Pre-Law News
Updates from Loyola's Pre-Law Society
Hi Everyone!
I hope you’ve had a great semester so far. As we approach the end of the semester, I wanted to take a moment to reflect on all that the Pre-Law Society has accomplished this year.
In the fall, we hosted our expungement clinic in partnership with Maryland Legal Aid, an event we hold each semester that continues to be both impactful and rewarding. We also launched our peer mentoring program, with approximately 40 freshmen and sophomores paired with upperclassmen for guidance throughout their pre-law journey. This spring, we expanded the program with new mentor-mentee groups, continuing the strong foundation established by our past president, Liz.
This semester has been especially active, with guest speakers from both immigration and real estate law. These Q&A-style events have provided valuable opportunities for members to engage directly with legal professionals and gain insight into different career paths.
Looking ahead, we have several events coming up, including a guest speaker on April 14th featuring attorney Lucy MacGabhann, our expungement clinic on April 19th, and a visit to Maryland Legal Aid on April 16th. Each of these events continues our commitment to both professional development and community engagement.
On April 9th, we also traveled to Washington, D.C. to tour Catholic Law and American Law. These visits offered a valuable perspective on law school and helped make the next steps in our academic journeys feel more tangible.
I am proud of everything we have accomplished this year and grateful for the continued support of our executive board and our faculty advisor, Dr. Beverlin. Following our March elections, I would like to congratulate Keira Rosaria (Vice President), Brianne Krutz (Secretary), and Katelyn Kohv (Treasurer). I look forward to working together, ensuring the Pre-Law Society's success, in the year ahead.
Wishing you all the best as the semester concludes, and good luck on finals.
Blessings,
Sophia
Hi Everyone,
I hope you are all having a great start to spring. Here on campus, it’s the final push when papers are completed and final exam studying begins in earnest. For seniors headed to law school it is the time to make decisions on seat deposits and firm up where the next stage of life will happen.
Earlier this semester I wrote on the question I’m most frequently asked: Should I become a lawyer? This time I thought I’d share some thoughts on what has the be the second most common question: Where should I go to law school?
Perhaps what is inspiring me is the combination punch of visiting American and Catholic University’s law schools last week with Pre-Law students, and then on Saturday talking to students (and their parents!) considering attending Loyola next year as part of their Pre-Law journey. In many respects this represents the beginning and end-points of most of my work.
As Father Brown said in his interview this month, the Jesuit liberal arts education opens up your mind in ways that are hard to fathom until later in life. Loyola does an excellent job of inspiring service to others and broadening one’s intellectual horizon, and as I shared with high school seniors and parents Saturday, that is very helpful for those pondering becoming an attorney. One thing, though, that remains a heavy lift is the nitty gritty choice of where to earn a Juris Doctor.
After all, this is a highly individualized choice with different aspects of a law school meaning different things to different people. It’s hard to unpack all that as an undergraduate when you are completing those tests and finals, especially when you are soaring into the relative unknown like Artemis II, not counting attorneys as family members or close friends.
Using American and Catholic as examples, let me provide four dimensions of law schools that you can prioritize exploring: Cost, Selectivity, Location, and Character. Superficially, especially if you have never physically been to American University’s Washington College of Law and Catholic University’s Columbus School of Law, one might see many similarities between the two institutions. On a certain level, fair enough. They both grant JD’s. They both have long track records of preparing lawyers for practice. They are both in Washington D.C. and they both cost a lot of money. One is the first law school founded by women and the other has a history with the Knights of Columbus before two institutions merged. But at the end of the day, they both confer law degrees.
Let’s start with cost. Beyond noting one costs $61,000 and the other $66,000, take a look at their American Bar Association 509 reports. You can google 509 reports, there is no paywall and all schools must submit them annually. Look here for the percentage of students who receive scholarships, what portion of tuition the scholarships cover, and if they are contingent. We learned last Thursday that Catholic recently quit offering contingent scholarships, but their current students do have them. Contingent means you must keep a certain G.P.A. to retain all or some of the scholarship money. And to be blunt, a 3.2 is not as easy as you think to get in law school as the grading experience is different than undergrad.
The cost of law school is something I want to explore more next year on campus, but keep in mind the changing financial aid landscape as you decide. There is considerable change on that front that involves caps on borrowing and the involvement of private lenders.
