The Care and Feeding of Support Groups

Imagine it’s the midnight on the Thursday before finals start. Your first exam is on Monday. And to use one of my favorite words from one of my favorite internet celebrities, you’ve got this dicked. Maybe two of your four outlines are done and the other two are nearing completion. Maybe you’ve already looked at a practice exam. Maybe your flash cards have been loving crafted, ready to be assist you at a moment’s notice.

And then it happens. You hear a noise more terrifying than a blood-curdling scream in a horror movie. In the midst of saving the final edits to that third outline, your hard drive decides to commit suicide. You have a plunky little netbook to soldier you through finals, but there’s a bigger problem: Everything. Is. Gone. Maybe you took my advice and used a service like Backblaze, but for the purpose of this (vivid) example, let’s assume you didn’t.

Your ability to get through a crisis like this is going to depend on one thing. It’s not how hard you can work, how fast you can type, or how smart you are. It’s all going to come down to how strong of a support group you’ve built in law school. And something like this will happen to you. No student can get through three years where as much is thrown at you as law school without enduring a crisis that you really can’t get through alone. And if you do, then I’m going to step out of character and say you did law school wrong.

Characteristics of Support Groups

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p style=”clear: both”>The core is small Malcolm Gladwell got a lot of press in The Tipping Point for the Rule of 150. But that rule is just an extension of a larger rule: that there’s a limit to how much of any one thing we can keep in our heads. Gladwell introduced another similar concept when talking about the Rule of 150: the sympathy group.

Take a minute, for example, to make a list of all the people you know whose death would leave you truly devestated. Chances are you will come up with around 12 names. That, at least, is the average answer that most people give to that question. Those names make up what psychologists call our sympathy group. Why aren’t groups any larger? . . . If your list was twice as long, if it had 30 names on it, and, as a result, you spent only half as much time with everyone on it, would you still be as close to everyone?

The core of your support group is going to be the few people, maybe less than 10, that you have the most invested in. When the shit hits the fan, it’s this small core of people that’s going to do the most in getting you back on your feet.

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p style=”clear: both”>It is people who are attending law school Your girlfriend who’s getting her poly sci masters degree is not in this group. Your parents are not in this group. Your roommate is not in this group. Your dog is not in this group. As much as this is about getting emotional support, it’s also about the tactial moves you have to make in order to get back to where you need to be. If the first place you go when all hell brakes loose in law school is to your parents, sure you’ll get some kind words and good ideas, but will you get copies of outlines?

A noteable omission here is people who used to be in law school, at least in the core group. Any advice about law school from someone who has finished (including my own) necessarily comes with the prespective of looking back on the whole thing. But if you’re a 1L whose computer decided it was last call, you don’t care about the bigger picture. And yes, it’s valueable to have a reassuring voice that says you’ll be OK, but if that person is one of the 5-12 people that you turn to first, there’s a likelihood you might get talked off a ledge when the better play is to jump.

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p style=”clear: both”>It has concentric rings The best support group has multiple levels. At the middle is the core group. These people are your anchor. Your rock. Your lighthouse in the storm. They’re the people who aren’t just going to help if asked, but will ask what’s wrong and start offering solutions.

The next ring or level is the people you know pretty well. You might try and get to know everyone in law school, but you’ll fall into a large clique (like it or not) based on interests and activities. It might include people from the law review you’re on, people who live on the same side of town as you, people who sit near you in the library, and/or people who enjoy more than the occasional night out.

Finally there’s the group of people that include everyone else in your classes, friends of friends, and people who don’t attend your law school, but you’ve connected with either in your past or via Facebook, Twitter, etc. I wouldn’t bet my career on these people, but they can be lifesavers and shouldn’t be totally ignored.

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p style=”clear: both”>How to Build These Groups

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p style=”clear: both”>Share and share alike We’re not talking about Creative Commons. When the time comes that you need to ask for the moon from someone, the best position to be in is having helped them before in the past. Your core group is going to be people you’ve helped regularly. That next level will be people who know you’re willing to lend a hand. The reason the final level isn’t as reliable is because you don’t help them as much, so they are wary that you’ll be there for them. But if they do, be sure to give back if the opportunity comes up.

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p style=”clear: both”>Don’t attach strings If you give someone an outline, you shouldn’t need to make it eyes online. If you help someone out, you should do so knowing that they’ll help you because they’re a friend, not because you made sure to get a promise from them. That said, if someone you don’t know or who has a reputation for being very one-sided, don’t be afraid to be a little skeptical. But this shouldn’t be a strict quid pro quo.

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p style=”clear: both”>Don’t take liberties You’re asking for a lot. It might be a copy of an outline someone has spent months writing. It might be to have someone spend hours of their precious time walking you through concepts they understood easily. So once you’ve been helped, treat the outcome like a precious resource. Outlines shouldn’t be passed along without permission. Eventually you need a punt a topic rather than drag someone down with you. Don’t be afraid to ask for a lot, but be happy with the help you get and respect when someone can’t help you more.

These groups are very important. They’re the life raft that almost every successful law student will cling to at least once. The happiest and most successful law students are the ones who know where to look for help, are gracious when they get it, and are generous when the shoe is on the other foot while still valuing the time and effort they put into helping someone going through the same gauntlet they are.

Tagged as: students, support, wednesday opinion