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“Mr. Spivey visited us at Stanford University to give a talk about the law school application process. As chair of the Stanford Native American Pre-Law group, I have hosted a number of speakers and admissions officers, and Mr. Spivey’s speech stands out as one of the most interesting and useful talks I have attended. He combines his university insider perspective with his admissions consultant experience, striking a balance that is hard to find. The information he presented was invaluable and I
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Of the top 20 law school, this year Spivey Consulting Clients have been admitted to: (asterisk means more than 1 clients successfully admitted) Yale Harvard* Columbia Chicago* NYU* Penn* UVA* Michigan* Duke* Northwestern* Cornell* Georgetown Texas* Vanderbilt* USC WashU* Comprehensive data will be released in September.
Wait-list activity this admissions cycle has been unprecedented and most, if not almost all law school will need to keep admitting from the wait list. Spivey Consulting is in high demand and we only have a few open spots for this admissions cycle (2012/2013). Email us to get one of our remaining spots at info@spiveyconsulting.com.
All of the following are free and, for some, can really make a difference.
I have four packages available, which break down as follows: (first 10 on each of the first three and then they close out) 1. Mock Skype or Phone Interview + 1 hour of wait-list advice. Price: $400. Package: You get an hour of mock interview (not with me, with someone who does this for a living) which includes the interview, evaluation of interview, and suggestions of what to say for your real interview that take the particular school in mind. Additionally, I will spent an hou
In this episode of Status Check with Spivey, we take questions from Reddit! Mike Spivey, Mike Burns, and Anna Hicks-Jaco discuss just how slow this cycle is (10:19) and how that might impact late-cycle applicants (6:47), why law schools place applicants on “holds” (1:23), decision timelines and how/why they vary (4:23), advice for scholarship reconsideration (11:20), whether schools rescind admits or scholarships if you ask for more money (13:31), how the new student loan caps might impact your request for scholarship reconsideration (14:00), whether you should email a school if you haven’t heard from them since you applied early in the cycle (23:44) and whether they might have forgotten about your application (24:44), predictions for next cycle (19:31) and waitlist season this cycle (15:00), the cannonball strategy of law school waitlists (25:50), how important softs are and whether “soft tiers” are admissions pseudoscience (27:48), essays about institutional injustice and how to avoid coming off overly negative in a way that could harm your chances (34:36), advice for becoming an admissions officer (37:40), and more.
Resources mentioned in this episode:
You can listen and subscribe to Status Check with Spivey on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and YouTube. You can read a full transcript of this episode with timestamps below.
In this episode of Status Check with Spivey, Mike has a conversation with Dr. Nita Farahany—speaker, author, Duke Law Distinguished Professor, and the Founding Director of the Duke Initiative for Science & Society—on the future of artificial intelligence in law school, legal employment, legislation, and our day-to-day lives.
They discuss a wide range of AI-related topics, including how significantly Dr. Farahany expects AI to change our lives (10:43, 23:09), how Dr. Farahany checks for AI-generated content in her classes and her thoughts on AI detector tools (1:26, 5:46), the reason that she bans her students from using AI to help generate papers (plus, the reasons she doesn’t ascribe to) (3:41), predictions for how AI will impact legal employment in both the short term and the long term (7:26), which law students are likely to be successful vs. unsuccessful in an AI future (12:24), whether our technology is spying on us (17:04), cognitive offloading and the idea of “cognitive extinction” (18:59), how AI and technology can take away our free will (24:45) and ways to take it back (27:58), how our cognitive liberties are at stake and what we can do to reclaim them both on an individual level (30:06) and a societal level (35:53), neural implants and sensors and our screenless future (39:27), how to use AI in a way that promotes rather than diminishes critical thinking (44:43), and how much, for what purposes, and with which tools Dr. Farahany uses generative AI herself (47:27).
Among Dr. Farahany’s numerous credentials and accomplishments, she is the author of the 2023 book, The Battle for Your Brain: Defending Your Right to Think Freely in the Age of Neurotechnology; she has given two TED Talks and spoken at numerous high-profile conferences and forums; she served on the Presidential Commission for the Study of Bioethical Issues from 2010 to 2017; she was President of the International Neuroethics Society from 2019 to 2021; and her scholarship includes work on artificial intelligence, cognitive biometric data privacy issues, and other topics in law and technology, ethics, and neuroscience. She is the Robinson O. Everett Distinguished Professor of Law and Professor of Philosophy at Duke University, where she also earned a JD, MA, and PhD in philosophy after completing a bachelor’s degree from Dartmouth and a master’s from Harvard, both in biology.
Dr. Farahany’s Substack—featuring her interactive online AI Law & Policy and Advanced Topics in AI Law & Policy courses—is available here. The app she recommends is BePresent. The Status Check episode Mike mentions, with Dr. Judson Brewer, is here.
You can listen and subscribe to Status Check with Spivey on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and YouTube. You can read a full transcript of this episode with timestamps below.
