Tag: law school

law school academic success Personality Skills

How Curiosity Plays a Crucial Role in Learning

Post author By Beau Baez
Post date July 5, 2021
No Comments on How Curiosity Plays a Crucial Role in Learning

Learning and curiosity have a deep relationship, and in fact, interest complements knowledge. We learn to the best of our ability when we are curious to know about vivid things. If you are not eager to know about something and various aspects of your subjects, your learning may remain incomplete. Besides, most of the most significant discoveries and innovations of the world started with curiosity. Those who could make a real difference to the world were keen to unlock new verticals of learning. So, it would not be wrong if we say that curiosity is the first step towards efficient understanding

To substantiate, there is a research-based study that affirms the vitality of keenness in the process of learning. According to this study, curiosity in students is as imperative as intellect in ascertaining their performance in their academics. Also, according to research in neurology, eagerness makes our minds more receptive to learning. When we are curious to learn, our brains tend to enjoy the process of learning and holistically grasp knowledge. Imagine if there was no curiosity in Albert Einstein, physics could have remained deprived of some crucial findings. If the Wright brothers were not keen enough, who knows if aeroplanes could have been a reality or not.

Needless to say, if you look at learning as an objective or a destination, curiosity is the journey to it. Would you be able to learn something you are not passionate about or are not interested in? You may be able to cram things for the sake of doing well in the exams and may even achieve good grades. But what about learning? This is perhaps the biggest problem with the prevalent education systems. The education systems are killing curiosity in students and learners to make them adapt to a method of continuous assessments or exams. However, learning and actual development in students is taking a back seat in this new trend. This blog talks about the various aspects of curiosity and how it supplements learning by playing a pivotal role in it. Next, let us analyse the different ways in which interest is essential for learning. On the other side of it, you can realise the importance of being curious while learning. The magic of curiosity can do wonders to make you passionate about the learning process.

5 Reasons why curiosity is vital for learning

1. It promotes active learning

Curiosity makes your mind much more robust and more open to learning new information. Curious students often ask questions during lectures and are keen to find the right answers. So, their mind is always receptive to learning and is active to grasp as much information as possible. Besides, they are keen to go beyond textbook knowledge and look to apply relevant experience in their day to day activities. Not only such students excel in their academics but also outshine others in terms of knowledge. In current times of cut-throat competition, holistic development is critical for students to achieve success. Therefore, in your pursuit of this comprehensive development, active learning can play a crucial role. Moreover, active learning is an essential prerequisite for some fields of study like engineering, law, and so on.

2. It attracts new ideas and observations.

Students who are eager to learn are often observant of new ideas. They have a knack for the exploration of various fundamentals of the education of the world. Besides, they try to create relevance with new ideas and discover ways to incorporate them into their pursuit of self-improvement. Curious students are committed to enhancing their knowledge by learning new things almost every day. However, students who do not have this eagerness only look at education as a system of exams or assessments. Can you relate to it? With curiosity, you can unlock new doors of success and skills for your personal growth. It can also build in you the sufficient ability to innovate and improvise in different areas of life. In its absence, you are often dishonest to your education and take it as a burden. You need the right motivation to keep pushing yourself to do well and excel. Thus, We can now affirm that curiosity can be a vital cog in your study motivation.

3. It rewards learning

Curiosity also has the prowess to make learning more rewarding for students. Curiosity prepares the brain for learning and makes learning a joyful experience. Based on this experience, students find subsequent learning pleasing and rewarding. Besides, they can see education as making a real difference in their life and their personality. This is another reason why you should look to develop curiosity in yourself to make your learning wholesome. If you are not keen on learning something, it becomes a mere formality. So, curiosity can make you fall in love with knowledge and rediscover your perspectives. If you are eager to learn, you will always associate learning with pleasure.

4. It unfurls new possibilities.

All the successful science experiments started with a curious idea. As they became successful, they opened a world of new possibilities for human civilisation. So, there is a lot of power that is intrinsic to the idea of curiosity. You can unlock new opportunities and horizons for yourself when you learn with curiosity. Without eagerness, these possibilities may remain latent around you, and you may never see them. But if you are keen to build on your knowledge each day, it can help you to realise or build new skills. Further, these skills can prove to be crucial for you when you start looking for your dream job. Hence, being curious is one of the best ways for self improvement that you can ever discover.

