Ariel Salzer, Author at Law School Toolbox®

About Ariel Salzer

Ariel Salzer is a tutor and mentor tutor for Law School Toolbox and Bar Exam Toolbox. Ariel has taught everything from conjunctions to calculus on four different continents. A primary and secondary school educator in the U.S. and abroad before law school, Ariel has always had penchant for teaching and editing. As a student at the University of San Francisco School of Law, Ariel tutored Torts and led 1L workshops on time management, exam preparation, legal writing, and outlining. As the chief Technical Editor on the Executive Board of the USF Law Review, Ariel was in charge of ensuring the accuracy of thousands of legal citations, and has become a Bluebook expert. She also served as a Case Counsel for the USF Moot Court program, and received CALI awards for high-scoring two classes, including Legal Research and Writing. After practicing law as a product liability litigator in California for a number of years, Ariel found her way back to teaching and now enjoys helping students find success in their law school classes and on the bar exam.

Ahead Of The Curve: Time Management When Starting Law School

April 6, 2017 By Ariel Salzer Leave a Comment

Welcome to Ahead of the Curve, our new series for incoming 1Ls. We’re getting lots of questions about what law school to attend, how to pay for it, and what people can be doing now to set themselves up for success in law school. Stay tuned, and be sure to sign up for our free mailing list and check out the Start Law School Right course to ensure you’re ready to go on Day One!

I remember starting law school and being both really excited and completely overwhelmed by the sheer force of so much new information. At times I felt like there was so much to do I couldn’t keep my head above water. Other times, I had so much extra time on my hands, I figured I must be doing something wrong.

It became apparent pretty quickly that the type of flimsy paper day planner I had used in undergrad just wasn’t going to cut it anymore. As a 1L, not only do you need to go to class, and of course, prepare for class, but there are so many other items on your to-do list that it can be difficult to make time for everything and prioritize what matters most. In particular, my recommendation for incoming 1Ls would be to incorporate time for the following kinds of activities every week: [Read more…] about Ahead Of The Curve: Time Management When Starting Law School

Should You Quit Law School?

November 17, 2016 By Ariel Salzer Leave a Comment

Most of the time, my job centers around trying to help people stay in law school—and how to succeed there—not how to get out. Recently, though, I worked with a student who I found myself advising to ditch the law altogether. I actually told this person, “If there’s anything else you can do, any other career path, even if it means starting a new career, do that instead.” Pretty harsh, I know. It was a tough conversation to have for both of us. So, how did we get to this point? [Read more…] about Should You Quit Law School?

Five Ways to Avoid Disaster in the Second Half of the Semester

October 31, 2016 By Ariel Salzer Leave a Comment

A lot of law students over the years have expressed doubt about when to start preparing for final exams. At the beginning of the semester, you really haven’t covered enough material yet. Then, once the semester picks up, things get so busy, that it’s hard to find the time. What tends to happen is that the really diligent preparation doesn’t start until late November for December exams—and that is a big mistake. [Read more…] about Five Ways to Avoid Disaster in the Second Half of the Semester

Seven Things Law Students Need to Stop Doing Immediately

October 18, 2016 By Ariel Salzer 2 Comments

Law school classes will always be made up of both mature, self-sufficient, well-informed people on the one hand and maybe a few childish, coddled, clueless people on the other. I’m not saying there’s no in-between grey area, of course there is. However, I’ve seen some startling behavior from several law students over the past few years, and there are some things that just need to stop. [Read more…] about Seven Things Law Students Need to Stop Doing Immediately

How to Navigate Law School as an ESL Student

October 10, 2016 By Ariel Salzer Leave a Comment

Law school in and of itself is challenging, but can you imagine having the added pressure of a language barrier? It happens frequently enough that professors sound like they’re speaking a foreign language, but what about when they actually are? [Read more…] about How to Navigate Law School as an ESL Student

How to Stay Productive and Remember Everything in Law School

June 7, 2016 By Ariel Salzer Leave a Comment

If you’re in law school, you can probably relate to the feeling of getting into the zone with an assignment or preparing for exams and completely forgetting about something important: someone’s birthday, the fact that you have a dog that needs walking, when your credit card bill is due, etc. It’s understandable—you have a lot going on! This is one of the reasons we here at the Law School Toolbox encourage our students to keep detailed calendars—not so much to remember holidays and things like that, but to make sure that nothing important is falling by the wayside. What qualifies as “important,” you might ask? Well, scheduling time to write practice hypos, going to your professor’s office hours, deadlines for applying to jobs, or following up on ongoing projects. [Read more…] about How to Stay Productive and Remember Everything in Law School

Ariel Salzer

About Ariel Salzer

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