PROFESSOR SERIES: THE BICE TORTS EXAM

From Arnab Banerjee (banerjee@usc.edu):

What you should remember most about Prof. Bice’s exam is that it is purely substance over style. He is one of the few professors where you can actually answer in outline format and receive as much credit as someone who writes a full essay. That being said it is a real racehorse exam even if you write an outline due to the fact that he has a 45 minute reading time and a 45 minute writing time. Take the 45 minute reading period to not only make an outline, but to mark down which of the issues you believe are the most important, and rank the order of issues you will try to return to if you have the time.

From Drew Gloger (gloger@usc.edu):

How I Prepared - the most important thing that I didn't do was practice enough multiple choice questions. As far as good things I did to prepare, I took a lot of practice tests and became comfortable with the way in which Prof. Bice expected students to respond to the issue spotters. He has a pretty particular formula for how you should structure your answer and I tried to adhere to that format. Also, on the policy question, make sure to touch on all the policy doctrines covered in class, even if they don't fit into answering the problem - just find a way to fit them in somewhere.

PROFESSOR SERIES: THE GROSS CONTRACTS EXAM
by Arnab Banerjee ('07)

FORMAT OF THE EXAM

The Gross exam last year did not have any multiple choice questions. It has short answers, one long issue spotter and a policy question. There is nothing particularly tricky about her issue spotter, in fact I feel it was one of the better written and fairer exams I have taken. It is just one fairly long question with several issues, and some of the bigger things, such as UCC 2-207, Staute of Frauds (even though we didn't go over this very much) and the Parol Evidence Rule. The short anwers were straight forward and generally she looked for one or two key points on each of them so it was easy to get full credit on a lot of those.
Her policy question is usually something that she spends a reasonable amount of time in class discussing. Don’t freak out if some of the past policy questions seem especially difficult because Prof. Gross usually selects a few policy topics each year to concentrate on and these vary from year to year. Gross gives you about 4 hours for the exam which I think is enough time--you don't need to rush but I think you can use most if not all of the time she gives you.

PREPARATION

Don't take very much time (or any time) going over cases because Gross does not care about them at all. Her lecture notes I think are perhaps the most useful as she is a pretty straight forward professor and lays out the black letter law for you. If there is a certain concept you don't get, I recommend using Emanuel's Crunchtime (or Gilbert's if you like that better), it is short and has some useful flowcharts and things like that. Also, I recommend reading the optional concepts book by Chirelstein--if you notice sometimes she lectures directly from that book. I have some friends who only read Chirelstein and ended up doing okay in the class, though I don't recommend this approach.
What I thought was the most useful was reading the model answers from previous years. It was a good way of seeing what she thought was important and what she thought wasn't. If I remember correctly some of the model asnwers she released last year had check marks on them so you could see what sentences she gave points to and what she didn't. Because Contracts has a lot more possible issues than most of your other classes, I would recommend a one page checklist or a good table of contents for your outline so you can make sure you are not overlooking any issues.
Also, in the issue spotter Gross will almost certainly ask you to calculate the damages so if you take a couple of hours to practice the math it will most likely pay off. Even if you don't get the math right she gives you partial credit for showing your work. Don't forget to say some things that may seem obvious like: "Because this involves the sale of goods the UCC applies." You can pick up some points with sentences like that.
Finally, remember to study for the policy question that she has had on all her pervious finals. Even though the policy question is worth less numerically, it is often what separates the A’s from the B’s. As I said earlier it will probably be something you debated in class. Maybe take the time to write out the pro's and con's or some of the policy issues you discussed in class and be able to talk about both sides of the issue.

