This Benefit Gets Members in a Study Groove

Study Groove Associations Now Fall 2019 Issue By: Rasheeda Childress

Volunteers at the Ohio State Bar Association assembled a “study session” playlist to help law students and early-career lawyers prep for the bar exam.

What’s the great idea? A playlist to help law students and lawyers study.

Who’s doing it? Ohio State Bar Association.

What’s involved? OSBA CEO and Executive Director Mary Amos Augsburger says the board often brainstorms about how it can support members. Law students and first-year lawyers receive complimentary OSBA memberships, and with the bar exam coming up, a brainstorming session led to the idea of a playlist to help people study.

Once the idea was in place, it was just a matter of picking the songs. “Our team did a great job of researching music that’s both relaxing and conducive to studying,” Augsburger says. Because the research showed instrumental music is best for concentration, OSBA focused “on songs without lyrics and instrumental versions of current, popular music.”

The playlist, called “Ohio Lawyers Study Session,” is available on Spotify. OSBA hopes to add more playlist options in the future.

While the playlist was created with law students in mind, it’s for all members. “Attorneys learn for a living, and our hope is that any one of our members can make good use of this playlist—whether it’s studying for an exam or researching case law for a trial,” Augsburger says.

OSBA’s goal for the playlist is to help show its newest members the association’s value. “Our hope is that they take note of these creative benefits, which are truly aimed at showing them how much we care about their success,” Augsburger says. “If our members are successful, especially our students and our young attorneys, then we will be successful down the road.”

What are people saying? “The response from Ohio law schools on social media has been very encouraging, and they have shared it with their students,” Augsburger says.

[This article was originally published in the Associations Now print edition, titled "Study Groove."]

Rasheeda Childress

Rasheeda Childress is a senior editor at Associations Now.