Case facts in outline Forum

[TierForceOne]

I know it's a little early to be thinking about outlines, but when I'm doing the reading it's helpful to know what I will eventually need to included on my outline.

2Ls and 3Ls, do you include case facts in your outlines?

[TheSpanishMain]

I know it's a little early to be thinking about outlines, but when I'm doing the reading it's helpful to know what I will eventually need to included on my outline.

2Ls and 3Ls, do you include case facts in your outlines?

Not really. Maybe like a single bullet point just to jog your memory.

[ph14]

I thought it was useful to include facts. The facts are important in drawing comparisons and contrasts to the facts on an exam.

[kellyfrost]

You are thinking about outlining way too early on in the game.


However, I always included only the facts I thought were relevant to the case.

[CaptainJapan]

I know it's a little early to be thinking about outlines, but when I'm doing the reading it's helpful to know what I will eventually need to included on my outline.

2Ls and 3Ls, do you include case facts in your outlines?

No reason to be formulaic in your approach to outlines...do what makes sense to you. I was one of the sad few who made a conscious decision to brief (just about) every case we read in class...the outline would include the case name near the heading of the relevant concept, maybe the holding, but no facts. If I needed to jog my memory, I scanned the outline for that case.

Don't worry about this for at least another 5-6 weeks

[rwe13]

As long as you know how a case would be used for a test, no need to include facts (so it can depend on the class). FWIW I waited till Mid-Oct to outline 1st semester and started week 2 for the 2nd semester and really preferred how I did it the 2nd. (Marginally better grades in the 2nd but unrelated to outlining)

[KMart]

Stop worrying about outlining for like 8 weeks. That being said, I had about one line dedicated to facts just to jog my memory unless it's a case I knew by name.

[Louis1127]

This is a good question.

Depends on the professor. Some profs will say that they don't care if you cite a single case on the exam- it's just about the law, and the cases are simply illustrations. But other profs will say that they like to see the facts on your exam compared and contrasted and analyzed with the facts of the cases.

[z0mbiecatz1234]

I actually disagree with people who say that it is too early to think about outlining. I say kudos to you for thinking about it while you have ample time to prepare and perfect them. Let me tell you my own experience with outlining. 1L fall I was convinced by upperclassmen and classmates alike that I shouldn't even start thinking of outlining until around October. "Okay, surely if everybody says that, it must be good advice" I thought and sure enough I did not begin outlining until October. October rolls around and I begin some outlines. I didn't have time to finish them all at this point (outlining for four bar classes is no easy task) so naturally I waited until a week or two before classes ended to finish. I was seriously overwhelmed and vowed to not let myself get in this situation again. Fast forward to spring 1L and I started those outlines literally two weeks after classes started. TOO early? Maybe, but I sure was happy when spring break came around and I was able to do this thing called relax where I was able to do things besides outline. I actually kept up with the outlining on a weekly basis. It's very easy to outline a few class sessions when you compare it to outlining the 40 classes you've had in Contracts. I ended up doing better in the spring, grade-wise and stress-wise (Is this because I outlined early? Maybe, maybe not, but it helped my sanity). While my classmates were preparing their outlines, I was studying mine and taking practice exams. I will continue to outline a few weeks after classes begin because it's a manageable task and it will save me stress later.

As for including facts, I did and will continue to include facts in my outlines. If you include facts, remember that the holding in X case might not be black letter law. Always always remember that jurisdictions vary on many rules. Case facts, in my opinion, put meat on the bones of rules and laws and thus make it easier for me to apply those laws to different facts later (on exams!). If you opt to not include case facts, at the very least, include them for the most important cases. In Contracts, you're going to want to include the facts of Lucy v. Zehmer for example. In Torts, the Palsgraf case, etc. My philosophy is this: If you already brief your cases, then it can't hurt to do a simple copy and paste of the facts into your outline. Better yet, just re-read your typed up facts and shorten it into something that will trigger your memory of that case later. As you study your outline you will be able to skip or skim parts of your outline (the facts will likely be skim-able for most cases). For example, in Property we read the Stambovsky case, in my outline I simply put "The ghost case!" because there was no way I was going to forget the facts of the case dealing with a haunted house. In my outline, a case will look something like this:

Lucy v. Zehmer
Facts:
Holding:
Class Notes:
X
Y
Z

I caution you to be wary of classmates (not people on here but actual people in school) who tell you they aren't outlining until October, November, etc. because 1) you don't know if they are actually doing that and 2) someone might try to convince you to outline in November because they don't want to be the only one procrastinating. (People like this exist, trust me.)

Good luck to you and I say the earlier, the better with outlining.

[A. Nony Mouse]

I think there's a difference between outlining early first semester and second semester, though - by second semester you have a much better idea of what goes in an outline and how to synthesize course material. I think any outline created at this point in the first semester of 1L is going to be much less helpful than it will be once things sort of click, which is usually a little later down the line. So while it might make sense not to wait till Thanksgiving or something, I think it is reasonable that you would start outlining later in first semester than in the second semester.