Feel free to contact Arnab at: banerjee@usc.edu
-O

WHERE I THINK YOU SHOULD BE

There are a few things which annoy me to the point where I can label them pet peeves (i.e., somewhere on the spectrum between the pluralization of the McGriddle and Carson Daly). One of these is misused quotation marks (e.g., I question "your" leadership). They recently raised the cost of drying a load of clothes in my building by a quarter. This in itself was annoying, because I only brought down 75 cents instead of the necessary dollar, but would not have been nearly as irritating were it not for the explanatory note posted by the people in charge of this unfortunate hike. After a rather unconvincing explanation suggesting that this increase is justified by the recent rise in oil/natural gas prices, the note ends with the following declaration:

We would like to "thank you" for your cooperation.

Seriously, what is that?

Now, I initially thought this would be a very short post listing a few suggestions... alas, I was severely mistaken as to the extent of my long-windedness. Again. Nevertheless, here are some of my thoughts on where I think you should be:

1. Panicking: way too early for this -- give it about a week or so. You have plenty of time left and if you use it wisely (suggestions below) you can maxmimize the time you have and not even stress out at all! Okay, I'm deluded--but, there is plenty of time left to get yourself ready for exams.

2. Class Preparation: please tell me you're not still briefing.

3. Outlines: by now you should have:

• determined for each class, whether or not you will make outlines from scratch or not. If you were considering making an outline from scratch and have not yet started, I would strongly encourage you to not do that.
  
• your outlines pretty much ready to go (I'd say by the end of this weekend, they should all be done). Note that you'll still probably be updating your outline as you review them-- though most people tend to just make comments on their printed outline--so you really just want to have something that you can start going through. It doesn't have to be perfect--just have something you can start to review and take notes on. Ideally, you want to be done with the outline creation process and start spending your time next week primarily reviewing your outlines and other materials, be done with the outline creation phase and onto the outline review phase.
  

4. Practice Exams:

• By now you should have looked at a practice exam for each one of your classes. Make sure you get all the available exams for your professor. Sometimes the packets sold by the library don't have all the exams that are available for a particular professor -- make sure to check if there are more exams on the USC Law website.
  
• You want to get yourself ready to be able to start taking and reviewing practice exams next week.

5. Strategery: I think you should figure out a study plan for Finals:

• The first thing to know:
• Your exam schedule:
• Tuesday, 12/6: Civil Procedure.
• 2 days off
  
• Friday, 12/9: Torts.
• 3 days off
  
• Tuesday, 12/13: Contracts.
• 2 days off
  
• Friday, 12/16: LL&E.

In making a study plan it is important to consider (1) the order of your finals and (2) the days in between a final.

You should figure out how you want to allocate your studying time as between classes starting on Monday next week and all the way through the last day of finals. Some people can study multiple topics on the same day and some would prefer not to and rather focus on a single topic each day. By now you probably know which type you are so make sure to adjust your schedule accordingly.

The two days before an exam, I personally like to devote strictly to studying for the upcoming exam. For Civil Procedure I would recommend devoting (at least) the 3 days before. The main thing you want to figure out is how to allocate your time (1) at the beginning of next week (i.e., before you focus on Civ Pro) and (2) how to allocate your time within each day (including the days in between exams).

• LL&E Note: There is probably no need to devote more than the 2+ days that you have in after your Contracts final to the LL&E final (especially for people in Marmor's class). This assumes that you'll have all your studying materials set by that time.

In deciding what to do on a given day, here are some tips:

The Test-Taking Game Plan: in the 2-3-4 days prior to an exam, your goal is to prepare yourself to take that exam. To help further this process, I suggest making a game plan for each specific test in the days leading up to it. This is both a passive and active process:

• As you're taking/looking over practice exams, you're developing a sense of what the exam is like. And, the more exams you'll take the more efficient you'll be at spotting issues and formulating responses. The game plan for the test is literally a plan for what you will do in the 3 to 4+ hours that you're taking the final. For example:
  
• do you force yourself to plan a response to a question for 5 or 10 or 15 minutes before you start writing?
• It's important to be disciplined here--I think some preparation time is essential, how much you take is up to you. I like to think that everyone has an ideal time to prepare an answer. The better your initial planning, the more material you'll ultimately produce -- not only does this planning increase the initial pool of issues you have to draw from, giving you more to write on from the start, it also prevents lapses in exam-taking (i.e., being stuck with nothing to say) which tend to occur when you haven't thought out a response. These lapses force you to stop your flow and re-plan your answer -- this is usually a waste of time given that you're not only re-reading the fact pattern, but now you're planning the remainder of an answer, i.e., account for all the issues you've already discussed.
  
