Official Kaplan July 2017 Bar Thread Forum

[Yugihoe]

Reviewing the final MBE now:

because the lawyer could strike three potential jurors for any reason other than race or gender

Isn't striking based on skin color (not necessarily related to race) also prohibited? Or am I remembering the skin color rule incorrectly?

What? I don't recall Kaplan ever differentiating between skin color and race.

[tacocohcevoli]

Reviewing the final MBE now:

because the lawyer could strike three potential jurors for any reason other than race or gender

Isn't striking based on skin color (not necessarily related to race) also prohibited? Or am I remembering the skin color rule incorrectly?

What? I don't recall Kaplan ever differentiating between skin color and race.

I just went ahead and looked back at my class notes; apparently it was a NY case, not a federal one. Neeever mind...

[soonerfreak]

Is it me or did Kaplan not assign essays in every MBE topic? I don't see any for con law notably.

What are you MEE strategy? I've been reading the prompts, and outlining the answers at this point. Then looking at the sample answer outline and sample essay answer. I think this is pretty good and lets me spend a whole day doing one topic and doing like 5-6 essays a day. I wonder if this is sufficient for me to get a grasp of the big picture because this way I am just applying law to the most common ways of testing. I get to avoid actually reading or reviewing the class notes/lecture handouts which I'm not sure will be helpful at this point.

That is what I'm doing. I know how to write an essay this point. What I need to make sure of is that I can spot issues and write rule statements.

[Asroma]

Is it me or did Kaplan not assign essays in every MBE topic? I don't see any for con law notably.

What are you MEE strategy? I've been reading the prompts, and outlining the answers at this point. Then looking at the sample answer outline and sample essay answer. I think this is pretty good and lets me spend a whole day doing one topic and doing like 5-6 essays a day. I wonder if this is sufficient for me to get a grasp of the big picture because this way I am just applying law to the most common ways of testing. I get to avoid actually reading or reviewing the class notes/lecture handouts which I'm not sure will be helpful at this point.

I am following my FSP religiously. I will know in October if this is a good strategy
As for MBE, I'm using Emanuel's S&T. The questions are definitely less nuanced and my scores are way better than those in Qbank.

[SurfLaw]

Anyone else taking CA see this?

http://abovethelaw.com/2017/07/californ ... -bar-exam/

[TheoO]

Finished the MBE today. Pretty happy with my performance over all, though I still need to work quite a bit on stamina. Mid: 126, Final: 140. Though I definitely pretty poorly on the essay section. Really feel like I need to improve memorization for that stuff, but not too sure how to focus my time on that.

[TheoO]

This final schedule seems pretty weak. Just a lot of outline reading with some minimal questions and an essay. Maybe they don't feel it's worth it, but I feel like my time is better spent taking like 50-100 qs a day and a few essays.

[Yugihoe]

This final schedule seems pretty weak. Just a lot of outline reading with some minimal questions and an essay. Maybe they don't feel it's worth it, but I feel like my time is better spent taking like 50-100 qs a day and a few essays.

Yea, fuck the final schedule. You should try to finish all the qbank questions if possible. That's my goal. I'm trying to hammer out my weak points now (civ pro and con law) but I do mixed sets too.

[iambify]

Are the questions on the Kaplan midterm and final harder than the QBank questions? I'm consistently scoring between 60-mid 70% on the QBanks but on the midterm and final, I'm barely scraping 50%. With a week left to go, the numbers on the midterm and final exams are really worrying

[hipcatdaddio]

Checking in (super late), but just now looking on TLS since bar prep started. Using Kaplan for North Carolina bar.

Glad to see I'm not the only person not following their FSP b/c it looks pretty useless to me. My MBE went from 119 on midterm to 122 on final. Not a whole lot of improvement there, which is why I'm hammering home the MBE questions instead of "reviewing the lecture slides" like the FSP calls for.

Also, not enough emphasis on NC essays in my opinion. Essays are 60% of the score in NC and MBE is 40%. I'm cranking out 3-5 essays a day trying to remember all the insanely archaic NC distinctions. 10 days to go here in NC.