The next aspect to look at, selectivity, is similar to cost in that it is unidimensional. Cheaper is, after all, better and similarly, more selective is better. As you likely guessed, law schools are very aware of selectivity’s importance to admissions candidates, and in turn base much of their enrollment decisions upon the impact on selectivity measurements. How many people apply and don’t get in? How high of a median LSAT score does the incoming class have? In my humble opinion, this leads to some unproductive admissions decisions, but to be fair, this is the nearly singular criterion on which they are graded. Take a look at the top right of the first page of the school’s 509 report to view their acceptance rate, and the percentage of admitted students who enrolled. These are nice complements to a school’s ranking.
Location, conversely, is entirely in the eye of the beholder, so involves a much different assessment than the numerical assessments above. Is the school in an expensive city? In American and Catholic’s case let me answer for you: yes! But perhaps you would have roommates there and not somewhere else. Perhaps you are moving back in with your parents during law school – you would not be the first. And look at the particular neighborhoods school are in. American and Catholic are across town from each other and apartments within walking distance rent for different amounts.
I’ll end with a plug for campus visits, such as the Loyola trip last week. The intangible “feel” of a school is also highly important. I’ll call this “character.” Ask yourself “Where will I have the best chance of succeeding?” “Is the school a good fit?” Fit and feel sound to me like the kinds of things you have to observe first-hand, just as all those parents and high school seniors do who visit Loyola each year. You can look up the size of American and Catholic’s incoming classes, you can count their journals published, read their average class size (it seems like they all have about 4 students per professor if you take that number at face value), and how many volumes are in the library. But visiting gives you a real sense of how the institutions are different. Right away you will pick up on differences between these two schools, as you would any others. So go out and visit schools. They are very expensive, if nothing else, so kick the tires and see what they are offering.
Finally, this marks the final Pre-Law newsletter that will be edited and compiled by graduating Pre-Law Work Study Ifeoma Ezeani. Ifeoma recently had her article “Disparities in Discipline” accepted for publication in the University of Washington Journal of Political Science. Congratulations, Ifeoma! It’s been my pleasure to work with you on your research, this newsletter, and all things Pre-Law the last few years. Your dedication, hard work, and thoughtfulness will be missed. Enjoy your gap year from higher education and looking forward to helping you with law admissions down the line.
Have a nice summer, and good luck with those finals,
Matt Beverlin
Loyola Pre-Law Advisor
Political Science Department
rmbeverlin@loyola.edu
By: Ifeoma Ezeani
Father Timothy Brown, S.J. is an Associate Professor of Law and Social Responsibility and Assistant to the President for Mission Integration. Fr. Brown first came to Loyola in 1987 and has served as a faculty member in The Sellinger School of Business and Management where he has recieved honors for his teaching include the Sellinger School Overall Outstanding Faculty award, the Harry W. Rodgers Distinguished Teacher of the Year award, and the Educator for Life award.
In 2023, Fr. Brown founded The Rev. Timothy Brown, S.J. Ignatian Life Center for the promotion of the Jesuit and Ignatian spiritual tradition at Loyola University Maryland and is in service to the Baltimore community. Fr. Brown earned his B.S. from Georgetown, M.A. from Fordham, M.Div. from the Weston School of University, and his J.D. from George Mason University. He serves on the Archdiocese of Baltimore School Board and the board for Cristo Rey Jesuit High School in Baltimore.
*Comments have been lightly edited for clarity*
1. You hold degrees in foreign service, theology, and law. What inspired you to pursue both the priesthood and the legal profession, and how have these vocations shaped one another in your career?
My answer to that would be the call to community service, civic service, and religious service. My call to do service in these various areas, one being more political justice, social justice, and one being faith-based justice, is kind of an understanding of advancing the causes of people who have no voice.
2. How does studying law within a broader liberal arts or Jesuit educational environment shape students differently from more traditional pre-law tracks?
From studying philosophy, theater, English, history, you are so far advanced from your fellow law students because you have a fuller sense of understanding on issues and how things, how people think and how they work. So, it's absolutely an advantage beyond your imagination to have that full liberal arts core. Maybe don't always appreciate that now, but it is a huge advantage the way your mind works.
3. What is one book, legal case, or form of media you would recommend to every pre-law student—and why?
There is an old book called “One L” by Scott Turow that I think is still relevant 50 years later, about his experience at Harvard Law as a 1L student.
4. What role do you think faith and spirituality can play in helping students navigate difficult moral or ethical questions in law and public life?
I think the role depends on your identity. You know, if your identity is a faith-based identity, you're going to do your work out of the core of your character. So if your character is has a faith component, or a component of justice or component of mercy or a component of compassion, based on your faith beliefs, whatever they are, you will be a very different lawyer, because you'll have the empathy to take on the mind and heart of your client, and you be a much better lawyer with that kind of approach.
