Law Students

It is with a dull anger that I read your article, "These temp lawyers are top-notch, a new firm in Boston promises," (May 5, 2008), which my grandmother handed to me as I was clicking on the classifieds in a fruitless effort to find an ad for a junior-level attorney. You see, I have four years of an Ivy League education, followed by three years of law school, and bar admission.

In a world where someone with a J.D. is automatically considered to one of the top earners in the country, the Globe frittered away the opportunity to report on the underclass of lawyers that are mired in tens (if not hundreds) of thousands of dollars in debt and count on document review to pay the bills. Instead, it gleefully perpetuated the "stereotype" by noting that a contract attorney is a "fancy name for recent law school graduates who are desperate for work" and touting the services of a staffing firm that refuses to hire recent graduates who "couldn't get a job anywhere," without bothering to interview a single contract attorney.

This recent underemployed attorney also used to be a journalist. Maybe she should have remained one, as the Globe could certainly use a refresher in one of the cardinal rules of journalism, Always Examine all Potential Angles.

Full post as published by Wicked Words on May 07, 2008 (boomark / email).