• should you outline the answer on paper or type it up on the computer?
• I personally like to plan an answer on paper because I think better that way. But after that is done, I like to type up an outline for the answer I just planned. I learned this the hard way, but it does ensure that you won't forget to discuss issues that you've actually spotted (damn you, thin skull doctrine!)
• on a multiple choice section, how will you allocate your time?
• I usually like to start by going through all the MC questions with short fact patterns or prompts and do all the ones that I can quickly figure leaving the tougher ones for round 2. Then I go through the questions with longer fact patterns.
• In more active fashion, you should figure out what type of document would help you execute this game plan (e.g., checklist) and work on putting it together.
  

• Timed Practice Exams Take Time: timing yourself on exams is great if you have the time because they can prepare your for the time crunch of an actual exam. However, it is also very beneficial to just go through exams, plan out how you would answer the question. Nevertheless, you should try to fit a timed exam at some point because (1) many issues are spotted as you're writing out your answer (i.e., you won't see all the issues when you're planning an answer), (2) you should have some practice with developing and discussing issues and (3) you never realize how much you actually know until you force yourself to take a test (usually you'll be quite surprised (I'll refrain from indicating whether or not this surprise will be pleasant)). That being said, I would try not to do a timed exam the day before the final (unless you do one early on). The day before the final
  

• Adequate Sleep Is The Most Underrated Study Aid: Yes, cheesy, but true. NEVER pull an all-nighter before an exam and think you're set because you chase some Vivarin with a can of Monster at 8:30 AM. Law school exams are long (never less than three hours) and are as much a test of endurance as anything else -- being on point for the entire time will undoubtedly help you so much more than a few extra hours of late night studying. Get at least 6 hours the night before.

Send me more questions if you have them -- there's really only so much time I can spend studying for my one final. Good times.

PROFESSOR SERIES: GARET'S LL&E EXAM
by Andrew Keats ('07)

FORMAT OF THE EXAM

While I’m sure Professor Garet has discussed the final exam format with you this will just provide a little more perspective. If memory serves me correctly, the exam was shorter than the other first semester exams, perhaps 3 hours long.

Multiple Choice: The first part was a closed book multiple choice exam, between 20-25 questions. Though you may only have half an hour to do the multiple choice, I don’t think anyone had trouble finishing this section, in fact most finished with time to spare. The questions in this section are somewhat random in that they do not necessarily focus on major themes in the course, but they are based on the readings and things that he has mentioned in class. I wouldn’t worry about the multiple choice too much, it wasn’t a difficult section.

Essays: The main section of the exam contains 2 essay questions. You should try to give equal time to both (though if there is some indication of different weights for the two you should give your time accordingly). Actually I always spend more time on the first essay because it takes me a bit of time just to get going. As you have seen from the practice exams passed out in class, the questions presented are fairly lengthy, with significant detail. Take time reading each question, read each one twice if possible (I know, after reading those things once you don’t want to go through the whole thing, so skim it again). One essay will be either a common law reasoning or a statutory reasoning problem (last year it was statutory reasoning for the first one…so I’d look for a common law reasoning problem). You will most likely be asked, as a legal clerk, to tell your judge how to rule. You will have to figure out what are the questions of law and what are the questions of fact. The second question will be broader and will require you to probably build on the issues, questions and facts developed in the first question. The second question will often be the "kitchen sink" question …. where you want to try and bring in everything else you can from class.