In this episode of Status Check with Spivey, Dr. Guy Winch returns to the podcast for a conversation about his new book, Mind Over Grind: How to Break Free When Work Hijacks Your Life. They discuss burnout (especially for those in school or their early career), how society glorifies overworking even when it doesn’t lead to better outcomes (5:53), the difference between rumination and valuable self-analysis (11:02), the question Dr. Winch asks patients who are struggling with work-life balance that you can ask yourself (17:58), how to reduce the stress of the waiting process in admissions and the job search (24:36), and more.
Dr. Winch is a prominent psychologist, speaker, and author whose TED Talks on emotional well-being have over 35 million combined views. He has a podcast with co-host Lori Gottlieb, Dear Therapists. Dr. Winch’s new book, Mind Over Grind: How to Break Free When Work Hijacks Your Life, is out today!
Our last episode with Dr. Winch, “Dr. Guy Winch on Handling Rejection (& Waiting) in Admissions,” is here.
You can listen and subscribe to Status Check with Spivey on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and YouTube. You can read a full transcript of this episode with timestamps below.
In this episode of Status Check with Spivey, Mike interviews General David Petraeus, former director of the Central Intelligence Agency and Four-Star General in the United States Army. He is currently a Partner at KKR, Chairman of the KKR Global Institute, and Chairman of KKR Middle East. Prior to joining KKR, General Petraeus served for over 37 years in the U.S. military, culminating in command of U.S. Central Command and command of coalition forces in Afghanistan. Following retirement from the military and after Senate confirmation by a vote of 94-0, he served as Director of the CIA during a period of significant achievements in the global war on terror. General Petraeus graduated with distinction from the U.S. Military Academy and also earned a Ph.D. in international relations and economics from Princeton University.
General Petraeus is currently the Kissinger Fellow at Yale University’s Jackson School. Over the past 20 years, General Petraeus was named one of America’s 25 Best Leaders by U.S. News and World Report, a runner-up for Time magazine’s Person of the Year, the Daily Telegraph Man of the Year, twice a Time 100 selectee, Princeton University’s Madison Medalist, and one of Foreign Policy magazine’s top 100 public intellectuals in three different years. He has also been decorated by 14 foreign countries, and he is believed to be the only person who, while in uniform, threw out the first pitch of a World Series game and did the coin toss for a Super Bowl.
Our discussion centers on leadership at the highest level, early-career leadership, and how to get ahead and succeed in your career. General Petraeus developed four task constructs of leadership based on his vast experience at the highest levels, which can be viewed at Harvard's Belfer Center here. He also references several books on both history and leadership, including:
We talk about how to stand out early in your career in multiple ways, including letters of recommendation and school choice. We end on what truly matters, finding purpose in what you do.
General Petraeus gave us over an hour of his time in his incredibly busy schedule and shared leadership experiences that are truly unique. I hope all of our listeners, so many of whom will become leaders in their careers, have a chance to listen.
-Mike Spivey
You can listen and subscribe to Status Check with Spivey on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and YouTube. You can read a full transcript with timestamps below.
In this episode of Status Check with Spivey, Anna has an in-depth discussion on law school admissions interviews with two Spivey consultants—Sam Parker, who joined Spivey this past fall from her position as Associate Director of Admissions at Harvard Law School, where she personally interviewed over a thousand applicants; and Paula Gluzman, who, in addition to her experience as Assistant Director of Admissions & Financial Aid at both UCLA Law and the University of Washington Law, has assisted hundreds of law school applicants and students in preparing for interviews as a consultant and law school career services professional. You can learn more about Sam here and Paula here.
Paula, Sam, and Anna talk about how important interviews are in the admissions process (9:45), different types of law school interviews (14:15), advice for group interviews (17:05), what qualities applicants should be trying to showcase in interviews (20:01), categories of interview questions and examples of real law school admissions interview questions (26:01), the trickiest law school admissions interview questions (33:41), a formula for answering questions about failures and mistakes (38:14), a step-by-step process for how to prepare for interviews (46:07), common interview mistakes (55:42), advice for attire and presentation (especially for remote interviews) (1:02:20), good and bad questions to ask at the end of an interview (1:06:16), the funniest things we’ve seen applicants do in interviews (1:10:15), what percentage of applicants we’ve found typically do well in interviews (1:10:45), and more.
Links to Status Check episodes mentioned:
You can listen and subscribe to Status Check with Spivey on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and YouTube. You can read a full transcript of this episode with timestamps below.
In this episode of Status Check with Spivey, Mike interviews Miller Leonard, author of How to Get a Job After Law School: The Job Won’t Find You (free online here), on the lessons he’s learned about networking and getting a legal job in his 25+ years as an attorney. Throughout his career, Miller has been a prosecutor, public defender, legal aid attorney, Special Assistant U.S. Attorney, and Municipal Judge, and he regularly shares legal employment and practice advice for his 40,000+ followers on LinkedIn.
Miller discusses concrete steps anyone can take to network with lawyers in their field of choice (8:03), the jarring dynamic shift that happens when high performers go from being students to job-seekers (17:01), networking advice for introverts (19:34), predictions for the future of the legal hiring market and AI (25:16), what law schools are doing right (31:35) and wrong (38:06), overlooked opportunities for new law school grads (42:22), and more.
You can listen and subscribe to Status Check with Spivey on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and YouTube. You can read a full transcript of this episode with timestamps below.