OP, as to facts in outline - it depends a little on how your mind works and how your profs work. Some people are good at remembering details and can just write "the hairy hand case" and that works for them. And like people said, some profs like seeing analogies to cases, and some don't care (because there is a danger that your exam will turn into reciting the facts of case X rather than actually analogizing to the facts in the exam - you are never going to get points for knowing that Lefkowitz involved fur coats, but you may get points for being able to say "fact pattern X [from the exam] is analogous to Lefkowitz because both involve an advertisement and the issue is whether the advertisement constituted a firm offer that cannot be withdrawn. Unlike in Lefowitz, however, here the advertisement was ambiguous, because there [something about the case] and here [whatever fact applies]. Therefore, the plaintiff here will likely not prevail." Or, depending on your prof, you may get the same number of points saying "The issue here is whether the advertisement constitutes an offer. However, since this advertisement is not clear, definite, or explicit, because it does not specify [fact from exam], the plaintiff will likely not prevail on his claim that the ad was an offer" and not mentioning Lefkowitz at all.)

Also, generally speaking, where a case has important facts, your prof will spend a fair amount of time on them in class, and so you will get a sense of which ones it might be useful to know and which you can ignore.

I tend to think that putting a lot of facts in your outline is counter productive - takes up too much time and especially when you're first outlining, you tend to put in too much stuff that you don't need. Plenty of people won't even put cases in their outlines at all - so in the offer section of a contracts outline, they wouldn't mention Lefkowitz by name, they'd just have the rule that an offer needs to be clear, definite, explicit, without any missing terms, with maybe a note that advertisements can be offers. Personally I liked putting the case name by the rule just as a reminder, but didn't go overboard on facts beyond that - maybe one line for really big or complicated cases.

[z0mbiecatz1234]

I do agree with the point about first and second semester being different in terms of outlining early. I think it's a great point to consider. Two weeks into your very first law school semester might leave you more confused than ready to begin outlining. If you want to start early maybe a little over a month would allow you to potentially see the big picture. Although I will say I wasn't entirely comfortable with outlining at any point my first semester.

[thesealocust]

It's definitely a good question - it might be too early to outline, but not to early to think about what the process will entail, and how that will impact reading/note taking/etc. early on.

I think including facts can lead to lazy or ineffective outlining. Ideally your goal is to synthesize all the rules of the course to use on the exam, not just list the cases chronologically. For most common law courses, making arguments related to the facts of specific cases is often gravy - great when you can do it, but not critical. So a great outline might have few facts, or be light on the facts. Including them won't hurt in theory, but doing so is probably more common for people who don't really "get" the purpose of outlining and exam prep.

I'm a huge fan of short outlines myself. I actually forced myself to only ever use case names as citations, not as topic/bullet headings, to make sure I was only pulling out important rule/policy details and not just dumping notes into a big list.

[bluthmodelhome]

I thought it was useful to include facts. The facts are important in drawing comparisons and contrasts to the facts on an exam.

Strongly agree. Knowing the key facts and why they matter is crucial to analysis on the exam.

[ph14]

I thought it was useful to include facts. The facts are important in drawing comparisons and contrasts to the facts on an exam.

Strongly agree. Knowing the key facts and why they matter is crucial to analysis on the exam.

Yeah, in my view it's the difference between an average answer (identifies the issue, applies the correct legal rule, analyzes the issue, reaches a reasonable conclusion) and an above-average answer (does all that but situates it in the case law, provides reasons that a court might rule this way or that way, etc.).

[tfer2222]

To each his own, but as a former undercover gunner, I'm a big proponent of early outlining. Once a week, right after classes started, I condensed my class/reading notes from that week into a very well-organized outline (also supplementing with old outlines/supplements as necessary). Towards the end of the semester i turned those long outlines into much shorter attack outlines and just focused on memorizing the shit out of them and taking practice exams (while most people were scrambling to pull together outlines and trying to remember what happened during the first half of the semester). I don't like to rush stuff/cram/get flustered if I don't have to, so this worked really well for me.

I also usually included at least one line re case facts, but it was very professor/class specific (for example, I included more facts for a con law outline than a contracts outline). You should look at old exams for each class to the extent possible. For some classes/professors, comparing and contrasting cases/fact patterns might be important on the exam. For others, its not important at all and might be a waste of time. Gear your outlines accordingly.

[buckiguy_sucks]

if you're in an open notes class and a class laptop user i don't think facts are necessary in your outline because you can just command f your notes

although this takes slightly more time

[A. Nony Mouse]

There are schools that don't let you access your notes/outline on the computer, though (examsoft can be set to shut off access to anything else on your computer and that was the case in all but one of my classes).

[WhiskeyAndCupcakes]

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