Top Law Schools

I had the idea of pushing ahead to the end of semester in every class and begin preparing outlines and taking exams. Any advice on this idea? Bad, good, to each his own?

How would you prepare outlines and take exams without having gone over the material in class? You want to cater your exam answer to your professor's style, and I don't know if you can do that effectively only a month into the semester.

frost wrote:How would you prepare outlines and take exams without having gone over the material in class? You want to cater your exam answer to your professor's style, and I don't know if you can do that effectively only a month into the semester.

I was wondering this as well, but what I figured for the exam couldn't you just do a problem that seemingly has only material which you already covered? (assuming it doesn't contain parts from the entirety of the course). I also remember reading that it's a good idea to do past exams and then ask the professor to review the problem with you. I don't know if that's common (and if professors are cool with it) but if it is, it definitely sounds useful.

I don't have any big plans this weekend, so I'm planning to push ahead with my Civ Pro outline. It's the one class that I really just "don't get." I'm thinking about spending part of a day briefly reviewing everything I've gone over so far and at least getting started on outlining the first couple of weeks' worth of material.


On the other hand, I don't see how you'll be able to read 7 weeks ahead.

2L here. Top 5ish %/LR @ T30. IMHO...this is a superbly awful idea. If you find yourself w/ extra time, absolutely own the material you're going over in class. I found my mastery of material early in the semester meant my outlining/review in Nov/April was just a finishing touch.

i would imagine outlining ahead would be okay, but i would rather spend the time on hypos. i'm trying to practice writing out answers and getting used to analyzing fact patterns.

i'm gonna save the tests for a little later, i just don't know enough law yet. but hypos, like crunchtime, cali, and e&e have hypos tailored to more narrow areas of the law. so you can practice exam-type problems with each section of the law you learn.

and one thing i figured out. it's kind of hard to just start from scratch and explain the law in sentences/paragraphs to answer questions.

MrKappus wrote:2L here. Top 5ish %/LR @ T30. IMHO...this is a superbly awful idea. If you find yourself w/ extra time, absolutely own the material you're going over in class. I found my mastery of material early in the semester meant my outlining/review in Nov/April was just a finishing touch.

How did you 'absolutely own' the material? Re-read? Sit around and hypo yourself to death? (genuinely curious)

Ersatz Haderach wrote:How did you 'absolutely own' the material? Re-read? Sit around and hypo yourself to death? (genuinely curious)

^ I'll bite: I read very meticulously and took copious reading notes. 5 pages of reading notes are a pain to condense into half a page on an outline, but not as much of a pain as 50 pages of highlighted textbook. Hypos are worthless until you're at least 2/3 through the class and can do actual exam problems, but if you're already referring to intense studying as doing something "to death," you might've picked the wrong kind of grad school. There might be an MFA program you can still get into. I don't know.

I know you were genuinely curious, but ask a question in a snotty way, you'll get a curt answer.

MrKappus wrote:

Ersatz Haderach wrote:How did you 'absolutely own' the material? Re-read? Sit around and hypo yourself to death? (genuinely curious)

^ I'll bite: I read very meticulously and took copious reading notes. 5 pages of reading notes are a pain to condense into half a page on an outline, but not as much of a pain as 50 pages of highlighted textbook. Hypos are worthless until you're at least 2/3 through the class and can do actual exam problems, but if you're already referring to intense studying as doing something "to death," you might've picked the wrong kind of grad school. There might be an MFA program you can still get into. I don't know.

I know you were genuinely curious, but ask a question in a snotty way, you'll get a curt answer.

Fair enough, sorry if it came across that way.