The changing of one year to another often prompts thoughts about the future and about goals and about change. For me this is no exception. Most recently I've been thinking about my plans to attend law school.

I have the rare opportunity to live near people who are actually in law school and see the kinds of hours they keep and the stress on their lives. Without attending law school I've been able to see the good, the bad, and the ugly, without actually having to spend any money on tuition or do any reading, or even take any exams.

What I've found is that there's a lot about law school that's good, and that I would enjoy. There's a lot I wouldn't. But the biggest issue comes down to what do I want to do with it?

I've always wanted to go to law school to practice constitutional law. I want to find the defenseless and defend them, and I want to stand on principle for things I think are important. This is probably most lawyer's dreams; I doubt anyone actually gets a thrill from writing contracts. But given the current state of affairs in the economy, and the massive debt I would incur, it would be impossible to attend law school and then do this kind of work, while still maintaining my financial obligations.

The truth is that law school would cost me about $150,000, almost all of which would need to be financed with borrowed money. There are little to no scholarships available for those who want to attend graduate schools, meaning most people who cannot simply get it from their parents or their own bank accounts have to borrow.

FinAid does some of the math for you with their repayment calculator.. According to the FinAid calculator, a $150,000 loan (or series of loans) at a very nice 4.5% interest rate for the typical 10-year repayment schedule would require a monthly payment of $1,154.58 and they suggest an annual salary of $186,549.60.

Compare that with PayScale's average salary for a lawyer:

11:45 pm | Comment (3) | Print | Categories: Contemplation, Continued Learning

I learned some interesting things about PHP this week. They are:

• Register Globals is just foreach($_POST as $k => $v) { $$k = $v }.
• Good planning makes good code and fast development.
• Classes are useful.
• Powerful functions don't have to be long or complicated to be powerful.
• Book knowledge is easy to get. Practical experience is more difficult. But combining practical knowledge with book knowledge can result in new ideas that were before impossible.

11:26 am | Comment (0) | Print | Categories: Continued Learning, DC PHP

A couple of months ago I bought a Macbook, which meant that I had my iBook that wasn't doing much. Solution? I installed a copy of Mac OS X Leopard Server on it. The experience was a lot of fun because I got a chance to learn how server services operate.
Continue Reading...

10:44 am | Comment (0) | Print | Categories: Apple, Continued Learning, How-To, New Features, Technology

4:11 pm | Comment (10) | Print | Categories: CACI, Continued Learning

10:34 am | Comment (1) | Print | Categories: CACI, Continued Learning

A few weeks ago I blogged about how CACI was sending me to training for my Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer (MCSE) certificate. Well, as it turns out the certification program doesn't qualify under CACI's tuition reimbursement rules, so I had to drop the class (since I couldn't afford to pay for it on my own).

Instead I bought the books that would have been used in the class and I'm preparing to take the exams on my own. While it's a dissapointment that CACI wouldn't pay for the courses it does open up considerable opportunities once I've earned the degree, since my certifications won't be tied to CACI for a period of time (had I accepted their money I would have been required to stay for 12 months).

So with intense study hopefully I'll be able to obtain these certifications in the same time frame as the Georgetown course. Here's to hoping, right?

1:11 pm | Comment (1) | Print | Categories: Continued Learning, Education, Jobs