5. It leads to personality development.

Curious students are fond of asking questions and challenging the merit of things. When they ask questions to their teachers on a regular interval, they can capitalise on their communication skills. Besides, in the process of asking questions on behalf of the class, they develop strong leadership skills. So, you can see that with eagerness to learn; you can incorporate a lot of soft skills into your personality. The process of being a curious learner can make you a much more vivid person than you have ever known. This confidence can give you an edge over others when the competition gets down the wire.

To wrap up, it can be concluded that learning is incomplete without curiosity and the willingness to learn. We tend to learn better when something intrigues us and inspires interest in us. Also, eagerness to learn adds a lot more value to the learning process. Learning can be fun when you are curious to grasp knowledge and are excited to discover new ideas. Moreover, there are scientific testaments to the correlation between education and curiosity. Further, In professional courses like medicine or law, curiosity becomes far more essential. Such professions require abundant knowledge and the ability to think beyond the ordinary. Thus, to be a successful lawyer or a doctor, curiosity is almost indispensable. You should continuously look for various ways in which you can encourage interest in yourself. This curiosity can take you places in your career graph and boost the prospects of meeting your career goals.

Tags curiosity, law school, law school academic success

Classroom Study Technique

How to Take Notes in Law School

Post author By Beau Baez
Post date February 2, 2018

How to take notes in law school isn’t difficult, if you use the Cornell notetaking method. Developed at Cornell University over 50 years ago, it has been used by people around the world to better organize their thoughts. Once class is over, you will have a better way to find what you covered in class, and to connect ideas covered in previous sessions.

Handwrite or Type Notes

This has become an issue because many students wanting to take notes in law school on their computers during class. While it is possible to use this method on a computer, the preferred method for taking notes during class is by hand. I’ve discussed this extensively in a video called Handwrite or Type Notes. The problem with typing notes is that the mind uses a different part of the brain when typing. And that part of the brain doesn’t retain information very well.

Paper

The first step is to have the right paper. While you can search for Cornell Method paper and purchase it pre-formatted, you can easily format any paper, lined or blank, with a ruler and pen. To format the paper yourself, go two inches (5 cm) from the left side and draw a line from the top to bottom, dividing the paper into two columns. You will take your notes in the much larger right column, and leave the left column alone during class. At the bottom, draw a horizontal line two inches (5 cm) from the bottom, which you will also leave blank during class.

During class you will place all of your notes in the right column. Don’t try to outline your notes during class. Instead, focus on the content of the discussion. Now, if there is material that is sequential in nature, then you may want to number it. But don’t try to place the material into a much larger organizational system during class. For example, suppose that your Torts outline you have Trespass to Land under section III(C). That is fine, but don’t worry about that during class time. So if your professor says there are 5 elements to Trespass to Land, then by all means write down 1 through 5, along with the elements. Just don’t worry about aligning it to your outline during the class discussion. By the way, I made a video on Trespass to Land that you might find useful.

Capture Ideas

Next, don’t take verbatim notes. Instead, capture the most important ideas. Since they are your notes, write telegraphically. You have likely seen movies where someone received a telegram. Because people paid by the individual letter they sent, telegrams sound choppy, yet they are completely understandable. You can employ the same technique and avoid words like a, an, the, or for. Also, use abbreviations. In law school, many students use a capital K for contract, a p for plaintiff, and d for defendant. These are your notes, so create abbreviations that work for you.

CUE Column

Shortly after class, you will use the left side column, which is called the cue column. Cue, spelled C-U-E, are your cues for helping you understand what is in your notes. You should write down key words in the cue column that correlate to your notes in the right column. For example, suppose your class discussion was about mutual assent for a contract. In the cue column you might write down “offer” in one spot and then further down the page you might write down “acceptance.” One advantage of using key words is that you can then find those key words on other pages where they appear, allowing you to tie concepts together, even though they might have been discussed at different times during class, or even over several classes.

Summary Section

Finally, the blank section at the bottom of the page is a summary section. After you complete the cue section, summarize your notes on that part of the page. This is critically important, because each time you engage with the material you learn it at a deeper level. Much more so than will occur if you only reread your notes. This is very similar to the Elaborative Interrogation technique, which helps create new connections between concepts.

Tags law school, law school classroom, law school note taking, law school notes, law school prep, law school tips, take notes in law school

Exam Preparation law school academic success

Do I Need Tutoring Services?

