Frustration of Purpose and Confusion of the Issues

Two legal phrases that best describe my mental state right now.

Last night, after scoring 78% on an Evidence practice set, I decided to go to bed. I was late anyway, but I did finish Evidence. For some reason, I decided to take my July 2008 Bar Exam essays to bed with me. Bad idea.

My undergrad degree is Education, so I learned how to test students and also how to give feedback. I was reminded last night that the bar examiners who write (and grade) those exams are lawyers, not teachers. For one, having essays with no writing on them to indicate where I did get points left me wondering where I really went wrong, especially when my essay covers the same things as a "model" essay. Was it my knowledge of the law that didn't come through as coherently? Did I not say the magic phrase? Second, knowing my score on an essay is almost useless if you don't know the overall range of scores---if average was a 5, then my 3 wasn't so bad after all.

I was also reminded of the range of my scores and that reminded me that different people write each question and grade it. So, it's obvious that the person who graded my Wills essay gave no points for about 10 things I mentioned that were also mentioned in the model essay. I could have written a letter to Santa on that essay and received as many points as I did actually writing about the issue (that would be 0 points). Yes, I got 0 points on an essay. It is a myth that if you identify the issue and write some basic, applicable rules, you'll get at least a point. Not true.

One point is all I have to recover, but I am aiming to recover a lot more. As for coverage, I am now down to Torts, Contracts, and Property (and their respective NC topics). I'm also down to 23 days until showtime. From today on out, it's at least 6 hours of studying a day until I take off time from work. At that point, it will be 8-10 hours a day. But, I will only be reviewing, which will be different than last time. Right now, I am feeling confident about the MBE, but not so confident about the essays. But, that is kinda where I expected to be at this point in the game---I wanted to get the MBE topics under my belt so that I could focus on memorizing NC law and writing essays in the home stretch.

I will pass the bar. I will pass the bar. I will pass the bar.