waspy and the bar(s)
I met up with Waspy this weekend at our favorite bar downtown, Hobo's, to get the scoop on the bar exam which she just took last week. She had been pretty tight-lipped about the whole thing and warned me that she'd rebuffed advances from all others who wanted to know how it went. However, only three sips into her vodka-cran, and she was ready to spill.
It's a two day exam given at the Airport Holiday Inn, where many of the takers end up staying the night before and during to help minimize stress. Waspy did it and it sounds like a pretty good plan to me. I'd rather roll out of a hotel bed at 7am and down to the 7:30 registration rather than roll out of my own bed at 6 and into my car to fight traffic to the airport, vibrating with anxiety all the way.
So, day-one starts with the practical application part of the exam. You're given a case file and an assignment and some basic instructions, then you have 90 minutes to crank out work product like a real lawyer. Maybe you will have to draft a will, an informational letter to a client, or a list of interrogetories. Waspy had to write a memorandum to a senior attorney. She said it was the easiest part and was the best way to start the whole process because it let you gently ease into the rhythm of writing and thinking about the law.
After that, there's a break, then comes the essay portion. There are nine, half-hour essays. Half-hour! That sounds, to me, like a great relief, because there's nothing more terrifying and potentially disastrous as the law school exam that consists of *one* essay question that you must answer in *three* hours. That means: there's a hell of a lot of stuff in that question that you will never in a million years catch, but you've got three whole hours to knock your brain up against it and drive yourself crazy. Nine, half-hour exams don't sound so bad.
After that, you're done with day-one and you fight the urge to go sit in the hotel bar and get completely drunk because you have to be able to get up and go at it again on day-two. You try to eat, you go to your room, maybe you cry a lot, maybe you call the people who love you and beg for sympathy, I don't know. Then you try to get a good night's sleep.
Day-two is multi-state multiple choice day. All across the country, people in every state will be sitting down on the same day, at roughly the same time to take this exact same multiple choice test -- so imagine that the cumulative, national energy around this test is powerful, like, perhaps powerful enough to send a wave of terror out into space that could knock sattelites out of orbit. I think Waspy said there were three, two-hour sessions. Anyone who's been in law school knows: multiple choice is the hardest and worst kind of test on the planet. Law school starts pounding into you from the first day that there are NO ANSWERS, ONLY MORE QUESTIONS! So the multiple choice test goes against everything you've been taught and forces you to somehow pick out ONE answer without being able to explain or qualify or say ANYTHING about your choice. It is torture.
This part of the exam only tests on the six basic areas of law that everyone learns in their first year of law school: contracts, torts, property, criminal law, constitutional law and evidence. I think. Frankly, I can't even remember anymore, but that seems about right. Once this six hour nightmare is over, it's done. You leave, you're numb, you can't believe you lived through it and *then* you go get completely drunk because it is a guaranteed fact that you will not be good for anything else at all for a few days. Then do you relax? No. You do not relax until you get your results in September, and then you only relax if the results are good. Why? Because, in Waspy's words, "I'd rather give birth to another baby than ever take the bar exam again." Sounds great! How do I sign up??
It's a two day exam given at the Airport Holiday Inn, where many of the takers end up staying the night before and during to help minimize stress. Waspy did it and it sounds like a pretty good plan to me. I'd rather roll out of a hotel bed at 7am and down to the 7:30 registration rather than roll out of my own bed at 6 and into my car to fight traffic to the airport, vibrating with anxiety all the way.
So, day-one starts with the practical application part of the exam. You're given a case file and an assignment and some basic instructions, then you have 90 minutes to crank out work product like a real lawyer. Maybe you will have to draft a will, an informational letter to a client, or a list of interrogetories. Waspy had to write a memorandum to a senior attorney. She said it was the easiest part and was the best way to start the whole process because it let you gently ease into the rhythm of writing and thinking about the law.
After that, there's a break, then comes the essay portion. There are nine, half-hour essays. Half-hour! That sounds, to me, like a great relief, because there's nothing more terrifying and potentially disastrous as the law school exam that consists of *one* essay question that you must answer in *three* hours. That means: there's a hell of a lot of stuff in that question that you will never in a million years catch, but you've got three whole hours to knock your brain up against it and drive yourself crazy. Nine, half-hour exams don't sound so bad.
After that, you're done with day-one and you fight the urge to go sit in the hotel bar and get completely drunk because you have to be able to get up and go at it again on day-two. You try to eat, you go to your room, maybe you cry a lot, maybe you call the people who love you and beg for sympathy, I don't know. Then you try to get a good night's sleep.
Day-two is multi-state multiple choice day. All across the country, people in every state will be sitting down on the same day, at roughly the same time to take this exact same multiple choice test -- so imagine that the cumulative, national energy around this test is powerful, like, perhaps powerful enough to send a wave of terror out into space that could knock sattelites out of orbit. I think Waspy said there were three, two-hour sessions. Anyone who's been in law school knows: multiple choice is the hardest and worst kind of test on the planet. Law school starts pounding into you from the first day that there are NO ANSWERS, ONLY MORE QUESTIONS! So the multiple choice test goes against everything you've been taught and forces you to somehow pick out ONE answer without being able to explain or qualify or say ANYTHING about your choice. It is torture.
This part of the exam only tests on the six basic areas of law that everyone learns in their first year of law school: contracts, torts, property, criminal law, constitutional law and evidence. I think. Frankly, I can't even remember anymore, but that seems about right. Once this six hour nightmare is over, it's done. You leave, you're numb, you can't believe you lived through it and *then* you go get completely drunk because it is a guaranteed fact that you will not be good for anything else at all for a few days. Then do you relax? No. You do not relax until you get your results in September, and then you only relax if the results are good. Why? Because, in Waspy's words, "I'd rather give birth to another baby than ever take the bar exam again." Sounds great! How do I sign up??
posted by reasonably prudent poet at 12:21 PM
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