I suppose I should address the title of this blog post early on. In one of my first summer associateship interviews for a pretty serious position, I was really clicking with an interviewer and got a little too excited. I am a first-generation student, a queer woman from the rural south and someone who has never really existed in professional spaces before; all to say I was SUPER nervous. And in this nervousness, less than two minutes into the interview, I said, “Okay wig,” a reference to a pop culture moment between Katy Perry and an American Idol contestant that lives in my, and many other queer folks’, head rent-free. I was immediately embarrassed because I realized that despite my best efforts to put on a super serious, ultra-stern persona, my less polished self crept through the conversation in the form of “wig.” Notwithstanding my embarrassment, the interviewer immediately caught the reference and replied, “I know, wig... I see that for us” (Katy Perry’s response to the Idol contestant’s comment). All my nervousness went away immediately by her response, and the rest of the interview was a ki for the interview history books.

While this was a funny moment and very luckily happened in front of a super supportive audience, I was genuinely scared that this might be a warning for the rest of my professional career. When I came to law school, I expected that everyone would be serious, stern and boring, and that I needed to be too. This is how we see attorneys portrayed in the media, and I assumed that because the law was serious, we had to be serious to be successful. I assumed that I would need to shrink and hide my personality and identity to fit into professional spaces. And sure, there is a time and place when it comes to how we present in the legal field because certain situations require more formality than others, but I was scared that time would be forever.

An issue arises when the assumption that solemness is the only way to fit within professionalism becomes so ingrained that those entering the legal field feel unable to be themselves. When our individuality is stripped, so are the backgrounds, perspectives and unique ideas that every future attorney brings to the space. And while every law student feels the pressure to present ultra-polished or diluted versions of themselves in legal spaces, first-generation law students, queer law students, BIPOC law students and female law students feel this pressure tenfold.

What we don’t realize is that being yourself is often what makes you stand out in our profession. Every law student is taught the same law, so decisions in hiring often stem from whether the applicant is a personality/culture fit. Every law student knows what the elements of a battery tort claim are, but not every law student is someone an attorney wants to spend 40+ hours a week supervising. This is exactly why your personality should come in during an interview process!

Even aside from the hiring process, though, where we as law students feel we have to hide our individuality, we lose the perspectives, originality and unique backgrounds that we all bring to the legal field. Especially as marginalized and historically underrepresented students, when we force ourselves to conform to the black and white, we lose the colors that offer new understandings and perspectives to the law that are needed now more than ever. When the law lacks diversity, the law is built against diversity. It is paramount, then, that we as law students enter professional spaces professionally, of course, but also as our true and authentic selves. As the attorney I was interviewing with said, “We, as attorneys, can only represent our clients to the extent we understand them.” And part of that understanding comes from experiences and backgrounds we share with clients, which we lose if expected to go without them. The best lawyering comes from authenticity, and the best authenticity comes from law students unafraid to be themselves in every space they enter.

If you’re wondering what the end result of #WigGate was, I got the job offer, though that is not really the point of the story. The point is that every person who enters law school should know that we are all people, not legal robots. And, as people, we bring our own thoughts, ideas, baggage and perspectives that we should celebrate, not suppress. If you’re a prospective law student, I would encourage you to enter law school celebrating who you are and what you as an individual bring to the field! If you’re already a law student, remember who you were, and are, outside of the law — you’re more than the time you spend in the law building. And if you’re Katy Perry reading this, just know, wig…

- Gâvvy Sanders is a 1L KU Law Student Ambassador from Tyler, Texas