MegaRoughDraftPersonalStatement x
Personal Statement for Law School
1.Tell a story
2.Story full of specifics and details.
3. The author takes action to solve a problem (The problem that I was constantly trying to solve was the goddam doors that were closing because I was not born in the US).
(I was walking a long-ass bridge going through people that were lined up to seek admission at the bridge that crossed from Juarez Mexico to El Paso Texas. It was night, warm, the RIO Grande underneath, several light poles lighted our way. I remember that uneasy feeling in my stomach. We were tired as fuck and I was nervous because my Labor Certification had been approved recently from the Department of Labor and my immigration law firm was getting ready to file the I140 and Adjustment of Status. My trip to Mexico was to visit my parents for the last time in the next 6 months because I wasn’t able to cross back to Mexico after submitting the Petition for Alien Worker). A warm breeze heralded the arrival of the greatest unknown of my life; was our legal status getting approved. In one hand, I was holding my work visa that was stamped inside my green passport with golden embolden letters in the other I was firmly grabbing my pregnant wife’s hand (We were expecting our first son B). As we picked up our pace we walked through a crowded bridge full of unfamiliar faces. “This should be the last time we crossed into to the US with our non-immigrant visa”, I told my wife with hesitation. (I had a TN visa and my wife a TD visa which is a dependent visa of the TN). We had traveled a long journey, (not only physically but a journey in life) that I started back in a small Mexican town 175 miles southwest El Paso Texas. My mother refused to travel to the US to give birth with a midwife, a common practice among people that live near the border, due to the fear that I was somehow going to be taken to war. It took me over 30 years to realize, that my biggest disadvantage throughout my life, is and will always be my biggest advantage. I was empowered to work my ass off because I was never given shit, I had to earn every single dime and work for everything that I had. I was born of goodly parents. My father managed to raise his small family with the equivalent of $2.50 US dollars per day. (My last summer home) One day I was cleaning the bloody blisters that I got from on my hands from cutting grass and weeds from around the lines of the peach trees. I used to work on summers in the same farm that my father managed. As he looked at me he told me, “you can do this all of your life, just like me, there is plenty, and it will never end”. Or you can invest in your studies and somehow manage to go to school”. Thank goodness I decided to go to school BUT before I went to serve a Christian mission to South Mexico in one of the poorest places in my dear country. I thought I was poor, I wasn’t. My family care and support made me a “wealthy” person.
Mother always told me, when one door shuts, another one opens.
Money wise doors were shut, another door opened with Thatcher got a scholarship.
Door shut with Arizona State, UTEP opened. Door was shut with old Immigration firing me with 5 months left with a work permit.
So many doors shut, as an immigrant, no student loans, every day fear of not being able to know if i would be able to pay rent, financial, knocking doors on summer under CPT program. Working 20 hours a week. Started working for a bank because they offered incentives so I was able to make the most money with the 20 hours (limited under student f1 visa) that I worked on a weekly basis.
Paid associates with scholarship and UTEP with no scholarship and little help
The process of PERM or Labor Certification is needed in order for a foreign alien to prove that nobody is able, qualified, and willing to do a specific job. It is based on extensive recruitment and a whole bunch of technicalities. It is a pain in the ass to get a certification from the DOL to take it to the next step with USCIS. The next step is to file an I-140 and then Adjustment of Status to get a “green card” or in other words become a lawful permanent resident. To this date, I’m still an LPR. I will qualify to apply for naturalization in 2021.
After graduating I was able to get OPT (optimal practical training which is basically a permit to work for a year to gain training and convince a company to sponsor you for employment and immigration purposes)
Got fired by an immigration firm
Started an immigration firm with my former boss
Firm has grown
Quotes.
Grandpa chose temporary decisions with head, the ones forever with heart
Conclusion
My ambition and motivation.
In this type of conclusion, you tell the reader what you hope to do with your legal degree, or why you’re going to law school. “Fighting for Immigrants and joining the fight against them.and my personal statement all end with a statement of the narrator’s ambitions (to fight for people like immigrants, to make the law function for people from neighborhoods like ours, and to tackle an Issue of Our Time, respectively).
Would like to go down to the trenches of the dark side where 11 million people lie, huddled in the masses weathering trump’s unconstitutional and racist siege. A law degree and license is the main thing that is my way.
Need to make sure my essay gives credence to my ambition of becoming a legal voice.
Would like to go down to the trenches of the dark side where 11 million people lie, huddled in the masses weathering trump’s unconstitutional and racist siege. A law degree and license is the main thing that is my way. I want to help others travel to the same path that I did but make it smoother for them.
About me
– 32 years old
– Married
– 1 son 1 daughter in the way
– Immigrant
– Born and raised in Mexico
– Learned English in high school
– Poor as dirt
– Father managed a farm and raised a family of 4 with the equivalent to 2.50 dlls per day
– Got a scholarship due to good grades after serving LDS mission
– Graduated associates with 4.0
– Admitted to ASU, dropped out because couldn’t afford out of state tuition
– Transferred to UTEP because of a program that they offer to Mexicans to pay instate tutions
– Dad max education is highschool
– Mom some highschool
– Came to the US with a Student Visa F1
– Limited to work 20 hours per week while in school
– Allowed to work 40 hours per week in summer
– Sold pest control D2D to pay for college and living expenses
– Served an LDS mission in Mexico when I was 18 years old (taught me the dark lessons of life that my parents were to traditional to teach me)
– Graduated and got a job an immigration law firm
– Started an immigration law firm with the managing partner of the previous law firm after both getting fired
– Got married
– Got a work visa
– Firm file for Employment Based Immigration
– Firm grew to 12+ employees
This is not the final letter of recommendation of my current boss.
Dear Law School Admissions Committee:
I write to recommend NAME to your committee without reservation. I have known NAME closely and continuously from 2013 until the present. He is the key employee of OUR LAW FIRM m and has been since its inception.
NAME is the Director of Business Development for our law firm. He oversees the firm’s growth by advising the partners on long-term opportunities and risks, as well as handling intake of new clients, large and small. Because of NAME efforts over the past five years, OUR LAW FIRM has become one of the very small handful of immigration law firms where annual revenue from legal fees exceed one million dollars per attorney.
Incident to his service to our clients, immigrants stigmatized and brutalized by the Trump administration, NAME is required to gain our clients’ immediate trust while simultaneously analyzing their cases against an ever-changing legal landscape. NAME has never failed to accomplish both tasks simultaneously. He somehow manages to correctly identify the relevant issues and possible solutions, while being compassionate, patient, and empathetic.
Since graduating from X Law in 20XX, I have hired and/or supervised several dozen lawyers, law students, and staff in various settings, from the U.S. Department of Justice, Executive Office for Immigration Review, to a large immigration firm with several office across the nation, to my own firm with offices in two countries. Yet NAME is without peer as the person possessing the greatest work ethic, promise, and soft skills necessary to thrive in the legal profession.
When NAME graduates from law school and obtains his law license, he will undoubtedly have many professional opportunities, but I hope he will return to OUR LAW FIRM as my law partner. He is the only employee I have ever had, for whom I could make such a statement.