Post author By Beau Baez
Post date January 5, 2018
No Comments on Do I Need Tutoring Services?

Woman providing tutoring services to law student

Are you considering tutoring services to help you next semester? Maybe you got your grades back and you didn’t do as well as you wanted. Or perhaps you just want to do better with a little extra help. Whatever your situation, law school tutoring services can help you reach your goals.

Law School Professors

Law schools don’t provide the individualized attention you need to reach your full potential. At many law schools, professors are not available, will not discuss with you how to write law school exams, or will not review your practice exams. This is because most law schools reward professors who write law review articles. Not those who spend time helping students. Or, you may have a tenured professor who just doesn’t spend a lot of time at the law school anymore.

Academic Support Department

If you’re lucky, you’re at a law school with an academic support department. The professionals in these departments tend to have a great deal of expertise, which can help you improve. But most of these professionals are overworked, assisting more students than they can reasonably help. This means that they do triage, creating workshops on general topics like note taking and IRAC. And if you schedule a meeting with one of them, the meetings are usually short because they are booked in back-to-back meetings.

Law School Tutor

A law school tutor will spend the time you need working for you, listening to you, and figuring out where you need help. One-on-one law school tutoring is powerful because you’re not like everyone else at your law school. You came to law school with certain skills, knowledge, and abilities that are different from your classmates. Some of your classmates already have strong writing skills. Some of them were in majors, like philosophy, that emphasized the critical thinking skills needed in law school. Others went to private prep schools, which taught them how to study better.

Let me use an analogy. You are in a race with your classmates. As you prepare to start the race, you all are placed on the track, but not all at the same starting place. Many of your classmates are starting the race closer to the “A” grade because of the advantages they brought with them to law school. Unfortunately, law school is not a level playing field. But you can learn how to outrun your classmates if you train the right way.

Self-Help

Now don’t get me wrong, going to your academic success department, reading some books, and watching videos on this channel will help. But most of your classmates are doing the exact same thing. For example, I recommend that you read Writing Essay Exams to Succeed in Law School, a resource I’ve assigned for years. But you need help to run past your classmates in the law school race. And trust me, this is a race in every meaning of the word. Why? Because your professor will assign grades based on a forced curve, where there are few winners. Everyone will be ranked, highest to lowest. Those in first, second, and third place get A’s, and everyone else gets lower grades based on how they performed relative to the other students in the class.

Law Tutor Qualifications

So how do you find a good law school tutor? If you type “law school tutor” in your search engine, you’re going to find many options. Look at the qualifications of the tutors. By qualifications, I mean what have they have done during their career, not where they went to law school years ago. The law school someone attended is based on a standardized test score and undergraduate grades, not the tutor’s ability to help you succeed in law school today. Also, the grades they got in law school is not relevant. Why? Because you are not them. You do not have the same knowledge, skills, and ability that they did when they attended law school. Finally, remember that anyone can create a website and begin selling law school tutoring services. Use your critical thinking skills before you hire just anyone with a pretty ad to help you.

Ideally, you want somebody who’s taught thousands of law students. A law school professor makes the best tutor because he or she understands law students. The professor has worked with students, developing strategies to help struggling law students succeed. Also, law professors have written and graded exams, which helps them in providing their expertise to you.

Testimonials

Look for online reviews or testimonials. Has the tutor helped students throughout the country? Have they helped students at unranked law schools up to the elite law schools? What are others saying about them.

And finally, do you trust the tutor to do a good job? Sometimes you have to take a chance, so look for a free introductory session or a money-back guarantee.

Cost versus Benefit

Tutoring services are not cheap, at least from qualified tutors. You need to ask yourself: how much are better grades worth to me? Law students are coming out of law school with huge debt loads, with many now graduating with over $200,000 in debt. A tutor can help with higher grades, which can lead to law review, moot court, and other law school honors. And usually, once you’ve mastered law school exams and are getting better grades, you won’t need to continue with a tutor. But till then, you may want to weigh the cost and benefit of tutoring services.

Tip from a Law Student

I was lucky enough to go to a school that, had excellent professors, who were willing to meet with me. But occasionally I found that I needed help. In one class, for example, I needed a tutor, but I hadn’t planned for it in my budget. I ended up earning my lowest grade in law school, and now wish I could have found a law school tutor.

