Cynthia Ward P’21 to Give Insights on Law School
By Amelia Yeager ‘20
For undergraduates pursuing law school, Cynthia Ward P’21, a professor of law at William and Mary Law School, says, three questions come to mind: What is it going to take to get there? What is it going to be like once I’m there? And what do I want to do afterwards?
Professor Ward finds that prospective students often overlook the second question. “Many of my students, particularly the ones who major in the liberal arts, come in without really understanding what it would mean to become a lawyer. And I was exactly the same way,” Professor Ward says. That’s why she’ll be coming to campus this week to talk to students about what to expect from their first year of law school.
In her experience, even if students don’t know what to expect from law school, those who come from liberal arts colleges like Kenyon are fortunate, because they are equipped with skills that will transfer to their new coursework. “I have had excellent students who have majored in everything from anthropology to zoology,” Professor Ward says. “[Whether they are] engineers, physicists, poets, historians—if they can read a piece of text, separate the good arguments from the bad, write critically about it, and use the materials to make an argument—those are the critical skills.”
Professor Ward is confident in the value of a liberal arts degree in preparing students for law school, not just because of the breadth of students she has taught, but also because of her own experience as a student. After graduating with a B.A. in Political Science and Chinese Studies from Wellesley College, Professor Ward found that the elements she enjoyed from her undergraduate studies applied to her law school interests. “I discovered a love of academe itself. I really loved the academic environment, the idea of scholarship, and the idea of teaching students.”
Having the opportunity to hone and apply skills across content areas and internships while in law school helps students eventually figure out what areas of law most interest them. While some students come into their first year of law school knowing exactly what they want to pursue as a career, many find their passions while studying. “A lot of students come into law school not knowing what they want to do. And they’ll discover a subject area, or a type of practice, or both, during law school, either from classes or summer experience, that tells them what their next step is,” Professor Ward says. For her, she knew that she wanted to become an educator directly after graduating from Yale Law School with a J.D. as an extent of her interest in academia.
As Professor Ward has observed in her students, having a good sense of what to expect as a law student can help you figure out how to get the most out of the experience. Professor Ward’s talk will fill students in about the details of the first year in law school. Attendees can expect to hear about curriculum, pedagogy, and the law student experience.
Interested in learning more about what law school will really be like? RSVP here to join Professor Ward for her eat-and-learn session at 5:30pm on Thursday, October 17th in Peirce 210. To learn more about post-graduate options in law, make an appointment with Maureen Tobin at the CDO.