I passed!!!

Panic Attack

Throughout the entire bar prep period, I've been fairly good. Sure, I spend the occasional 2 hours watching a movie, take a few breaks to check e-mail and facebook, and had lunch a couple times with friends, but overall I've diligently kept my nose in the books. I've adhered as closely as possible to bar/bri's paced program, practiced countless MBE questions, outlined for every subject and made flaschards, reviewed said outlines and flashcards, outlined essays, simulated essays, reviewed all my wrong answers to both the MBE and the essays, practiced performance tests, and modified my outlines.

Now, it is crunchtime. There are only 10 days left until the bar exam. And I am freaking out. Not for any of the typical bar-inducing stress related heart attacks such as the, OMG I'm never going to remember the rules to Prop 8 or, I can't differentiate hearsay exemptions from hearsay exceptions. Instead, I'm freaking out because I've lost focus. Although I'd planned to spend crunchtime simulating essays, I've lost all ability to focus and concentrate. I can't sit through an essay and just write it. Last weekend, I was an essay writing machine, writing out nearly a dozen and a half essays and reviewing the answers. Today, I could barely get through one.

Professor Honigsberg claims that "no one has every failed the bar because they took time off from studying." Part of me thinks I just need a break. But I'm afraid that if I do, I'll never get back into study mode, that I'll just let myself slide off into distractions and will lose focus forever. I'm afraid that I'll lose valuable study time and will never learn the California distinctions for Evidence, Professional Responsibility, Wills and Civil Procedure. I don't know what to do . . . bang my head against a wall and hope I'm retaining something and learning anything from all this, or take some time off and just trust that after a day or so, I will be able to throw myself back into studying and really buckle down.

Whatever I decide, I better do it fast because my stress level is rising exponentially by the minute.

Advice #1: Sign up for bar/bri the first semester of your 1L year

Today was the last day of bar/bri. The last day of the bar prep class I paid $3500 to take. On the one hand, I know I couldn't have done it all on my own, especialy considering that I hadn't taken a number of bar subjects -- my school didn't even offer one in Community Property. But on the other hand, I wonder if it was really worth over three grand. I received poor feedback on my graded essays with often illegible comments and watched video lectures only -- no in person, live lectures. So was it worth it? Probably not. I say this not because of my five hundred complaints about bar/bri, but because of the fact that I overpaid for my course.

Aside from the fact that there are a number of "botique" bar prep courses out there that charge a lot less (I'm still glad I took bar/bri . . . most people take it and it has a decent reputation), I overpaid because I didn't sign up for the class my 1L year. Had I signed up the first semester first year of law school instead of the summer before my third year, I would have locked-in the 2005 rate of $2800. Instead, since I signed up last summer (just in time for the MPRE!) the course cost me $3436.50 (why such an odd number? Because, apparently the bar prep is taxed). And my friends who waited until their final semester of law school to sign up for bar/bri? They ended up paying $3800. By signing up our first year, they could have saved themselves $1000. With those savings, they could pay for their post-bar trip (that pretty much everyone I know is taking).

At the time, I thought signing up for bar/bri was too expensive. How was I going to afford $2800 my first year of law school when you're supposed to focus on school? I planned to work my third year of law school (and ended up with two jobs) to help defray costs so why not wait until my 3L year to sign up for bar/bri? Also, I didn't know if I was going to take the bar in California, Massachussetts, New York, etc... and thought it would be a hassle to switch states.

As it turns out, I should have researched my options a little better. There is no hassle to switch states. You make one phone call to bar/bri (their corporate office is super nice) and it's done. You'll lock in whatever price the course for that particular state was at the time you signed up for bar/bri, even if you end up switching to another state. Also, you don't need to pay the full course amount all at once. You only need to make a $200 deposit and end up receiving additional material such as the first-year review books, an MPRE book, and a couple of upper-level outlines as well. You can make payments throughout law school or can simply pay the remainder in March (before they start applying late fees in April).

So, if you're still in law school, SIGN UP FOR BAR/BRI TODAY. Do NOT wait until the month before you graduate. All it takes is $200 which ends up going to the cost of the course anyway.

