Scott Green

As a law student, undergrads are always asking me questions.  “Why do you think I care that you’re a law student?” is a typical one.

The truth is we graduate-level students have a lot of wisdom, as measured in ponytails.  And there’s nothing we know better than why you shouldn’t become a grad student yourself.

It’s becoming a more popular option.  As the economy gets worse and jobs become scarce, a lot of graduates are using their newfound collegiate knowledge and maturity to take on an extra $100,000 in debt before joining the real world.  But it’s not all as glamorous as that.  College isn’t the same after you finish your first four years.

The biggest difference is age.  My friends and I are always amazed to see junior high students walking around campus, spending time in the Union, sneaking into bars, etc.  Eventually it becomes obvious they are, in fact, college freshmen, a group that apparently no longer hit puberty until age 20.

Female freshmen also have gotten younger, but not in the good way I used to hope.  When I was an undergrad they mystified me; they were so much more worldy than us guys.  They never punched each other in celebration of a particularly exciting football play or consumed an entire bottle of ranch dressing on a dare.

Now, not so much.  On Halloween, for example, they dress in ultra-provocative costumes made with less fabric than a standard pair of tube socks.  Four years ago, this sight melted my brain out my nostrils; now I just wonder how their parents would feel if they knew.

Another difference is that graduate students have long since given up fighting for causes that don’t affect us.  Consider the struggle against commercial whaling.  Thousands of undergrads around the country continue to stage protests, and yet it is completely impractical to expect whalers to give up their trade.  Think about it:  If they can’t hunt whales for oil, then what will they use to oil up their harpoons when they hunt for whales?

But the biggest problem with going to grad school is that you actually have to learn.  In law school we even had to do this in a completely foreign language consisting of legal terms, including “amicus curiae” (“friend of the court,” as in, “Hey Vinny, be an amicus curiae and give the judge a $25,000 bribe, willya?”); estoppel (a website that sells stoppels); libel (my attorney advised me not to explain this one); etc.

You also have to regularly write 30- and 40- and 50-page papers to the point that if someone asked you to write a standard undergraduate-length 15-page paper you would offer him a kidney.

But the worst part is, if you succeed in graduate school, your reward is growing far older, remaining on campus, and writing entire books.  That’s because the most successful grad students become professors.

Scott is a third-year law student.