[hipcatdaddio]

Are the questions on the Kaplan midterm and final harder than the QBank questions? I'm consistently scoring between 60-mid 70% on the QBanks but on the midterm and final, I'm barely scraping 50%. With a week left to go, the numbers on the midterm and final exams are really worrying

I think they are. I consistently do better on the QBank than on the questions in the book (including the mid-term and final).

Also, anybody else completing their MBE Question book, do you notice the questions getting insanely harder as the subject goes on? For instance, questions 60-100 being much harder than questions 1-40? It doesn't do any favors for my confidence.

[iambify]

So are the terrible midterm/final scores something I should definitely be worrying about? Or can I trust that if I'm getting in the 60-70s% range in the QBank, I should be OK for MBE for a passing grade?

[stannis]

Has anyone else's MBE practice scores dipped a little?

Mine have dipped by about 5% in the last 3-4 practice tests. I think I've hit saturation for the amount of law I can memorize and am going through the questions too quickly and am missing some key facts that seem obvious on review. They also seem to be throwing out more esoteric questions where <35% are guessing correctly.

Anyone else experiencing this?

My scores are still in a comfortable range, but it's pretty damn demoralizing to see my scores decline when I'm grinding away at it.

[TheoO]

Im hanging around the ~70% mark. I feel pretty comfortable with that if the 10-20 point increase at the test date expectation is to be believed. I definitely feel like I'm getting some diminishing returns on the MBE and I'm making some fool's mistakes on some of the questions. If you feel worn out by the MBE, take a day or so and just focus on something else. I'll just work on MEE for the next two days or so.

That said, I only did one ~100 question set yesterday and previous did a 50 or so. I guess in the 70% range should feel sale? I'm not sure how much I have to overperform on the MBE to negate any poor performance on the MEE. Which is what I really want to do.

[Asroma]

I feel like I am loosing focus. I do not know if it's normal at this point. Probably we are all tired.
For the next few days I'll do mix Qs on the big tickets, like negligence, individual rights. I think I'm losing my grip on those after focusing on all the nuances of the final review.
I really don't know what to do with the MEE topics. Can't retain anything.

[stannis]

I feel like I am loosing focus. I do not know if it's normal at this point. Probably we are all tired.
For the next few days I'll do mix Qs on the big tickets, like negligence, individual rights. I think I'm losing my grip on those after focusing on all the nuances of the final review.
I really don't know what to do with the MEE topics. Can't retain anything.

I've been ditcing the FRP/outlines and opening new essays, writing a quick outline, and then checking it against the model answer. It's a good way to absorb new rules and stuff I didn't know without opening a 600 page book full of rules I don't know.

I'm in the same boat as the above posters re MBE performance and diminishing returns.

[mandyjay11]

I agree with you both, I am starting to get extremely tired. The last seven 50-question QBank quizzes I've taken I've gotten 70% on the dot. I review my answers and everything, but still can't get any higher. I might be maxed out on that front. Now I'm doing exactly what stannis is doing and outlining essays and comparing those outlines to the one in the essay bank, which is actually really helping me retain a little more information at this stage. I still foresee that I will be doing a lot of guessing when it comes to writing these MEEs though.

[Damage Over Time]

So are the terrible midterm/final scores something I should definitely be worrying about? Or can I trust that if I'm getting in the 60-70s% range in the QBank, I should be OK for MBE for a passing grade?

I got absolutely wrecked by the Kaplan midterm and focused a lot on grinding QBank questions in preparation for the real thing when I took the exam last summer. The midterm was definitely a wakeup call that I needed to reevaluate my study methods (ended up doing a lot less passive lecture-watching and a lot more QBank questions). I ended up passing. Don't let the bad scores get to your head and stay focused on maximizing your performance on the QBank, and I think you'll be fine for the MBE.

[soonerfreak]

I feel like I am loosing focus. I do not know if it's normal at this point. Probably we are all tired.
For the next few days I'll do mix Qs on the big tickets, like negligence, individual rights. I think I'm losing my grip on those after focusing on all the nuances of the final review.
I really don't know what to do with the MEE topics. Can't retain anything.

Same, I did a kaplan set and Emmanuels set today and the Emmanuel set I missed questions for stupid reasons. Won't do any MBE questions tomorrow and instead focus on essays and making sure my MEE flash cards cover all the major stuff.

