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I've been rocking MBEs, but I feel like today's NY section completely kicked my ass. My questions are twofold:

1) How badly can you do on the NY day if you do pretty well on the MBE?

2) What happens at most firms if you fail the bar exam? Do you get another chance or do you get the boot?

Depends on how good your MBE is. If you have a very strong MBE, you could do below average on every single essay and still pass. And of course right now it feels like you bombed, since you are probably only focusing on the areas you messed up or didn't know as well, and completely pushing aside the areas where you put down a perfectly acceptable answer. So stay positive, and make tomorrow count.

I felt the same way, and I'm guessing most did. The NYMC is always impossible, and the MPT was strange.

The MBE has always been my strong point as well, so I was kind of anticipating coming out of today feeling lousy.

Anonymous User wrote:I felt the same way, and I'm guessing most did. The NYMC is always impossible, and the MPT was strange.

The MBE has always been my strong point as well, so I was kind of anticipating coming out of today feeling lousy.

Me too. NYMC was ridiculous like always, MPT was incredibly weird, and I doubt any 2 answers will look the same. But like I said, just focus on the positive. Yeah, I had like 2 or 3 sub issues where I genuinely didn't know, and made stuff up. And 1 that I literally didn't have time to address since I ran out of time. Yet I know I hit the vast majority of issues, so I can't let the negatives eclipse the positive. Ok, today is the hard day, and it is over. Tomorrow will be a lot less painful.

OP here. Thanks for the encouragement. I got like 75/100 on the 100Q MBE thing for Barbri, which was the last MBE thing I did. I felt decent about that - if I pull it off tomorrow, can I pass even though I feel like I bombed today?

Anonymous User wrote:OP here. Thanks for the encouragement. I got like 75/100 on the 100Q MBE thing for Barbri, which was the last MBE thing I did. I felt decent about that - if I pull it off tomorrow, can I pass even though I feel like I bombed today?

You got 75/100 on the simulated final exam from Barbri? Dude, you are an MBE genius.

Don't feel too bad. You couldn't have done worse than me. I ran out of time and didn't get to the multiple choice. I literally had to just pick B for more than half.

newyorker88 wrote:Don't feel too bad. You couldn't have done worse than me. I ran out of time and didn't get to the multiple choice. I literally had to just pick B for more than half.

Me too. I got through half of the questions and then bubbled in B for the last 20 because I ran out of time. I also did not finish writing out my answer on the MPT despite giving myself a full 90 minutes.

I basically came home yesterday and cried for a couple of hours.

However, if it is any consolation, I'm from an Ivy and after talking to others from my school it seems like many people from my class didn't finish, finished at the expense of screwing up an essay majorly, or just christmas-treed the NYMC.

Anonymous User wrote:

newyorker88 wrote:Don't feel too bad. You couldn't have done worse than me. I ran out of time and didn't get to the multiple choice. I literally had to just pick B for more than half.

Me too. I got through half of the questions and then bubbled in B for the last 20 because I ran out of time. I also did not finish writing out my answer on the MPT despite giving myself a full 90 minutes.

I basically came home yesterday and cried for a couple of hours.

However, if it is any consolation, I'm from an Ivy and after talking to others from my school it seems like many people from my class didn't finish, finished at the expense of screwing up an essay majorly, or just christmas-treed the NYMC.

OP here. Thank you, that actually is some consolation as it means there are a lot of smart people who are in exactly the same boat as us. I go to a non-ivy T-14 and left feeling like I must have been the only person at a school like mine who didn't ace that thing. I'm glad to know that maybe we actually are okay. Best of luck guys, at least it's over!

Glad I found this thread for a little commiseration. I've been driving myself crazy for the past week. I graduated from a middle-of-the-pack law school with a 3.9 GPA, but I'm just not great with rote memorization, and studying for the NY essays was a genuine struggle for me. I know there's at least one major issue that I completely misconceived, several smaller issues that I fudged in part, and a lot of things that I got substantively right but might not have used the right buzz words to trigger a hurried grader. The MPT was a wild card, and the MBE felt fine, but I really have no clue how I did.

At this point I'm just hoping I cobbled together enough gimme points to squeak by. I wish I had some sort of window into how these things are really graded or what a barely passable essay (as opposed to the released sample answers) actually looks like. I also have no idea what my employer's policy is for retaking and am not comfortable asking, for obvious reasons.

Good luck everyone. I know it's going to be a long three months for me.

I thought it was a bit harder than I expected overall, especially the MBE, and I think that seems to be the consensus. Hopefully that will all come out in the wash.