Patent Bar Study - PLI vs PRG Forum

[Lawhelpneeded2013]

I am going to study for and take patent bar examination this summer beginning with study starting next month. I have a few thousand dollars allocated towards purchasing study materials and want your insight/opinions on which to buy from your experience. I am stuck between PRG (Kayton) and PLI, both "home" editions, not live courses. What do you guys think?

[Dr. Review]

I took PRG, but voted for PLI. PLI spends more time prepping you for the test. It is geared towards getting you a passing score, and focuses on strategies to get you there. PRG is a good course, don't get me wrong, but you spend time learning more practical practitioner's tips than you would with PLI.

Given that you're taking the course to get a 70%, and not so much for practical skills, PLI gets you there. It's also the class everyone takes.

I will say this for PRG though, their written materials came in handy when I started out as an agent (AIA will render them unreliable if not obsolete).

[Lawhelpneeded2013]

I took PRG, but voted for PLI. PLI spends more time prepping you for the test. It is geared towards getting you a passing score, and focuses on strategies to get you there. PRG is a good course, don't get me wrong, but you spend time learning more practical practitioner's tips than you would with PLI.


Given that you're taking the course to get a 70%, and not so much for practical skills, PLI gets you there. It's also the class everyone takes.

Is it important for future marketing of myself and summer jobs to be able to actually become a practical practitioner or is it simply enough to pass the exam?

I will say this for PRG though, their written materials came in handy when I started out as an agent (AIA will render them unreliable if not obsolete).

I spoke to PRG about AIA, they stated they will be having new videos, exam ware questions, and publications completed by mid April to reflect the changes.

BTW, if it matters, PLI is about $400 cheaper and is ready for AIA now. I sent in my PTO-158 a few days ago and qualify for cat A so I am thinking I should hear back in the next three-four weeks and hopefully take exam at end of June (which hopefully I will not need but can retake in July before the 90 days is up). So if PLI is more exam focused to get me ready in 90 days that may be way to go but want to make sure it is not at expense of not understanding what to do when an actual patent practitioner day comes.

[Dr. Review]

When I said the AIA would render my materials obsolete, I meant just the materials that I already own, not their new materials.

PRG tends to be slower on updating the course. Having said that, the PTO JUST changed the test, so there are going to be a lot of unknowns you'll be facing if you take it sooner rather than later.

Neither course is going to get you ready to actually do this stuff. No one is going to expect you to be able to draft usable claims or a ready-to-file response to an office action right after you take the test. It's sad that the test doesn't actually examine useful skills, but there it is. Both courses give you a similar understanding of the material, but PLI is just more test-driven. For example, PLI tells you what types of questions you should know cold and what types you should look up on test day. PRG prefers you to have a practical knowledge base (which is only arguably more useful while practicing).

Keep in mind, no matter which course you take, you should be ready to spend 100-150 hours prepping, and you should answer hundreds, if not well over a thousand, practice questions. On the week I took the test alone, I answered 400+ questions.

Honestly, I am the only person I know who took PRG, and while I see some benefits to the course, I can't definitively say it was worth the extra money. I passed, but so did the guy in the office next to me who used PLI.

[wiseowl]

I spent time with both classes. The PRG materials were admittedly older (maybe 2002-03ish), and PLI was current. As others said, PLI helps you pass the test. PRG is a lot of good knowledge, but is more background than necessary for the test.

[farmernate]

Took PLI and passed the exam on the first go over spring break (mid-march). In my opinion, it was more than sufficient to prepare me for the exam which included a surprising amount of AIA phase 2 questions. Reiterating what was said above, the most important thing to prepare for this exam is putting in the time to get comfortable searching the MPEP and federal register notices, and doing practice problems.

[yeast master]

I passed a couple of weeks ago after having used PLI. I don't know much about PRG, but if it's true that it has a lot of information that you don't need to pass the test, that would be annoying. I felt like PLI was pretty efficient.

[skw]

I passed easily on the first try with PLI, but I took the exam in summer of 2011, so two revisions ago. I had the paper materials, which I believe they no longer offer. PLI will get it done for you if you follow the program, take the PTs and learn to efficiently search the MPEP. Good luck. It is painful, but a helpful credential to have when job hunting.