[Yugihoe]

Feeling pretty demotivated right now. I've been doing like 60-100 qbank questions everyday and doing pretty well - generally 75% right.

Took the 200 question Kaplan final today and it felt like I was guessing on almost all of them. Wtf? Generally during the qbank questions, I can prephrase the answer and feel confident in my choice. Seems like the questions were so different with tricky fact patterns. I ended up getting only a 127. Had a 124 for my midterm, so almost no improvement. Totally destroyed my confidence...

[nybar2017]

Feeling pretty demotivated right now. I've been doing like 60-100 qbank questions everyday and doing pretty well - generally 75% right.

Took the 200 question Kaplan final today and it felt like I was guessing on almost all of them. Wtf? Generally during the qbank questions, I can prephrase the answer and feel confident in my choice. Seems like the questions were so different with tricky fact patterns. I ended up getting only a 127. Had a 124 for my midterm, so almost no improvement. Totally destroyed my confidence...

It's totally okay to feel demotivated for a bit, but don't let it get you down for long, as you are doing better than you think. 127 is significantly higher than the national avg! Have you watched the explanation videos yet? Chris basically explains that the Kaplan final questions are much harder than the actual test. He said the MBE is made up of questions having difficulties of 1, 2 and 3; whereas the Kaplan final had all 2's or 3's because he wants you to see the hardest possible questions. He said the combination of some more time to study and the relative difficulty of the MBE means that you can expect 20 more marks on the actual MBE than how you did on the final.

He also said the questions were much harder than the midterm, so 124-> 127 is more of an improvement than it seems. I'd recommend watching the explanation videos, I found them super helpful for the questions I got right and the ones I got wrong.

[Yugihoe]

Feeling pretty demotivated right now. I've been doing like 60-100 qbank questions everyday and doing pretty well - generally 75% right.

Took the 200 question Kaplan final today and it felt like I was guessing on almost all of them. Wtf? Generally during the qbank questions, I can prephrase the answer and feel confident in my choice. Seems like the questions were so different with tricky fact patterns. I ended up getting only a 127. Had a 124 for my midterm, so almost no improvement. Totally destroyed my confidence...

It's totally okay to feel demotivated for a bit, but don't let it get you down for long, as you are doing better than you think. 127 is significantly higher than the national avg! Have you watched the explanation videos yet? Chris basically explains that the Kaplan final questions are much harder than the actual test. He said the MBE is made up of questions having difficulties of 1, 2 and 3; whereas the Kaplan final had all 2's or 3's because he wants you to see the hardest possible questions. He said the combination of some more time to study and the relative difficulty of the MBE means that you can expect 20 more marks on the actual MBE than how you did on the final.

He also said the questions were much harder than the midterm, so 124-> 127 is more of an improvement than it seems. I'd recommend watching the explanation videos, I found them super helpful for the questions I got right and the ones I got wrong.

Thanks for the comforting words. Yea don't really have time to wallow now I guess. I'm going to watch the videos tomorrow. I still need to review all the types of MPTs and watch the conflicts of laws MEE video too.

[tacocohcevoli]

I did well on the final but am not doing so well on the QB questions (like solidly within the 60-70% range), if that's any consolation. I don't know what that means for me come next week, but probably more important to be doing well on the QB than getting most of the hard questions right.

[mandyjay11]

I did well on the final but am not doing so well on the QB questions (like solidly within the 60-70% range), if that's any consolation. I don't know what that means for me come next week, but probably more important to be doing well on the QB than getting most of the hard questions right.

Was there a post that said what we "should" be getting on QBank question sets?

[tacocohcevoli]

I did well on the final but am not doing so well on the QB questions (like solidly within the 60-70% range), if that's any consolation. I don't know what that means for me come next week, but probably more important to be doing well on the QB than getting most of the hard questions right.

Was there a post that said what we "should" be getting on QBank question sets?

It depends on your strategy; I'm working while studying, so I made the decision to try to rely primarily on a good MBE score to get me into passing range. If you have the time to do good MEE/MPT prep, you don't need to be scoring 70%+ on the MBE to pass.