For many students in law school, they have great dreams of successful and prestigious jobs in the legal field, but find themselves living in a constant nightmare of life as a broke student. While it is true that good things come to those who wait, there are plenty of good and great opportunities to make money in law school currently. With the right know-how and hard work students can make some cash on the side, with proper knowledge of how to make money while in law school.
What Avenues Are Available?
There are a lot of ways to make money while in law school and to explain every opportunity would be painful. Instead we’ll focus on avenues for law students to make money primarily inside of school with a few opportunities and avenues outside.
By narrowing it down to avenues and opportunities within school it makes it easier to see and think about close opportunities for law students to make money.
Related: How to Afford Law School
1) Tutoring
Law schools have a very rigorous and loaded workload. Additionally, the concepts of law are not the easiest to understand. There is a huge need for students to receive assistance on how to handle their workloads and understand their studies better.
A way to meet this need and provide a valuable service, is to tutor students who need help with their law school work. As a tutor, you can charge students to meet with them regularly to review and go over their work as well as teach, and help them practice effective study habits.
The only big caveat to this option is that in order to be a tutor, one might need to be on top of their studies before beginning to teach and lead others. But if this is you and you are a great student, put your skills to use by helping others for a fee.
2) Research Assistant
In law school, each semester professors undergo research where they dive into a topic in order to advance their scholarship. Due to the large nature of these projects professors need assistants and more often than not will pay them.
Research assistants are tasked with roles such as copywriting, editing sources and citations, and in depth research along with much more.
Another great aspect of being a research assistant on top of getting paid is that it provides a unique opportunity to gain expertise in new concepts or see familiar concepts worked out/used. This gives students who are research assistants not only immediate value in getting paid, but also value that will come in handy later in their careers that may lead to more money.
3) Work in Your Law School Library
A law school’s library to a law student is like a ship to a sailor. They will have to be there, and they will be there often. If you’re going to be at the law library often, why not stay a little longer and make some money while you’re there?
As a library worker you will be tasked with organizing sources, and information along with writing, researching and analyzing data.
One great upside to this job is it isn’t the biggest workload out there. When you think of jobs that operate at breakneck speed and cause the most damage to the mind and body, a library worker is far from that. More often than not when a library worker has no work to do they will read or engage in studies to pass the time.
This is a great way to do some work, get paid, and study all at the same time.
4) Internships
Probably the best way hands down that a law student could make money is by gaining an internship at a law firm. By working at a law firm a law student is not only making money currently but they are getting their foot in the door in their industry and gaining real world knowledge and applying their studies.
Legal internships can help students establish valuable industry connections and help students set themselves up with a job post graduation.
Internships range from part time to full time positions. To find legal work internships students can look online through job posting websites as well as asking around and calling their local firms to see if any positions are available.
5) Scholarships
Another great option for students to make money in law school is through scholarships. Scholarships are posted by schools regularly for students to use as financial aid. These scholarships most of the time have no restrictions on them use-wise and can be a great way to help students pay for law school materials such as books, resources, or even other law school expenses such as rent.
Look around your law school’s website and talk to your administrative office to get a start on how to find applicable scholarships. To apply for a scholarship the process is mainly just filling out an application and submitting it. What will determine if you receive the funding is based on the scholarship itself.
Most law school scholarships have a set criteria to meet. These may come in the form of requirements such as being a certain minority, being in a specific location, while others are merit/academic based. If you are a law student you should find out what scholarships you qualify for and apply asap. Scholarships are very competitive and there isn’t enough to go around for everyone.
Related: Why is Law School So Expensive?
6) Sell Old Materials
If you are a law school student and you have been enrolled for a while you know that many books become useless after your class is over. Instead of letting them collect dust you can sell your textbooks to classmates and other law students to make some quick cash.
Don’t stop at textbooks either, let some of your old, antique law school resources be put to use! Ever thought about selling your old class notes? It may sound strange, but very little variation is seen year after year from professors. Many classes are taught in the exact same way year in and out, meaning the notes taken in a class a year or two ago may still be valuable to someone taking the same class now.
Offer your previous notes to classmates. The notes are already written and complete, helping them to just focus in class rather than scribe everything down. This is a valuable convenience many students will pay for.
Think Outside The Box
There are many other avenues for students to make money while in law school other than traditional part-time jobs. Some of the biggest and profitable options come in the form of media. The field of law to many is confusing and complex. A great way to take advantage of your law school education and provide value to others can be by taking legal concepts and info and presenting them in a clear and fun way to others through media channels.
Some examples of these options are:
7) Blog
Start a blog that discusses legal topics. This could be in the form of short articles that explain legal terms, or it could be blog posts that comment or explain past pop culture cases. For example, you could make blog posts about how and why the OJ Simpson verdict was so controversial. Then each week or month you write another post about another popular case and so on. A great example of a law school blog is The Girl’s Guide to Law School.
8) Law podcast
Podcasts are one of the most popular channels of media today. Take advantage of the demand for them and start a law podcast. One idea to implement could be a law/true crime podcast that discusses popular cases in the news or locally around you and discuss the legal ramifications of them. You could take popular interesting cases and break them down in layman’s terms for people to better understand. For examples of law school podcasts you could emulate, check out Test Max Prep’s list of 9 of the Best Law School Podcasts.
9) Law social media
Another idea is to create an instagram page. One potential idea could be starting an instagram page that breaks down popular business deals and what they mean. So for example make a post that discusses a new acquisition Facebook made, why they made the purchase and what it means for them.
Once again, people love to hear information and content presented to them in a clear and concise way. This could be a great option to explain business dealings and mergers to people in a short, easily digestible way.
10) Affiliate marketing
Whether you are considering a blog, podcast, being a social media influencer or some other form of media, look into learning how to leverage and earn from affiliate marketing. In a nutshell, affiliate marketing is simply referring others to purchase relevant products and services. If you are interested in learning more about affiliate marketing and how you can earn money online, we highly recommend Wealthy Affiliate.
Fair warning, each of these unconventional avenues does not provide money directly and immediately. Oftentimes it will take a bit to get started up and it will also take many viewers, readers, and listeners before you can collect that sweet ad revenue.
But the sky’s the limit, and if you have the hard work and hustle to start one of these then go for it and best of luck!
No Shortage of Ways to Make Money in Law School!
There are many ways to make money as an aspiring lawyer. Some of these ways can be found in avenues related to the law school one attends such as working in the library, selling old class materials, or even just applying for scholarships. Additionally, students can make money in law school by thinking outside the box and leveraging their talents in unconventional ways to make money as well.