PREPARATION

What I did: While this is no help at this stage, I recommend doing the reading and showing up for class…but that’s just me. At the very least show up for the last class (its an experience you won’t get any other time in law school). I showed up to class, skimmed all the reading, but didn’t have much in the way of notes to show for it. I found a couple random outlines that were floating around and just gave myself the two days before the exam to do any studying. I hadn’t taken any of the practice exams and read over them and the sample answers over those two days. While possibly adding more stress because the sample answers were beyond anything I could do or even think of, and didn’t always seem to emanate directly from class, they were helpful…and some of the arguments stuck with me and I was able to use them in the final. The outlines I had were great because they squeezed down all the articles into short bullet points and rearranged the arguments into their proper categories (i.e. listing all formalist judges, writers, and their reasoning, etc..).

What I recommend: While I didn’t do much more than reading the samples...

• I think taking these tests and writing out answers would be a valuable way to study. I think going over them (even if not writing them) in study groups would be the best way to use group time. I didn’t do study groups (in case you’re worried that you need to).
• As far as the materials - have a sentence or two written down or in your head that describes each article or its main theme. Themes are important.
• Pay attention to the judges you’ve discussed in class and where their judicial reasoning fits (realism, positivism, etc.). The same goes for other major writers and philosophers (where do their arguments fit? What umbrella do you put them under? What do they stand for?).
• Understand how to deal w/ a common law reasoning problem, a statutory reasoning problem…and which articles you would analogize to.
• A one page checklist was helpful for a bunch of people who took the exam last year, because you want to try to jam as much from the class as you can into the exams (though not confirmed … I find quantity of writing is often an important factor in the grade). I would even throw quick "shout-outs" to a judge or writer in parenthesis to show the relevance of an argument to whatever I was rambling on about.

Things to remember: One key I think is really important is understanding what the actual question asks of you and not losing that focus. For instance our exam dealt w/ a fact pattern that seemed to be all about the section of the class on "personhood". I didn’t mention those issues once in my answer, even though I was trying to find a way to. Why? The question didn’t ask or lead me towards those arguments for my answer. That wasn’t what the issues were about, it just happened to be what the facts were.

Hope some of this helps. Good luck w/ your exams and remember, LLE doesn’t count for as many points.

Feel free to contact Andrew with any questions at: akeats@usc.edu

Studying For and Answering a Policy Question
by Will Troutman ('06)

First, I must naturally disclaim this little diatribe, as any good future lawyer should. Haha…law school jokes…always funny. But seriously, every policy question on every exam is different, so the recommendations I make are broad generalizations that generally should work, but generally should be tweaked per each exam.

In preparing for policy questions, there are three main principles that I would recommend you follow to ensure at least a mean’s worth of success:
1. KNOW THE POLICY
I know that seems obvious and circular, but really, it’s the most important aspect of any policy question. Every subject you study in the first year is informed by certain overarching themes, and therefore, the law's function according to policies that conform to those themes. These themes are seldom consistent, and typically have advocates and opponents, but for the most part, your professors should distill the course material down into 2-3 dominant themes, and therefore, policies.

For example, in torts, the themes and policies tend to be distributive justice, corrective justice, and instrumental justice. In contracts, the themes and policies that inform the various laws tend to be “make whole” and “fairness,” as indicated by the lack of punitive damages in most, if not all, contract disputes.

So how do you figure out the themes and policies? Well, it’s both simple and hard. On the one hand, many professors make it a point to signpost the policy throughout their lectures. If this is the case, you are in good shape. On the other hand, surprisingly enough, the professors are vague, obtuse, and verbose, making decoding policy more difficult than ignoring their various verbal tics and hygiene issues.

In the latter case, a good way to look for policy is to focus on the contradictions in the law. If the decisions of the common law are markedly different than those of the Restatements, or the modern statutory scheme (most relevant next semester, in criminal law), a brief look at the differences between common law, Restatements, and modern statutory schemes employed by various states will usually yield the themes that inform these different laws.

