MBE - how'd you feel? Forum

[starryski]

The guy next to me was on problem 74 with 5 minutes left. Felt bad for him. Maybe that'll help someone's analysis a bit.

Jesus, that's like 3 minutes per question. Maybe I read and digest fast, but I'd go crazy analyzing each 100 word question that long. I generally read, cross out obvious wrong, reread facts if necessary, then look at remaining choices until I get correct answer.

maybe he skipped around? i did every 33 when i felt i was falling into a rut or just not getting many in a row

I do weird stuff like that too...I started the afternoon session doing 100-90 in reverse order.

i would bubble in every 33. skipping in between. and if something looked short (when i turned a new page) i start with that. keeps things...fresh?

[Veridian40]

I also want to chime in and say that the general consensus in my state (myself included) was that that was a nerve-wrackingly D heavy exam. I was glad to see people here agreeing.

[bmonroe]

Glad to hear everyone thought this test was weird. So many D answers and Earnest Money.

To paraphrase Radioactive Man: "My Score! The MBE Prep does nothing!"

wtf was earnest money?! i saw it like 2-3 times?!

L

lMAO ! I was thinking the same thing ! Like ? I'm sorry ? Speak English

[Veridian40]

Glad to hear everyone thought this test was weird. So many D answers and Earnest Money.

To paraphrase Radioactive Man: "My Score! The MBE Prep does nothing!"

wtf was earnest money?! i saw it like 2-3 times?!

L

lMAO ! I was thinking the same thing ! Like ? I'm sorry ? Speak English

The thing that was killing me was the the questions where two of the answer choices were the exact same thing, but with maybe one word changed. Without going into specifics there was one involving an expert witness that almost made me get up and leave right there lol

[smokeylarue]

86% of board thinks MBE was harder than expected and it keeps rising. .. this is damning. Was it this bad last year?

[Arbinshire]

86% of board thinks MBE was harder than expected and it keeps rising. .. this is damning. Was it this bad last year?

More like 56%

Its this bad every year, and thereafter ad infinitum.

[bmonroe]

Glad to hear everyone thought this test was weird. So many D answers and Earnest Money.

To paraphrase Radioactive Man: "My Score! The MBE Prep does nothing!"

wtf was earnest money?! i saw it like 2-3 times?!

L

lMAO ! I was thinking the same thing ! Like ? I'm sorry ? Speak English

The thing that was killing me was the the questions where two of the answer choices were the exact same thing, but with maybe one word changed. Without going into specifics there was one involving an expert witness that almost made me get up and leave right there lol

Around question 160 my vision started to blur and I thought I was dying for sure!

[dietcoke0]

86% of board thinks MBE was harder than expected and it keeps rising. .. this is damning. Was it this bad last year?

More like 56%

Its this bad every year, and thereafter ad infinitum.

Harder. Not a lot harder. Someone missed at least one question.

[Tanicius]

86% of board thinks MBE was harder than expected and it keeps rising. .. this is damning. Was it this bad last year?

Yes. I averaged 75% on MBE's and walked out of the test center believing I had to have failed.

Here's the thing thing. What you guys aren't perceiving, because of test stress, is the fact that you got a shit ton of easy questions right without even really thinking. Because you didn't really think about them, you can't even remember them. It's only the hard questions that you remember, and because you did 200 questions today, there were a lot of hard questions. But percentage wise those hard questions don't account for nearly as much as you think.

[somuchbooty]

86% of board thinks MBE was harder than expected and it keeps rising. .. this is damning. Was it this bad last year?

More like 56%

Its this bad every year, and thereafter ad infinitum.

Harder. Not a lot harder. Someone missed at least one question.

lol

[somuchbooty]

86% of board thinks MBE was harder than expected and it keeps rising. .. this is damning. Was it this bad last year?

Yes. I averaged 75% on MBE's and walked out of the test center believing I had to have failed.

Here's the thing thing. What you guys aren't perceiving, because of test stress, is the fact that you got a shit ton of easy questions right without even really thinking. Because you didn't really think about them, you can't even remember them. It's only the hard questions that you remember, and because you did 200 questions today, there were a lot of hard questions. But percentage wise those hard questions don't account for nearly as much as you think.

I think the difference between today and what I was expecting is that I figured there'd be at least 60-70 or so out of the 200 that I was 100% sure I got right, 100% would bet my life.

I'm guessing there were only like 25 of those on this test. There seemed to typically be some possibility for confusion that wasn't 100% extinguished when you picked a choice. Just my impression.

[Learned Throw Hands]

That was ridiculous. I did like 2,000 practice questions but I think I was practicing for a different exam because I definitely wasn't prepared for what I took today.

[941law]

The answer choices were more difficult than private companies. Fact patterns had a different style in some on MBE, but were no harder than some of the private company fact patterns. You not only needed to know the black letter law, but also needed to really understand the intention of the question to choose the "answer that makes the most sense" because there might have been several. If it was a civ pro question that was involving an employment law issue, I went for an answer that solved it via civ pro and not an answer that required me to know employment law.

Get those wild lizards out of here and screw vaccinations.

[BVest]

How can so many questions be that unfamiliar after doing 1200 practice questions?

