook. LARW worries me a little. It is like learning to read all over again.

I came to school this weekend and decided to study in the library. I had a fair warning about how cold the place would be, but even the advance notice was not enough. Brr...was it cold!! It is not very helpful to a person who loves to sleep in a cool quiet place. So I hauled myself out and sat in one of the classrooms on the first floor. People, please be forewarned if you ever hear groans of frustration coming out of one of these rooms, it’s just me.