So here is my advice: set aside some money at the beginning of the semester in case you need law school tutoring services. Place this future expense in your budget, and spend a little less money on going out. And if you don’t end up needing a tutor, that’s a little more money in your pocket at the end of the semester!

Andrea

Tags law school, law school student, law school success, law school tips, learning law better, tutoring services

law school academic success Time Management

What to do Between Semesters

Post author By Beau Baez
Post date December 28, 2017
No Comments on What to do Between Semesters

Wondering what to do between semesters? Are you bored, or ready to get a head start? Here are 12 tips on what to do between semesters. Some of the tips are school related, while others are not. The key is to find a balance between preparing for school and relaxing a bit—both are important. You may have two, three, or even four weeks off, so use the time wisely.

Tip #1

Family and friends. This is the time to reconnect with your family and friends. School is demanding, so take time over the break to visit with them, ask them what their last few months were like. Resist the temptation to talk about yourself, and instead listen to them. If you have trouble focusing on others, consider reading this short article on active listening.

Tip #2

Reflect on the past semester. Ask yourself what worked, what didn’t work, and what you will do differently. Not only in school, but in your personal life. I used to think reflection was silly, but there are significant educational benefits to self-reflection. You may want to start journaling if you don’t do so already.

Tip #3

Create process goals. A process goal involves how you are going to do things. For example, you may decide to get to school an hour earlier so that you can study in the library. Or you may decide to make flash cards each day after classes are over. A goal to get an “A” in a class is not a process goal. You can control the process, but not the outcome. To delve deeper on this, watch this video on how to set goals.

Tip #4

Plan next semester’s schedule. If you don’t have a schedule, then make one and stick to it. This includes not only going to class, but deciding when you are going to study, eat, sleep, exercise, shop, relax, and attend religious services.

Tip #5

Exercise. You need exercise not only for your body, but also for your brain. Studies show that exercise is correlated to increased cognitive ability.

Tip #6

Read a good book. And no, I don’t mean your textbook. Read something that is going to challenge you and get you to think about the great ideas. I recommend Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics, Thomas à Kempis’ Imitation of Christ, Sun Tzu’s Art of War, Sertillanges The Intellectual Life, or any other of the numerous great books.

Tip #7

Review the material for next semester. If you have your textbooks, look through them and start getting familiar with what you will be covering next semester.

Tip #8

YouTube and blogs. I don’t mean for entertainment, though you should do some of that. Look for videos and blogs that will help you next semester. If you need help with writing essay exams, find a useful blog post, like this one on the IRAC method. If you are having problems with grammar, find blogs that will help you improve your language skills.

Tip #9

Online courses. If you can find online courses that will help you with the skills you need next semester, or in courses that you are going to take, then enroll in the course. I’m talking about relatively short courses so that you can complete soon, that way you can go into the semester with an understanding of the material. It takes our minds some time to digest knowledge, so get a head start over the break.

Tip #10

Watch a movie. Go out and enjoy some popcorn, a drink, and movie with some friends. This is the time to relax a bit before you start the next semester.

Tip #11

Enjoy nature. Find a park, mountain, ocean, or other nature preserve where you can walk outdoors. It’s important to get away from the city and enjoy an open space.

Tip #12

Improve your writing. Figure out where your writing needs improvement and then work on that area. I’m not saying move from a weak writer to the best writer in the world, but make one incremental improvement. The key is to not give up on this important skill, and instead to continue improving. One day, you will be the great writer that you need to be to get top grades on your essay exams. If you don’t have an exam improvement book, I recommend Writing Essay Exams to Succeed in Law School.

Tags between semesters, inbetween semesters, law school, law school success, law school tips

Study Technique Time Management

Akrasia: How to Overcome Procrastination

Post author By Beau Baez
Post date October 19, 2017
No Comments on Akrasia: How to Overcome Procrastination

Procrastination

What’s the most creative excuse you’ve used for your procrastination? There is the usual: Facebook, surfing the net, checking your phone. Successful people do better because they put the important things, like studying, first and avoid the unimportant, like watching that 10,000^th cat video.

Akrasia

Socrates called this problem akrasia, which is when someone acts against their better judgment. In the Bible, some English translations use the word self-indulgent. Regardless of the translation, the idea is that you know what is best for you and instead you do something else. For an easy-to-read article on why we procrastinate, read this article 0n procrastination.