If neither of these suggestions works, or more importantly, you just want to use your time most efficiently, there is a solution. Most of your classes have tons of prior outlines, created by former masochistic students. Go through them and look for the outline made by the sickest, most pain-loving former student. This one likely will have a whole section devoted to policy. Know it. Learn it. Love it. And it’s there, whether on the APALSA, PAD, or JLSA website. As you review that outline, if something doesn’t make sense, grab your Gilbert’s/Emanuel’s/Examples & Explanations and look it up in the index. These study guides all spend significant amounts of time on policy considerations of the body of law.

2. KNOW YOUR PROFESSOR'S POLICY
It’s great to know the policies that permeate a given area of law, but it’s even better not to relegate yourself to a 2.5 because you write an eloquent essay that attacks your professor’s entire body of scholarship. All good professors cover the various themes that inform the policies of their area of law, but they always, through just expertise or hubris, focus on one theme or another more than others. This will be painfully obvious when you take Con Law and your professor unfortunately covers Roe v. Wade in a disdainful tone or refers to every Scaliathomas dissent with mockery. See – I just did it there. I discussed two different issues but made it clear where my preferences lie! Law school jokes…always funny.

So, once you identify your professors’ tendencies, make sure your policy essay embraces those tendencies and discusses how great they are, while mentioning and discrediting the others. Again, these tendencies are clear in lecture, as mentioned above, but also typically are pointed out in the various outlines.

3. KNOW THE "HOT TOPICS" IN THE GIVEN FIELD
Finally, one can almost always predict the policy question with certainty. Without fail, your professors will choose a policy question that relates to a highly debated or unsettled area of law. Anytime the red states and the blue states have diametrically opposed laws, a potential policy question is born. Anytime the Supreme Court is about to hear argument regarding an issue, a policy question relating to it is likely. You get the drift. Most of your professors will spend some time discussing these sorts of unsettled and controversial areas of law that can be viewed in one way or another through different thematic lenses. Again, outlines and study guides are a good source of these sorts of issues. Typically, whole sections may be devoted to such things.

So, there you go, policy in a nutshell. I do have a few more tips for answering these questions:

First, make sure you have a separate policy outline, that, ironically enough, outlines the major policy points on which you need to focus. Then, when you get your question, you can just apply your list, going down it one by one and discussing the issue with regard to each policy position (again, giving extra attention and relevance to your respective professor’s pet project).

Second, look at the past exams of your class and see what kinds of policy questions get asked. Sometimes, the question will be very broad, asking you to compare and contrast to sorts of laws.

For example, a crim law question might ask you to compare and contrast criminal common law and the model penal code and discuss why the differences exist. Conversely, a question might be very narrow, giving you a certain controversy and asking you to discuss possible resolutions given different policies. For example, in torts, it could be a law that imposes a certain penalty (let’s say, strict liability) for a certain behavior, and you will be asked to discuss the merits of such a law and such a penalty, given the behavior. Does it serve the principles of distributive justice? Instrumental? Corrective? And if so, is this a good thing given the purposes of those policies?

And finally, if you find your course, and its policies, are heavily informed by certain authors, do make mention of them in your policy outline and in your answer. It’s always bonus points to write “as Judge Learn-ed Hand would say…” in your essay.

That’s all I got. Good luck. Be efficient and perspicacious and you’ll be fine.


Feel free to contact Will with any questions at: wtroutma@usc.edu
--O

EXAM ACCOUTREMENTS

OK, I still don't understand what I should bring to class on the actual exam. Do I bring a whole outline of 50 pages? Do I make a more condensed outline? How long? Thanks.

Generally, you want to bring everything to the actual exam. Definitely take advantage of the open-book exam: casebooks, study aids, whole outlines, short outlines, policy outlines, checklists, Torts on Tape, Calamari & Perillo, etc. Anything you possess that even remotely relates to the subject matter, bring it to the exam. Now, most likely, you won't use anything except for your checklist and outline -- but it doesn't hurt to have other resources around.

The primary reason is that your outlines and checklists are, by definition, condensed versions of the extensive detail contained in your casebook and study aids. Therefore, it'd be nice to have a reference if the exam question requires more detail than that contained in your outline. This almost exclusively arises on policy questions and multiple choice questions.

