To many, becoming a lawyer seems like a goal near impossible to achieve. It requires years and years of schooling, schooling that costs thousands upon thousands of dollars if you want to get a good education. This highly expensive and time consuming process puts off many people from the profession, even if, deep down, it is what they really want to do. However, there is a chance that many of these people who see no other option to pursuing that law degree haven’t considered one particular alternative. That alternative is becoming a paralegal. A paralegal is someone who does legal research for a living. Legal research includes things like interviewing witnesses and clients and assisting attorneys prepare for trials. Paralegals started out as just lawyer assistants and nothing more.
But the profession has grown tremendously in recent years and the profession has developed into a legitimate career in the law field. Paralegals do not run trials, but they assist and put together much of the work before the trial. Paralegals have become a very useful and necessary part of the law field, and their importance should not be underestimated these days. They are crucial to the trial process. Without paralegals legal research would take far longer and attorneys wouldn’t be nearly as efficient as they can be in the courtroom. There are some major pluses to becoming a paralegal rather than pursuing a full attorney career. The education path for a lawyer lasts for seven years and is then followed by the infamous bar exam.
To become a paralegal you do not need to take the bar exam and most programs are only about two years long and you come out with your paralegal degree and can immediately start making as much as $100,000 if you land yourself in the right place. So becoming a paralegal takes far less time and you won’t spend the next thirty years of your life paying off student loans. Clearly, becoming a paralegal is a very smart alternative. The education process as a whole is very efficient for paralegals. Through most programs you will get to dabble in multiple facets of the paralegal career to find what works for you. Paralegal education spans from immigration paralegal, to corporate law, to intellectual property, to family law, criminal law, personal injury, you name it. Through a paralegal program you will learn about all of these different branches of a paralegal career, and by the end of your education you will know exactly what suits you and which career path you want to head down.
You obviously shouldn’t expect to land exactly where you want to be right out of college. You won’t start off with the job of your dreams, but you can work towards it with a little bit of effort. You will start out by taking whatever you can get, and settling for all the small jobs that just put bread on the table. But your career with continue to grow and after a few years of experience you will work your way up to becoming a paralegal for some of the biggest law firms out there. All you need is a little perseverance and a little determination. You can’t get discouraged from the work, no matter what kind of people you deal with. In the law profession there are obviously going to be some folks who are difficult to work with. That is just how it goes. Don’t let a little verbal abuse put you down. Keep at it if you are really and truly serious about becoming a paralegal. Start looking into education programs to find out if this is the right career path for you.