5. You founded the Rev. Timothy Brown, S.J. Ignatian Life Center in 2023. What inspired the creation of this center, and how does it connect to Loyola’s broader mission?
It goes to our spirituality, the judgment spirituality. It's a way of continuing that learning, moral formation, faith formation, spiritual formation, when the time comes when a lot of judgments aren't going to be teaching here anymore, we'll continue that, that movement with lay people running it. We just need to have some money to pay them. So, we decided to start it with my name on it, so that we can get some people who know me, that might contribute for the day when we're all not here anymore.
6. After decades of teaching and service, what has kept you passionate about working with students and the Baltimore community?
I think I have more energy now than I had when I was younger. I am determined to fight artificial means of learning, that when you have these wonderful gifts, use them. Do not outsource them. And we have a whole city of people that could use the talent of our Loyola students. Get out there, give your talents to support other people's needs.
7. From your experience teaching and mentoring multiple generations of Loyola students, what gives you the most hope about the next generation of leaders and future lawyers?
I think that every generation has its own unique personality and your generation brings a whole new energy than your parents and grandparents. Each generation brings your own hope, and you bring your own desires. I see things that your generation brings that weren’t thought about before, especially the passion for social justice, sustainability, and environmental justice. Different understanding of people than people before, so it gives me hope.
Letter from Ifeoma Ezeani
Major: Political Science
Minor: Forensic Studies
Post-Grad Plans: I will be taking a gap year to work and apply for the 2027 law school cycle!
Hi Pre-Law Students!
From my time as both an under-class student and upper-class student in the Pre-Law Society, I have experienced being completely unsure of how to achieve my postgraduate plans, to being confident in which next steps are best for my future. This year I really got to see how ambitious, proactive, and strong-minded the members of this organization are and how determined you all are to pursue law school or a legal related career after Loyola.
I say all this to say, while you may have your predetermined plans, don’t forget to enjoy yourself during undergrad and do things that bring you joy! Study abroad, join non-academic clubs, and take that non-major related class! I had the most amazing opportunity to study abroad the spring semester of my junior year, and although it delayed my initial plans to pursue law school right after graduation, it was truly a transformative experience that taught me so much about myself, that I would do over and over again. The years you spend as an undergrad Pre-Law student are stressful, and it’s only going to get more stressful after.
One thing that I had to come to terms with is that law school and legal careers aren’t going anywhere, taking gap years are completely okay, and even sometimes great options to strengthen yourself as an applicant and reinforce your passion for the law. Really use this time to find your legal interests and hobbies that keep you grounded. I wish you all the best of luck in your future endeavors, I have no doubt that you all will become brilliant minds in your future careers!
All the best,
Ifeoma Ezeani
Letter from Danika Trucchi
Major: Political Science
Minor(s): English; Gender & Sexuality Studies
Post-Grad Plans: I will be attending the University of Richmond Law School in the fall!
Dear Pre-Law Students,
The only thing I knew when I started at Loyola was that I wanted to go to law school. However, I am going to be a first-generation law student, so I had absolutely no idea what I was doing. Getting legal internships and applying to law schools was incredibly frustrating and overwhelming. What I realized overtime, though, is that it is better to ask for help than to assume that I can and or should know how to do this all on my own.
As you continue your journey at Loyola, please keep asking any and every question that you have about your prospective career. Whether you’re wondering how to best approach the law school application process or workshopping how to avoid burnout, someone is going to be there to help you. You just need to ask. Don’t let the feeling of being lost and confused deter you from pursuing your legal career.
All the best,
Danika Trucchi
Letter from Cameron Langlois
Major: Philosophy
Minor: Political Science
Post-Grad Plans: I will be attending Loyola Marymount Law School in Los Angeles, California, specializing in Work Law!
My name is Cameron Langlois; I am graduating from Loyola after having studied philosophy and political science. Post-grad I will be attending Loyola Marymount Law School in Los Angeles, California, specializing in Work Law! I am forever grateful to everyone here at Loyola Maryland who has encouraged me to grow into the person I am today. My biggest piece of advice for Pre-Law students is to focus on finding your voice.
Pick a major that you are passionate about, not just an easy A or something you think “looks good on an application”. Think outside the box and create a narrative that you believe in. Philosophy of Labor was that narrative for me, but it can truly be anything. Passion is the biggest advantage you can have, so study what you like to talk about! You will be in school for potentially another 7 years, may as well enjoy it!
Best of luck to all of you!