Speaking of costs and finances, Brunette on a Budgette has some fantastic advice on student loan debt. She has some great financial advice generally and you may want to check it out (erm . . . post-bar, that is . . . after all, I know no one else is wasting time during these valuable 2 remaining weeks, right?)

I'm going to feel like a moron if I fail this thing...

Despite California's depressingly low bar passage rate (lowest in the nation), I'm going to feel like a complete idiot if I fail the bar this summer. Why? Because Professor Honigsberg told us ten different stories about how all sorts of bad things have happened to people he has known and they've all passed the bar. From having surgery just a week before the bar, to major depression, to being loaded on sleeping pills . . . it's apparently still possible to pass the bar exam. Then, you have the Wills and Trusts guy, Professor Ira Shafiroff basically saying the exact same thing. He told us about how he blew a contract essay and a torts essay on the first day, missing huge issues and making up the law. (BTW, he is now the fourth bar/bri professor who gave us the advice: "If you don't know the correct rule to apply, just make up something that sounds reasonable.") He also broke out into hives during lunch on the first day which continued throughout the bar exam. And he still passed. So moral of these stories as far as I can tell? Only morons fail the California bar exam.

I don't buy that for a second, though. Every year, about a quarter of the students from my law school fail the bar exam. I look at the students I went to school with for the past three years, the ones who are here in California prepping for July 29, 30 and 31 and I know that they are studying hard, working on essays and MBE questions, staying up late to outline. But 1 in 4 of them will not pass. I really couldn't even hazard a guess as to which of us will pass and which of us will fail.

I'm terrified that I'm going to be one of the ones who does not pass. My MBE score sucks (I'm generally terrible at multiple choice exams) and I'm just barely hanging in there with the essays. Forget about the damn performance test . . . after practicing a couple, I'm pretty sure I'm going to get creamed on that thing. Especially if I have to draft an affidavit or an opening statement or something.

And writing this post is giving me an anxiety attack.

Back to practicing more essays . . .

Graded Essays

So far, I've received passing grades on most of my essays. How accurate these "passes" are is unclear, however, given that at least one of bar/bri's answer misstated the law. Now, this determination that bar/bri incorrectly stated the law is not coming from my often faulty memory regarding the correct rules, etc... No, this determination is coming directly from my class notes. And from the Conviser Mini-Review. And from the long bar/bri outlines. So either the bar/bri graded essays book is lying to me or the other three bar/bri created materials are. Don't these people consult with each other? Shouldn't the person (or people) who write the outlines for a given subject also write the model answer for essays on that given subject?

I'm pretty scared about the essay portion of the exam. I'm scared about the entire thing, to tell the truth. But the essays frighten me to death because what if I simply don't know the law? What if I get a Rule Against Perpetuities question? Other than rambling something off about 21 years, my only option is to make up the law? This is the advice I get from bar/bri?

And despite the fact that bar/bri says my essays are "passing" there's always some caveat at the end. "Pass, BUT do this next time," or "Pass, but you were off point on section 2." I feel like I'm just barely passing which is not good, considering that I'm also just barely passing the MBE portion of the exam. On the actual bar exam, what if I have a bad day? Or just an average day and don't get lucky with my guessing? Am I going to be a point away from passing the bar exam? I guess all I can do is work as hard as I can. Write at least an essay a day as Professor Honigsberg suggested, hopefully more. Throw in a performance exam here or there. And, of course, keep up with the MBE practice. Then prayer, lots of it.

By the way, it took me 15 business days to get back one of my graded essays. Supposedly they come back within 10 business days but "usually sooner." Usually sooner my ass. I pay how much for this sub-par service? Reminds me of my wonderful days with Kaplan . . .

Good Idea?

Can I say that I love the Professor Honigsberg? He actually reassured us a bit (before we . . . okay, maybe it was just me . . . got hammered on the simulated/practice MBE) by making it seem pretty easy to pass the bar. Of course, I'm going to feel like shit if I fail after hearing about the girl who had her appendix out the week before the bar and passed, or the girl who slipped in the shower and hit her head and showed up with a concussion . . . and passed. But he makes it seem doable.