[edit: scooped]

[TJW68]

I took Kaplan, which I thought was amazing until taking the REAL thing. I took 4-5 Kaplan practice tests (62- 75%) Nothing amazing but "passing". I thought the "hard" part was over after Day 1 Florida essays and MCQ. I thought Florida questions were the "unknown" and Kaplan sim
test would mirror MBE. BUT DAMN, the MBE was rough. Even knowing all the rules. When you see the "trap answer" vs. the right answer in almost every question you start second guessing yourself way more than expected. Which eats up your time very quick. If I do happen to fail I will not use Kaplan again. Kaplans main guy "Chris Fromm" I really liked, I think he did an awesome
job of turning theory into rational thought. (Ill emphasise Chis Fromm is better than any
BAR turor you could hire.) That being said after comparing Kaplan Q's vs. MBE Q's I dont think it translated very well. They may have tested same legal theories just not to the same degree of nuance. I find this surprising considering Kaplans guy Chris Fromm has taken the MBE many times in many states. However, I do also find it interesting that the July 2014 class avg. was lowest in a decade. This could indicate the NCNX is trying to shift the Bar exam from simple memorization test to an actual legal knowledge and application test. This would coincide with Florida's test. During Kaplans FL Bar Prep Prof. Jon Grossman said, "While I guess FL Bar Examiner could pose a murder q in an essay . . . they have NEVER done so before." FALSE. This statement would no longer be true per July 2015 Exam. To my subsequent test takers, I'm not trying to crap on Kaplan. I think they do a great job. I would just keep in mind that I think a seismic shift is occuring at low frequencies not to alert bar prep companies. At the end
of our exam we were "asked" if we used a Bar prep company. Among the six choices Barbri, and 5 Ive never heard of was a blank fill in the space. Add up the dots, its always about the money. NCBX will be coming down hard on Bar
prep companies and in turn all you.

Best of luck in the future.

[5ky]

86% of board thinks MBE was harder than expected and it keeps rising. .. this is damning. Was it this bad last year?

Yes. I averaged 75% on MBE's and walked out of the test center believing I had to have failed.

Here's the thing thing. What you guys aren't perceiving, because of test stress, is the fact that you got a shit ton of easy questions right without even really thinking. Because you didn't really think about them, you can't even remember them. It's only the hard questions that you remember, and because you did 200 questions today, there were a lot of hard questions. But percentage wise those hard questions don't account for nearly as much as you think.

I think the difference between today and what I was expecting is that I figured there'd be at least 60-70 or so out of the 200 that I was 100% sure I got right, 100% would bet my life.

I'm guessing there were only like 25 of those on this test. There seemed to typically be some possibility for confusion that wasn't 100% extinguished when you picked a choice. Just my impression.

Totally normal feeling. Very common. I agree 100% with Tanicius.

[Learned Throw Hands]

I'm definitely not using BARBRI for my retake I'll tell you that much.

[smokeylarue]

I took Emanuel's practice test less than a week ago and it was SIGNIFICANTLY easier. There were very few questions that made you go "wtf", it was straightforward. This exam was full of those "wtf" questions, I don't think we're just stressing over nothing. This was objectively much more difficult.

[somuchbooty]

I'd apportion 57% to overreaction, 43% to these questions were actually shitty. We'll find out when the results are released by the bump, right?

[notcool]

I definitely bombed the AM session.

PM was better, but still too many questions where I narrowed it down to two and then basically had to guess (and when this happened, I bet I picked the wrong answer more often than not).

[mhylden]

I suppose I am among the masses of folks who thought the MBE was very hard today. I had all sorts of off the wall results with barbri. Ranged from honestly 1% to 100% but overall thought their stuff was long, hard, and too complicated (twss). I scored a solid 102 on their full day practice test. If I got 102 correct today I would be surprised. I'm just echoing others but I felt certain I got maybe 15-20 correct today.

Essays seemed much much easier.

[UVAIce]

I did over 1000 questions with Adaptibar and I generally felt that this test was mostly representative of the types of questions I had answered. I think the best I ever did on a set of questions (100) was ~88% right. I doubt I did that today, but I felt fairly solid. There are some questions I know that I got wrong afterwards, which always sucks, but I definitely got some questions right. I'm far more worried about the VA local day - I have no idea how they are going to grade essays, etc.

[petepilsh]

After the July 2014 exam there was a very large outcry about the difficulty of the MBE. Some were stating it was the most difficult MBE in the history of the MBE. Others were forecasting it would be the biggest scale in the history of the MBE and everyone would survive.
After the July 2014 MBE results came out, we learned two things:
1. The scale was not large and was actually, as one could predict, very similar to other years. It did not have the statistical impact many had hoped for.
2. Passage rates in nearly (I think everyone one if I remember correctly) state were down when compared to July 2013-2010.

That's the thing about the MBE... It could go either way, you never know, but one thing is for sure, it will certainly be interesting.

[LAW813FL]

Is the scale the same for every state? Or do states take the raws of their applicants and scale them then?

[5ky]

After the July 2014 exam there was a very large outcry about the difficulty of the MBE. Some were stating it was the most difficult MBE in the history of the MBE. Others were forecasting it would be the biggest scale in the history of the MBE and everyone would survive.
After the July 2014 MBE results came out, we learned two things:
1. The scale was not large and was actually, as one could predict, very similar to other years. It did not have the statistical impact many had hoped for.
2. Passage rates in nearly (I think everyone one if I remember correctly) state were down when compared to July 2013-2010.

That's the thing about the MBE... It could go either way, you never know, but one thing is for sure, it will certainly be interesting.

i'll only add that pass rates in NY were not noticeably down. among aba graduates, first time takers, 83% passed, compared to 86% from 2013 and the same as 83% in 2012.

i know it really sucks and it's exactly what i did for the first few days after the bar when i took it, but honestly just try to forget about it.