That being said with respect to outlines, you definitely want to bring in your master outline and you should also have a more exam-friendly document, such as a checklist or shorter outline.

What happens on an exam: Ideally, by the time you're ready to take the exam, you will know the material so well that the mere sight of a word such as "duty" or "consideration", with little more, will be sufficient to prompt a thorough analysis (by you) of that element on your exam. In other words, you'll read the fact pattern, you'll spot an issue like negligence and then you'll proceed to analyze each element based on your knowledge of the material. Ideally, you won't need something to tell you how to analyze the element, rather, you will want something to tell you which elements (or issues) need to be analyzed.

The main problem is that a final exam is a serious time crunch. Because of this you want to make sure that: (a) you're not missing relevant issues and (b) when you analyze an issue, you're doing a complete analysis. This is why, at the very least, you want to have:

• a streamlined outline -- not more than 20 pages, but ideally somewhere around 10 to 15 -- which has the very very bare bones analysis of every major issue in the subject matter.
• this is made directly from your master outline -- as you read through the master outline and learn the material, start to remove unnecessary material (hypos, cases). Continue doing this until you have just the simple analysis and nothing more.

• a simple checklist -- not more than 2 pages, but ideally just 1 -- with all the possible issues that you've learned about.

This I would say is the minimum. I think the ideal would include one or both of the following:

• an issue-spotting outline (ideally 10-15 pages)-- this outline features three sections for each major issue:
  
• SPOT: different facts which tend to suggest that this issue exists
• best way to build this section is through practice exams.
  
• CONNECT: broader issues that could possibly be applicable when this issue exists.
• best way to build this is through practice exam answers and just by reading over your master outline and drawing the connectiosn yourself.
  
• ANALYSIS: the bare bones analysis (basically, what the streamlined outline contains). Within the points of analysis is a mini-CONNECT section, which points to potentially relevant issues within the analysis.
  
• best way to build this is through study aids.

• a tiered checklist (not more than 5 pages)-- this checklist contains a listing of all the issues, like a normal checklist -- but underneath each issue are all the relevant issues that could be applicable once you spot the initial issue.

Note: if there is a policy question on your exam, you should (a) definitely include policy arguments within your master outline and (b) consider making a separate policy outline (basically, this entails just taking all the policy stuff in your outline and putting it on a separate document).

So, to sum up, you want to have something on the test which will actually help you take the test. This means having something that will:

• guide your analysis (a short, streamlined outline) so you're not missing any steps once you spot an issue.
• make sure that you're not missing issues (checklist, issue-spotting outline) and, ideally, helping you spot additional issues which relate to the ones you've spotted
  
• provide you with a more expansive analysis for discussion if necessary (your master outline); and
  
• cover any gaps in your outlines (study aids, casebook).
  

What to do this week: REVIEW PRACTICE EXAMS. I've asked several of my friends what they think is the best thing 1Ls can do to get ready for exams and they all said the same thing: "We don't go to law school, quit asking us about this crap." At which point I turned to my friends who do go to law school and they all recommended the following: look over practice exams. The sooner you look at exams, the better off you'll be. It doesn't matter if you can't answer the questions right now -- it'll help you realize very very quickly what you need to be doing and you should let the exams drive your outlining and your studying. From here on out, your time should be primarily spent on preparing to take a law school exam.

I think the main reason law students get frustrated with their grades is that they don't take the time to learn about what's expected from them on exams and, more imporantly, the kind of preparation that is required to do well on an exam. Instead, they expect that what they've been doing on a daily basis will adequately prepare them for the exam. The grade they end up receiving invariably fails to represent what they think they should have gotten -- in other words, law students aren't so much frustrated by bad grades as they are by the lack of relationship between how they think they did and what they actually got. I think this gap between expected grades and actual grades would be significantly reduced if people took the time to look at practice exams WELL before their first final.

If you have any questions or would like sample outlines, checklists or anything else, e-mail me at bleiweis@usc.edu.