He made a lot of suggestions, often by mocking what a lot of students seem to think are good ideas with regard to studying. After talking about a student who decides to only outline essay questions (rather than actually simulating them), he asks "Good ideaaaaa? Good idea to just outline the essay? NO!" Maybe it's one of those things where you have to be there, but it was amusing.

Anyway, here's my recap (mostly from day 1) of the two days of Performance Test workshops that we had:

1. If you don't know the rule, make it up. (Yes, he is the third bar/bri professor to give this advice.) Alternative, ust work with the facts.
2. Erwin Chemerinsky has an amazing memory that none of us have (something I'm sure we all figured out after the Con Law lecture)
3. Bar/bri has no competition. Everyone takes bar/bri. "And anyone who doesn't take bar/bri just goes through the botique bar prep courses . . . and then they take bar/bri the next time around."
4. Everyone passes. (Even though he then launched into explanations for why a ton of people he knows didn't pass. So by everyone he means, it's possible for anyone to pass?)
5. Don't skip the essays on the paced program. He makes it sound like practicing and simulating the essays is the most important thing on the schedule. Judging from my essay performance thus far, I'm inclined to agree.
6. As far as the bar grader goes, as ageneral rule: the longer the answer is, the angrier the bar grader gets.
7. Be a sheep. Blend in with the crowd. If you give a "goat" answer and try to show off your creativity, the bar grader will wake up from his monotonous skimming of your essay answer and try to figure out why your answer seems so different. Good idea? Apparently not. Blend in!
8. Big lunch = big nap. Be careful what you eat during the hour lunch break or you risk going into a food coma.
9. Sleeping pills are not the best idea. He told us about a woman who vowed to go to bed early the night before the bar exam. She took half a sleeping pill at 10 p.m. (her usual dosage). By midnight, she was still awake and so took the other half. At 1, she was still up so she took another sleeping pill -- a full one this time. And at 3, guess what? Yup, still awake so she took yet another. This woman took six times her usual sleeping pill dosage. I'm sure you can imagine how she felt in the morning. (I think this was another one of his "she passed" stories, but I'm not 100% sure)
10. As an example that you must write something on the essay, Professor Honigsberg discussed a friend of his who grades bar essays. It was a property question that began, "I'm depressed." Then the essay continued with the following: "My boyrfriend got drafted to the NFL and now he's leaving me. And the worst part is he wants his ring back. I'm really depressed." Result? This essay got a 45. Reasoning? She talked about a ring and it was a property based essay.
11. Effectively, there are 10 grades on the written portion of the exam. Each essay is worth 100 points and there are 6 of them. Each performance test is 100 points which is doubled to get the individual performance test score and there are 2 separate performance test. Hence you have 600 points for the essays and 400 points for the performance test. Professor Honigsberg said, "You know how everyone says they passed the bar? WRONG! They all failed. Every single one of them. But the standard on the bar exam is failing. Watch." He then proceeded to write down ten grades. 65, 65, 65, 65, 65, 65, 60, 60, 60, 60. 65 for each essay and 60 for the performance test. For each of the 65s Honigsberg pointed to the number and said "FAIL!" then for the 60s, he shouted out, "MAJOR FAIL." Then after adding up all the scores, he ended up with 630 total points. Apparently the score you needed last year to pass the written portion was 627. "See?" he told us, "A failing score is the standard. You just need to shoot for FAIL."
12. And finally, he gave us two actual pieces of advice for the performance test. First, if there's a footnote in a case in the "library" read it; it's important. It's how the bar examiners manage to stick in an extra case into the materials.
13. The other piece of advice: if you're told to write a closing argument or opening statement, do not give stage directions. Apparently, one woman once wrote on her performance test "Walk ten feet then say this . . . "

Numbers 1 through 11 above took up the first fifty five minutes of class on Monday. That's right, in a three hour and fifteen minute class, he spent fifty five minutes talking without any substantive mention of the performance test.