100 Mile Hike

Last year I decided that I wanted to go on a two-week hike with the Boy Scouts at the Philmont Camp in New Mexico. But I had a problem: I needed to lose 75 pounds to be eligible to go. Over the course of 18 months, I experienced akrasia numerous times by indulging in several pizza buffets or eating ice cream. Each time I deviated, I knew I was hurting my chances to go on the hike.

I am glad to report I reached my goal and completed the entire two-week, 100 mile hike! To see how tan I got on this hike, and for some lessons I learned that apply to law school, check out my video on tips from hiking you can use in law school.

Tip #1

You need a commitment reminder system. I began doing this years ago by using a day planner. If you haven’t used one, this is a paper calendaring system where you place your activities into a schedule. Today you can do this with any calendar app, or if you want something a little bit different there is an app called BeeMinder. This app allows you to track any goal that can be measured by numbers. For example, you may want to spend 60 minutes a day studying for Constitutional Law. BeeMinder will send you reminders, where you can input your commitment into the app. But here’s the twist: the first time you don’t meet your goal, BeeMinder will ask you for a credit card. And if you get off track a second time, BeeMinder will charge you five dollars. By having a disincentive to lose five dollars, you are more likely to keep your commitment.

Tip #2

A second approach is for you to use short-term rewards to help you defeat akrasia. The part of teaching that I hate is grading exams. To force myself to grade, I place all the exams in stacks of five. When I grade five, I then have permission to go do something else, like get some coffee or talk to a colleague. Think about short-term rewards that will work for you. Maybe that means Facebook for five minutes or eating a chocolate kiss. Keep in mind that these have to be short-term rewards rather than long-term rewards. If you know that that 5 minute Facebook break will turn into a 60 minute Facebook break, then you should think about doing something else like going for a short walk. Exercise is a great way to get your blood flowing, which in turn helps you focus and retain information better. Watch this video on how the brain benefits from exercise if you want to learn more.

For more ideas, here are 10 more tips for overcoming procrastination. One good book you may want to read is Procrastination: Why You Do It and What to Do About it Now by Da Capo. If you need help with your procrastination, reach out to our tutors and let us help you overcome this bad habit.

Tags akrasia, law school, law school study technique, law school tips, procrastination, study technique

Torts

Intentional Torts

If you are a first semester law student taking a midterm exam, intentional torts are likely on the exam. This means you will likely see some questions on Intentional Torts. In this blog post I will help break down what you should write about on an essay exam. Also, what to keep in mind on a multiple choice question.

Intentional Torts

These six torts require an intentional act directed at a victim or a victim’s property. Intent in this context requires that the wrongdoer either committed the act on purpose (or desired the outcome). A second way of establishing intent is when the wrongdoer knew to a substantial certainty that the result would occur. The intent requirement is different from the two other types of torts, negligence and strict liability.

Negligence and Strict Liability

Negligence focuses on the unreasonable conduct of the wrongdoer, while strict liability looks at certain activities that the law classifies under the strict category. For example, keepers of wild animals, products liability, or those that use explosives. For some interesting statistics, you may want to read about the different type of tort actions brought in the United States.

Once a plaintiff is successful in establishing that an intentional tort has occurred, the defendant can avoid liability by proving that there is an affirmative defense that applies. An affirmative defense is a legally recognized excuse for a person that committed the act to avoid liability. These defenses include consent, necessity, self-defense, defense of others, and defense of property.

Damages

Once a jury determines that a person is guilty of committing a tort, the final step is for the jury to determine the amount of damages that should be awarded. Tort law is very generous and attempts to place the victim back into the place they would have been if the injury had never occurred. This means that a plaintiff may recover all damages that are reasonably related to his or her injury.

Summary

The topics you could discuss on an intentional tort exam question:

Intent: unless the essay indicates that intent is present, then you absolutely need to establish the intent element. Intent requires that the wrongdoer either committed the act on purpose, desired the outcome, or that the wrongdoer knew to a substantial certainty that the result would occur.
Elements of the tort: this will depend on the tort. For example, here is a video on battery.
Affirmative defense: a wrongdoer will argue this to avoid liability even though he or she did in fact commit the tort of which he or she is being accused. These defenses include:
1. Consent
2. Necessity
3. Self Defense
4. Defense of Others
5. Defense of Property
Damages: the jury will determine the plaintiff’s recovery. The general rule is that the plaintiff should receive an amount that will place them in the position he or she would have been if the injury had never occurred.

