Background: I have been adjunct faculty in English at a college in CA for quite some time; FT jobs in higher ed are scarce and enrollment is declining. I started an ABA accredited paralegal degree program over a year ago at the same campus where I teach. I had done some legal writing and research (H-1B visa petitions) in 2021 even before becoming a PLGL student. I have had a few interviews in the past year.
I interviewed earlier this month for a FT legal writer job at a small firm with one attorney. There would be a 90-day probationary period, and no benefits just yet. I really need FT work, especially since very few of us got more than one class to teach for spring. (I have one now for winter.) And when you’re adjunct, you can lose the class you were assigned if FT have to make their contractual load.
Depending on how things go, I might end up taking this job. We do have a contractual right to take up to a 2-year break in service and still retain health care (if we chose to get it through the college, which I did) and even “rehire” rights (actually right of first refusal/first dibs).
I am still interested in what you folks have to say about this. I have not worked in the private sector before, so it will be a big change. It could also be more stable, especially with paralegal being a field that is growing. These firms need writers, demand writers, assistants, and of course full-fledged paralegals.
I have a friend who works as a litigation paralegal who has been negative about my venture from the beginning. She thinks nobody would want to hire me because I am middle-aged and couldn’t handle litigation, which often requires working very late and very hard. There are many areas of the law that have nothing do with litigation, however. Now she is already telling me not to take this job since they did not take off today for MLK Day.
I regret having told her anything about it. Guest speakers in my paralegal classes said that maturity can be an asset.
If it’s true that nobody will be willing to hire you, then they won’t hire you, simple as that, and there won’t be any decision for you to make. If they do decide to hire you, then it’s up to you to decide whether the job they’re offering is better than the one you have. Both jobs, of course, have pros and cons, and your friend might tell you some of the cons you hadn’t anticipated, but you still need to be the one to weight those.
My company doesn’t take MLK day off, but we have 2 floating holidays to use whenever we want (in addition to a nice amount of vacation time and sick leave). Google says 30% of American companies take it off.
Will your benefits begin after the 90-day probationary period?
My being older wasn’t a problem at all in getting hired. I played it up by pointing out my maturity and being long past workplace drama. The company president himself is older, which was helpful.
My paralegal neighbor has normal hours. It’s some kind of property law. She’s also worked fully remotely for 7 years.
Your friend sounds like a Debbie Downer.
I say go for it - you’ll never know unless you try.
I like your point about being past workplace drama. I’d already told the attorney that I will focus, learn whatever he wants me to learn, and work hard, among other things. My three references must have made a good impression with their replies to him, too.
As somebody who’s worked both within academia and outside it, and has known a lot of people who’ve worked only in academia, I think a lot of academics tend to be too timid about exploring other career paths.
Yes, higher education can be a wonderful place to work, with really interesting and supportive colleagues who really care about research and teaching. (Yes also, horrific counterexamples abound, don’t @ me bro.) A lot of people are worried that if they walk out of that Magical Library its door will shut behind them forever, and consequently they put up with some really miserable academic career paths when an alternative might work better for them.
So I would say, you have nothing whatsoever to lose by trying to get this legal writer job; either they’ll make you an offer or they won’t. If you do get an offer, make sure you know exactly what your options would be for possible re-entry to your academic position to some future date, which it sounds like you do. Then if the legal job looks like a better deal and it’s something you want to explore, don’t be afraid to go for it. Best of luck!
My son-in-law is an attorney, and he loves to go to court, but he is in a minority. Oddly, it seems most attorneys hate court. However you should check what their overtime policies are. You might have to work late for a case with deadlines, but you should get paid for it.
Good writers are few and far between, good fast writers even more so, so if that identifies you (and I bet it does) go for it.
Sometimes the non-academic world is more sane than the academic one. Good luck!
MLK Day is one of those holidays that’s mainly observed by the government, and government-adjacent organizations, such as law firms. Any law firm that does NOT observe it is a very strange duck.
OP says this is a very small firm with one lawyer. I can see not observing MLK day in this situation.
I agree with what @Kimstu said, having also worked in academe and in private. I say see what happens. And I think your “friend” might be jealous that you have some options!
He had already told me during the first interview that he couldn’t imagine asking the writer to work over time. If he wants others to work over time, he asks them if it’s all right and compensates them.
