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I had my contracts exam this morning and it was not like what I expected at all. On the first question, most of my entire essay was on just two issues (one mainly, and the other one got a brief mention) and I didn't really talk about any other issues...and I feel like my analysis was all over the place because I didn't know how the elements fit into the test so I just meshed everything toegther into one big analysis and I just put in rules from a few cases. and it was hard for me to explain WHY an element wasn't satisfied so i just kept giving reasons but didn't make an actual convincing argument because i couldn't figure out how to actually explain WHY

and the next question was about somehting i didn't even study and I had no idea what to talk about, so i kept flipping through my UCC book and found a rule on it, and basically just applied that rule to the case, and I didn't write much else and most of my analysis just focused around that one rule

and after the exam i realized i only wrote about 2900 words on a 3 hour exam, and other people said they wrote 14 pages (mine was only 12). and someone else talked about how they didn't get enough time to write all the counter arguments for the last question, and i barely had any counter arguments..because the question said "what should the court rule" so I thought we needed to make a decision on whether the person will win or not, so i did not leave things ambiguous and i made a decision..and even though i addressed like one thing the opposition could say, i mainly focused on making persuasive arguemtsn for the side i picked..

and overall i just feel like my analysis was very superficial and cursory and i didn't know the material well enough to go into depth and make interesting arguments and go deeper into the issues

Nobody here can tell you how you did. The only productive thing you can do at this point is relax.

BaiAilian2013 wrote:Nobody here can tell you how you did. The only productive thing you can do at this point is relax.

Also, this is why talking to your classmates after exams is a shitty idea.

It's stupid to compare 12 pages vs. 14 pages. That's not going to be an inherent difference in quality

Sometimes its okay to feel like you had no answers and didnt really know what happens because that's what the exam is designed to bring out. You really dont know how you did until you get your grades back. I promise you this. This is because the grades are curved (so it only matters how you did relative to your classmates) and because youre a 1L so you have no idea what is being asked on a law school test until you actually do it. I've had 1L classmates walk out of tests swearing that they aced it and got B-'s. Ive walked out of tests knowing I missed issues and knowing I had no answer (even restating the law incorrectly in one instance) and still gotten A's. You just wont know. Relax!

For what it's worth, I had an exam where I wrote 21 pages and got an A, but the person who booked the class (got the highest grade) wrote 11. Professors don't grade by page count.

But yes, as everyone will tell you, you have no idea how you did and will have no idea until you get your grade back. I think everybody has a story of when they think they murdered an exam, and did worse than they expect; when they think they totally bombed an exam and did much better than they expected; and when they did exactly as well as they thought. Not only can you not be sure of how well your classmates did, which will dictate your grade based on the curve, or even what exactly your professor is looking for, but you probably don't even have an accurate recollection of what your exam answer/analysis was like. Stress does wild things to memory, and there were times that I thought I was writing totally shallow, meaningless slop and I got my exam back and realized it all meant a good deal of sense.

Sorry man, I know it's aggravating, but you really have no idea and you have to let it go.

P.S. Whatever your classmates say after an exam is also irrelevant. They also have no idea. Trust me.

The first question to done fucked up son. You gotta talk about all dem issues. Your analysis was probably fine though. YOu don't have to make brilliant argument. I wouldn't worry about that.

That question where it was just 1 UCC rule, well maybe that's the only rule there is. If so, you did fine on it, if not:

The biggest problem you have, is that you only wrote a 1 sided persuasive argument. That's a classic B- choice son. You gotta write arguments for ALL sides (there are more than 2 usually).

Median at best brah.