By the way, bar/bri still sucks. Big time. Although they promise to return our graded essays within 10 business days, mine's been missing for 13 business days. The advice I got? "Read the sample answer on your own. We have a 'rogue grader' out there so not all the con law essays have come back." Thaaaaaaaaanks. Because when I pay $3500 for a bar review class and I'm a neurotic law student, it's not like I expect bar/bri to actually do its job and give me feedback that will help me pass the bar. Full post to come when I feel like I have enough energy to vent . . .

Day 2 of Property

Professor Franzese's songs of the day:

• Dido's "Thank You" ("The morning rain clouds up my window and I can't see at all. And even if I could it'd all be grey, but your picture on my wall")--I think it had something to do with habitability but I'm really not sure
• No clue who it's by but, "I'm sorry Miss Jackson, I am for real"
• "It Takes Two"

Considerably less today, but then the video we got today was simply the after lunch portion of a full day lecture she gave in L.A. (Apparently a lot of L.A. live classes run for the full day instead of the 3 or 4 hour video lectures we get in the mornings).

Property sucks. And so does bar/bri.

Property Lecture

Day 1 of Property
Professor Franzese, the Property Lecturer likes to sing and tell stories using voices. It can be entertaining (at least I didn't fall asleep today) but a little annoying. If her songs or stories were more directly related to the material, I would be all for them. I love mnemonic devices, even ones that don't make sense (i.e., Armadillos From Texas Play Rap, Eating Tacos) as long as there is enough connection to the material or enough repetition to make it stick in my mind.

Today, I don't think any of the songs will stick in my head -- or, at least, the reason Professor Franzese insisted on singing them will not help me remember anything about property. I think I'll remember her singing Destiny's Child for awhile, but won't remember whatever it was that had to do with property law and survivorship rights (presumably the reason she keeps singing).

Today's Songs/References:

• Ja Rule's "New York, New York" (She sang the first two lines which begin, "I got a hundred guns, a hundred clips, I'm from New York (New York). I got a semi-automatic that spits next time if you talk. I got a hundred guns, a hundred clips. I'm from New York (New York)")
• Mick Jagger's "You Can't Always Get What You Want"
• Tom Hank's character as Forrest Gump (she likened him to a remainderman . . . so I guess that one I've actually remembered)
• N*Sync's "No Strings Attached" (btw, she knew the names of all five former N*Sync members)
• Destiny's Child's "Survivor" (she not only knew the name of the two members of the group other than Beyonce, but sang it twice; the second time she made the group she was lecturing at [Los Angeles] respond with "word" after every line)
• Dr. Evil (complete with voice)
• MC Hammer's "Can't Touch This"

While I believe that was it for today (in our three hour lecture), I'll post additions for the next two days (I'm sure she'll continue the singing tomorrow). Also, in a post which is soon coming, Why Bar/Bri Sucks . . .

Three days of property...and more to come

"Real Property" is slotted for Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. My least favorite subject. My lowest grade in law school. One of the few classes I dreaded going to my 1L year. And there are three glorious days ahead.

Despite the fact that this is actually a subject I took, it definitely makes me more nervous than, say, Criminal Procedure or Con Law II. I know I'm in the same boat as most people, though, since pretty much everyone says Property is the subject they're most worried about.

To make things even better, though, not only do we have three days of Real Property, but in the upcoming weeks we also have a day of Wills, a day of Trusts, and a day of California Community Property.

I hope I pass the bar so I never have to think about Property Law ever again...

Professor Sakai's Essay Workshop #2

I've decided that the essay workshops are completely useless. You go in, sit down, outline essays and go over the answers. The answers are published directly behind the problem. How is this any different than the big essay practice book we have? The outlining and simulating of essays that are the assignments listed on our paced programs every couple days? I can go over them myself, thanks.

Apparently other people in my class agree with the value (or lack thereof) of these essay workshops. The couple in front of me were actively engaged in a soccer game playing on ESPN 360. Then, they left during the second break. More than a handful of people left during the first break.

The fact that it was a Saturday morning class (and day 6 in row of class) made it even more worthwhile. :P I know, I know, we get Monday off. But what I can't understand is why we need to have a Saturday class? It's run through video lecture anyway...why not just play the video on Monday and give us our weekend back?