Good luck on those midterms!

For a better understanding of the intentional torts, you can check out our book on the intentional torts or our course: Introduction to the Intentional Torts. If you want something that is covers all of Torts, you will want to look at Understanding Torts by Diamond, Levine, and Bernstein.

Tags battery, intent, intentional torts, knowledge to a substantial certainty, law school, law school course, Torts

Exam Preparation law school academic success Study Technique

When to Use Law School Study Aids

Post author By Beau Baez
Post date August 31, 2017
No Comments on When to Use Law School Study Aids

Person at desk with a book covering their face

Have you wondered when to use law school study aids? Perhaps you have heard some 2Ls or 3Ls talk about certain study aids that helped them get an A in a class. Maybe one of your friends bought one of those 3L’s study outlines. If you are considering using a commercial study aid, please read this first to learn how to effectively use these study aids.

Commercial Law School Study Aids

A commercial study aid is anything other than what you created. This can be outlines, hornbooks, treatises, notes from a prior year, case briefs, audio, video, anything that you did not create is what I include in the concept of a commercial study aid.

In my first week of law school, my professors told me to never ever use law school study aids. I now understand why they gave their students that advice. This was because most students use study aids that hurt their chances for success. For example, study aids used the wrong way will create a false sense a mastery that results in lower grades. I’m not telling you that you will fail law school. But you may remain a B or C student when you could be an A student.

Canned Case Briefs

The one study aid that you should never use is the case brief. A case brief is when someone else has read the case and provided you with the relevant facts, issue, and rule of law. Since this is the one study aid that I am telling you to avoid, let me tell you why. The sole purpose for reading cases is class preparation. So in all likelihood, your professor will cover the case in class. It is okay to go to class not fully understanding every case you read as long as you truly worked through it and tried to understand it before class. If you want to learn more about this, check out my video on how to brief a case.

Most students believe they have to go into class as experts or their professor will destroy them. That may have been true years ago but today, the vast majority of professors will work with students if they are struggling with understanding a case as opposed to not having read the case at all. It is through struggling through the law that you learn, not by reading someone else’s notes. (For more information, watch my video on how law school professors operate).

Available Law School Study Aids

Now let’s look at all the resources that provide the black letter law. These resources include hornbooks, treatises, outlines, audio, and video. My recommendation is that you use these resources to help you understand the law. For most students, you should probably read one of these resources first and then read your assigned cases. That way the case will make more sense to you. After all, you learn the law better if you read a case in its legal context.

Audio resources in particular can be used very effectively. For example, you have to get to school, that means you either walked there or drove there, taking some time to get to class. Don’t waste that time! Use your time effectively. Audio can be a great way to use that down time rather than listening to the radio or something else as you’re driving into school.

How to Use Commercial Outlines

Finally, let’s discuss commercial outlines. DO NOT USE someone else’s outline, whether purchased or not, without making your own law school outline first. You are going to learn a whole lot more if you condense your notes and turn them into your own outline instead of relying on someone else’s thought process. Now, you did not hear me say to not use someone else’s outline, period. What I tell you is to struggle and make your own outline first. Once you have put your best time and effort into creating your own outline, and you are convinced that you have the best outline possible, then look at someone else’s outline to see what they have done. Then you can make changes to your own outline. Certainly you are going to miss things but you do not want to look at someone else’s outline first and then not do the hard work because then you don’t learn and you remain that B or C student.

The primary reason why most people that use law school study aids never reach their full potential is because they never struggle with the law, which is how we learn. Many students become satisfied with their grades, believing that they can’t do better because they just didn’t understand the material, the professor was too hard, or the exam wasn’t fair. While a B student will graduate law school and pass the bar exam, the best jobs and opportunities go to A students.

Tags law school, law school academic success, law school outline, law school study aid, law school tips

Essay Exam Exam Grading law school academic success

Law School Exam Grading: How Law Professors Grade Exams

Post author By Beau Baez
Post date November 7, 2015
No Comments on Law School Exam Grading: How Law Professors Grade Exams

A plus law school graded exam for law school exam bank.

Law school exam grading is one of the least transparent aspects of the law school experience. A student takes an exam and then weeks or months later gets a grade. But a grade without feedback from their professor. They will never discover why they received the grade, and almost certainly no help on improving.