BTW, the job is mine if I want it. I just have to check the contract at the campus to see if I can stay on the health insurance there, at least for a while, or if I need to look into other options.
Ooops, I was wrong about one critical thing in the OP: to keep on the college health care plan for adjuncts, I would have to teach one class minimum. I do have one class for spring, but it is a hybrid, so I would need to see if they’d switch it to online asynchronous.
Litigation can be very time-consuming and demanding; it’s not unusual to work late hours or weekends, particularly in a filing deadline crunch.
That said, it depends on the type of work you will be assigned. If the lawyer says that they wouldn’t use you for litigation work, but other types of writing, I could see that being a more regular hours type of job.
I agree with others that you should explore options. If full-time work is important to you (that’s what you mean by FT, right?) , it doesn’t sound like adjunct work will work for you long-run; sounds very stressful, not knowing each term if you will get a full-time assignment. One thing that law firms generally have is steady work.
Sidebar, but may be helpful for the OP:
Barristers are generally the minority of the bar. It can be very stressful, and very long hours can be part of it, for some periods in the cycle of a case. There’s a considerable psychological burden, walking into court carrying your client’s fate on your shoulders: Will the client go to jail (or, in some countries, be killed by the state)? Will the other spouse get custody? Will your client be found liable for the accident?
Solicitor work (corporate, contracts, property and real estate, wills and estates) can be demanding, but the hours are more reasonable.
Good points. I have no plans to pursue litigation work even after I finish this paralegal degree. I would go as far as being a demand writer for a personal injury attorney.
With the current enrollment climate in higher ed, I say go for the paralegal job, especially if you can maintain your health benefits by teaching an online class. Or maybe they can switch your current hybrid class for a hybrid evening class?
I’m a full-time professor at a community college and enrollment has plunged. An elective that I’ve taught for years, filled to capacity, will probably be cancelled because there aren’t enough students, and I’ll be given an English 101 that an adjunct could have taught.
My wife and I are both lawyers. She has taught business law, hospitality law, and paralegal courses for 25 years or so.
In our experience, it is nearly impossible to earn a living wage as adjunct faculty. And the FT jobs are so scarce as to be essentially nonexistent. I would suspect it is worth your while trying to see if legal writing/paralegal is a better course for you to pursue - especially if your college gig allows you to try it w/o risk.
Working for a small sole proprietor can have benefits and risks. Basically, is he a good guy with a thriving business who treats his employees well? Or is he an asshole whose business is struggling? You would do well to do whatever you can to try to suss that out before accepting anything. I’ve known lawyers at both extremes - and every point in between.
Legal writing and paralegal can be defined extremely differently. In our current shop, we have a coterie of writers who work entirely at home, and out deadlines are such that they could do their work in the middle of the night in their PJs. In a current job, my paralegals/clerks were much more closely tied to the court calendars.
Realize the potential issues of accepting a job which is - by definition - lower in the pecking order than others. It is not uncommon for lawyers to “look down on” non-lawyers - tho, again, not all lawyers are assholes. Most decent lawyers appreciate and value what a good paralegal/clerk can provide them. I hope this guy is such a lawyer.
Although I’m guessing that an adjunct faculty member, a group notoriously low in the academia pecking order, is already very familiar with such issues.
There is that. My view was skewed by my wife’s employment in community colleges, where the VAST majority of teachers are adjunct, so the pecking order is not so apparent. Instead, it is a situation where nearly ALL teachers are treated as expendable cogs.
Do you enjoy it, or is it just necessary? When he graduated from law school he dragged us to see the mock courtroom in his school, where he spent many happy hours.
He is changing specialties and has a job offer because no one in the firm really ever wants to go to court, and he does.
He has mostly avoided jobs with ridiculous hours. But there are some people who love getting up in front of people, and some who hate it.
I enjoy it! (Which would have come as a surprise to long-ago young law student Piper!) Yes, there’s a lot of Sturm und Drang, and there can be long hours and stress, but I really enjoy the research, and the crafting of the written arguments, and the oral argument. In my particular line, I tend not to do much trial work with witnesses, which requires the ability to juggle lots of balls in the air. Give me a nice agreed statement of facts in chambers, or a clean Notice of Appeal, and I’m off to the races.