The Value of the LSAT

I've always been very anti-standardized testing. Despite the fact that I did well enough on the SAT and LSAT to get into most of my top choice colleges and law schools, I never saw the value in standardized tests. It seemed to be a measure of how well one could memorize vocabulary words or learn stupid tips and tricks taught by Kaplan or the Princeton Review.

The LSAT in particular bothered me coming into law school. I felt that law schools placed too great an emphasis on this 3 hour exam, often rejecting highly qualified students who don't test well. Why do law schools place such a heavy emphasis on the LSAT? Although the party line seems to be the claim that the LSAT is an excellent predictor of law school success (most anecdotal evidence that I have shows that your LSAT score in no way predicts how you will rank within your entering law school class), some say it is all a part of the law school rankings game. GPAs and LSAT scores apparently account for a large percentage of a school's score used to rank law schools in U.S. News and World Report's annual rankings of graduate programs. I have another theory.

Unless you go to school in Washington state, you're probably going to have to take the Multi-State Bar Exam (also known as the MBE) as part of your bar exam. It appears that a good 25% of prepping for the MBE is doing exactly what I believe the SAT and LSAT tests on: ability to memorize stupid tricks. During bar/bri's video lectures, the professor always pauses, breaking from his outline and hypotheticals to announce yet another thing to watch out for on the MBE. "If you see specific performance as an answer, it's probably the wrong answer" or "Watch for terms like . . . "

So there you have it. The value of the LSAT is (quite possibly) a predictor of your ability to play the MBE by memorizing the five hundred tips and tricks that bar/bri will no doubt continue to throw at students prepping for the bar exam.

Advice from bar/bri professors

What I learned from Professor Sakai today about the bar exam essays:

1. If you don't know the rule, make it up. Seriously. Basically, he suggests that if we look at an exam question and have absolutely no idea what it's talking about or can't, for example, remember the elements necessary to prove defamation, to simply make up a rule and apply it to the given facts. You will get some points for the application of your made-up rule to the facts given. His caveat: you don't want to be doing this all the time.
2. As part of the above rule, he noted that it is very easy to make up a rule by simply throwing in a bunch of key terms relating to the subject. Example, in any negligence action, just thrown words like "reasonable prudent person" and "foreseeable" into a rule.
3. If you don't feel comfortable making up the law, just discuss the facts. Talk about who the plaintiff is and why he's suing the defendant. Apparently, you will get at least some points just for just discussing the facts. And, chances are, as you're discussing the facts you'll start remembering the causes of action and (hopefully) the elements necessary to prove those causes of action.
4. Do not refer to nmemonic devices as proper rules. Example, when saying that character evidence may be admissible to prove Motive, Intent, Mistake, Identity, or Common plan or scheme, do not write on the essay "Admissible under MIMIC rule" as the phrase "MIMIC rule" has no actual legal significance but, rather, is a merely a nmemonic device used to help remember when character evidence is admissible.
5. Bar exam graders spend about 2 minutes grading each essay; each essay should be approximately 5 to 6 pages long. Apparently, a former student of Professor Sakai who is now a bar grader said that he spends about 20 minutes grading 10 essays. How on earth graders manage to read 5 to 6 pages of a bar exam essay in just 2 minutes is beyond me. Do they just scan and look for key terms?
6. Do not copy and paste an analysis in subsection (a) of the problem if applicable in subsection (b) of the problem. Simply say "see above." Bar graders get it and you don't want to piss them off with an answer exceeding the suggested 5 to 6 pages.
7. If you're already behind in the bar/bri's "paced program" do NOT try to catch up. Stay current in the assignments or you may always be behind. Try to reserve some time toward the end of the summer to go back and catch up on things, but don't try to "chase" the schedule to catch up. So, if you haven't done the torts or evidence assignments, blow them off for the time being. Personally, I agree with the whole stay current thing, but I definitely think you should work on catching up throughout rather than waiting until the end of summer. Evidence and Torts seem too important to simply blow off and hope that there's enough time to learn it later.