Holistic Grading

The traditional law school exam grading method is holistic grading. This is where the professor reads the exam and assigns a grade based on the professor’s past grading experience. For example, the professor decides that “this exam is an A and the other one is a C.” Thankfully, very few professors grade using this method.

Analytic Grading

The most common form of law school exam grading is analytic grading. The professor creates a grading sheet, where points are assigned for discussing certain issues. For example, on a Torts exam, there may be 1 to 5 points for Breach of Duty. The professor will then decide, after reading each exam, whether the student gets 1, 2, 3, 4, or 5 points for Breach of Duty. While this approach is better than pure holistic grading, in practice, most professors are still grading holistically as there are no written criteria for each issue. A true analytic grading sheet, which some professors use, have written criteria in assigning points. For example, a 5 might be given for “rule statements that clearly identified the law and connected the correct facts to the law.”

Feedback

Many law professors don’t provide good feedback for several reasons. First, many are not rewarded by their law schools for teaching. They are not required to meet with their students or help them improve their exam skills. Most law schools reward professors that write scholarly articles that get published in top journals. And for many professors, that means spending time writing and not helping students. A friend of mine was visiting at a top 50 law school and he shared this story with me. His office was next to a faculty member who was always busy writing. This faculty member always kept his door closed and locked, so that he could spend time writing. When students knocked on his door, the students were ignored. Even though the faculty member was inside his office and the students desperately wanted help. This faculty member understood that his top 50 law school rewarded scholarship over teaching. While this story is disturbing, it is all too common at many law schools.

Professors Not Trained in Feedback Techniques

Another reason that professors don’t provide meaningful feedback is because the professor hasn’t spent the time learning how to provide good feedback. For almost every law professor, grading is the least desirable part of the job–who really wants to grade a hundred essays in three weeks. This means that many professors use checklists in assigning grades. For example, a professor grading a 4th Amendment exam might have something like this on her spreadsheet: Police are legally allowed to observe Joe on public street (2 points); Police may stop Joe and ask him a quick question (3 points); Police may pat down Joe for weapons (5 points). And with that checklist, if you are ever allowed to see it, you see that you got 2 points, 2 points, and 3 points.

But that kind of information is almost worthless because you don’t know WHY the professor assigned those points to you. Suppose that you do meet with your professor and you ask her why she gave you 3 points for an issue, you are likely going to get a response like this: “you need to have a stronger rule statement and your analysis could have been stronger.” That is a conclusion that does not really help you for the next exam, and you are likely to continue making the same errors on future exams.

Meaningful Feedback

What every law student needs is meaningful feedback and a plan to improve. From day one I have worked hard at trying to help students improve, but I did a poor job during my first few years of teaching. At first, I would meet with students for about half an hour and go through their exam with them, line by line. That sounds good, but it didn’t work. Then I had shorter meetings and provided students with resources to improve, and that didn’t work either. Over the last few years I came to realize that students don’t improve because they don’t really understand what law school essay exams are really about. Most students believe that an essay exam grade is based on their understanding of the material. That is a profound misunderstanding of the law school essay exam!

Students need more than the law. They also need to use the IRAC Method for organizing their exams. After meeting with many students, especially those that got the lowest grades, I came to realize that they knew the material. If I had given them an oral exam they would have received high grades, not low grades. This taught me that students don’t know HOW to write an answer that makes sense to professors and bar examiners. So once you get your grade, make an appointment with your professor.

Empowering Students

Ideally, feedback should be designed to help students become self-reflective learners. This will allow them to see the patterns embedded in future law school or bar exams. Let me tell you about Henry (not his real name), who was in the first group of students that I worked with using my self-reflection method. Henry got one of the lowest grades on the midterm exam. He was devastated and came to me for help as he did not understand how he could have received this low grade. Rather than telling him what he did wrong, I provided him with some tools so that he could use to self-diagnose his midterm exam. He then spent hours using those tools, and on the final exam received the second highest grade in the class. That was an epiphany for me. I now follow the old saying: give a person a fish, they eat for a day. But teach them to fish then they eat for a lifetime.

You can significantly improve your writing if you stop expecting line-by-line debriefs of your answers. Instead, become a self-reflective learner. It’s hard at first because most students have never done it. It’s also time consuming, which stops many students because they don’t see the value behind the method. But once you go down this path it will help you become a better writer and thinker. For more information on this method please check out our exam grading page.

Tags law school, law school essay, law school exam, law school grading, law school grading method, law school professor

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