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Comment by gonehome | Hacker News Reader

If I were to leave tech and go to law school with an interest in getting involved and helping with the legal issues immigrants are currently facing at the border and elsewhere is there something that would be useful to know?

Some particular law school that has a better focus or things you wish you had known when starting out? I figured out how to navigate the tech interview/application process, but don't know a lot of lawyers to understand the legal one.

Thanks!

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Although I have no experience in immigration law, as a former lawyer and software engineer (and the CEO and co-founder of a legal tech startup), I'd caution against moving into law (or at least taking a long hard look and talking to people who have made the transition).

I left a PhD program in CS to go to law school based on ideals around having a positive impact through the legal system. Ultimately, the law is a slow, difficult, and painful system to work through and with. The work is mostly tedious (relative to software development) and most of the time you're not really having a significant or positive impact. It's generally not very rewarding.

I'd be happy to chat if you're interested in hearing more about my take. (itai [at] judicata [.com])

I'm not plugging this school but Northeastern University School of Law is a progressive coop law school so you could gain a lot of experience in public interest law while pursuing your degree, including working with asylees.

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