What I learned from yesterday's torts lecture:

1. If you don't know the law, make it up on the essay. See above.
2. Now is not the time to break up with your significant other. Because bar review lectures are the perfect place for dating advice...Apparently, another professor starts the first day of bar/bri by announcing, "If you're in a bad relationship break up today or plan on staying in the relationship for the next couple months."

Back to my koka-kona addiction

Coca-cola's latest marketing gimmick is to print its name in a different language on the side of each coke can to highlight its status as a worldwide partner in the Olympics. My current case of coke is the Russian version: Koka-Kona. Yes, my caffeine addiction is back in full swing -- and it's only day 2 of my bar review course! It's almost entertaining to see how quickly my kitchen counter can fill up with empty coke cans to be deposited in the recycling bins out front.

So far, I'm both impressed with bar/bri and incredibly frustrated with it. The video-lecture courses began with Evidence, a course I (luckily) took during law school. The material seems so straightforward and much easier to grasp than when I studied it in law school. Bar/bri provides these worksheets that allow you to follow along with the video lecture and essentially fill in the blanks. Definitely helps keep me focused during the lectures. It also makes me wonder why I spent an entire semester learning evidence if you can learn all the important parts of the Federal Rules of Evidence in two days (the third day of evidence lectures apparently teaches the distinctions between the federal rules and the california evidence code). I suppose that when you're just learning the black letter law, it's a lot easier to grasp . . .

I am, however, not particularly thrilled with the corny jokes and "cute" mispronounciations that the video lecturers seem to love. I'm sure bar/bri wants to make it more entertaining than simply providing a series of boring, monotone straightforward lectures but I don't know how patient I'm going to be if I have to sit through hour upon hour of nerdy law humor each day for the next two months. I also do not need to be taught how a lanyard works, thank you very much.

So far, it seems like a lot more work than I anticipated as well. Although I had heard that July becomes a massive cram-session, I was under the impression that during June you still had time to socialize, relax, and have fun. It is now 10:21 pm and I still have not finished my assignments for tomorrow. The only breaks I took today were to run a few errands (post office and purchase of index cards and post-it notes), eat lunch, and make/eat dinner. If the work only increases in July, I think my caffeine intake is going to have to quadruple next month . . . and I will, once again, live the insomniac's life. I kind of miss being an insomniac, though, so maybe that won't be such a terrible thing. Or maybe I'm just doing something wrong . . .

My original plan was to try to take one day off a week from studying, at least in the month of June (I was planning on Sundays). At the moment, this plan looks like it is need of serious adjustment because looking ahead through the paced-program bar/bri suggests, I will definitely not be able to get the review, practice ("simulated") essays, and torts mini-review (all scheduled for Sunday) done by Saturday night. Though throughout law school I was never one for shortcuts, I find myself desperate to figure them now. Hopefully I'll get the hang of it, though, and will enjoy bar/bri a bit more next week. (Well, as enjoyable as bar review can be, at any rate.)

Back to making more evidence flashcards and drinking coke!

I'm moral (or at least have good moral character)

According to the State Bar of California, I have good moral character. This response came back surprisingly quickly; despite the warning that moral character and fitness applications take a minimum of 180 days to process, my notification came a little more than 60 days after I sent it in.

I do, however, know people who ended getting calls from the State Bar Association because their references didn't return the questionaires they received.

At least that's one less thing to worry about now!

A place for my thoughts (and likely rants) on the bar exam.

Introductory info:

I'm currently a 3L, simultaneously excited and terrified about the upcoming bar exam. I've spent the last three years out of state (or even out of the country) learning about . . . the law, most of which will not be tested on the bar exam. I attend a school that doesn't teach any state specific law because alumni end up scattered all over the country; other than a few footnotes in casebooks that note "But be careful! The law is different in some states, such as California!" I have learned nothing about California law. But that's what bar prep courses are for, right? I'm moving back to California in less than a month and signed up for bar/bri but not pmbr. I'm slightly neurotic (let's face it, most law students are) and tend to obssess over exams. I already have complaints about the bar registration process in California, but we can save that for another post . . .