Yes, but . . .

Well, I'm a chatty one this month, aren't I? I wanted to drop one final post before classes start (this evening) to answer some questions I am sure are burning in the minds of the exactly no people that read this blog (except for you, of course, Adam). Basically, I went back to my original post and found that I do have some preliminary answers to the questions that drove this blog in the first place.

• Can I join Law Review?
• Probably. early on last semester the students received an email congratulating the winners of the write-on competition to one of the school's many journals. At least one of those winners was a comrade-in-arms evening student. It wasn't the Law Review per se, but it is a highly acclaimed journal, and I can't imagine that the workload for it is any different than for Law Review.
• Can I take a clinic?
• Probably. For those who just tuned in, a clinic is a combination seminar/practical class that gives you both "hands-on" experience with clients, and fulfills a writing requirement (at least the latter is true at Rutgers). Clinics will vary from school to school, but they are highly coveted because of the practical experience they provide. Again, students just received an email stating the winners of the lotteries for certain classes and clinics, and there were part-time evening students among them. Note that evening students will not be able to participate in just any clinic; your schedule and the needs of the clinic will determine if you will be available when clients need to see you. For a clinic that deals with Federal Tax law, for example, the work will need to be done when courts are open, so that will likely not work. However, a Domestic Violence clinic or Community Law clinic that has a lot of face-to-face interaction with clients that work during the day would be perfectly suited to an evening student.
  
• Will I ever give a "yes" or "no" answer again?
• Probably not. Studying law, studying anything in depth, for that matter, ensures that people see the world in shades of grey (which may help to explain why post-graduates and doctors are often jaded about political rhetoric). Lawyers need to be especially careful about what they say to people. Advice may be mistaken as legal gospel, but few lawyers ever really "know" the law of any particular subject. Everything is open to interpretation and further review. Just because you have 50 years of precedent and 3 statutes on a subject doesn't mean that your particular case will come out a particular way. I add this as a way of apology to my family and friends who are ready to pull their hair out if I answer one more question with "yes, but . . ."
  

So, lots of things are conceivably open and available to evening students. Whether you or I will be able to participate in any of them has more to do with our own schedule and circumstances than any formal restrictions on our class load (that was a long-winded "yes, but . . .").