Law Students

First night of Bar/Bri and initial thoughts on the course

By AustinGroothuis

Bar/Bri started yesterday for many students (at least students in Illinois). What to expect on the first night of Bar/Bri? See more about the first night of Bar/Bri by clicking below...

1. The first night here was Torts.
2. The format is this: one of the big books they give you contains all of the lecture notes. The lecture notes have blanks where the professor will tell you to fill in key words and phrases during the lecture. Pretty straight forward and easy to understand.
3. Before a class, you're expected to read the more extensive outlines of the upcoming lecture. But the in class stuff is what really drives this home. Conviser, who started Bar/Bri and teaches at Chicago-Kent, seems to know the bar and many of its tricks inside and out. So he seems to know when to emphasize or deemphasize topics.
4. After class, they want you to then review those lecture notes that you just completed. And then you go on to an assignment (usually actual problems)...read the next days lecture, attend lecture, review notes, do assignment, repeat.
5. The class starts with a 30 minute overview of Bar/Bri and the bar exam itself. There is no need to take notes during this part and I wouldn't feel too bad if you happen to show up late the first day. If you're not familiar with the format of the exam by the time Bar/Bri is over, then there is a big problem.
6. The 30 minute overview stretched the first class to about four hours. Especially in the evening course starting at 6:00 lasting to past 10:00, this was pretty tough to take.
7. The TV's on which they they played the DVD lecture here were two tiny 1990's 27 inchers or so. In a fairly big auditorium, it would have been nice to have some bigger TV's or a projection screen. Not terribly important, but could have made the lecture seem more live and engaging and for the cost of one student's tuition they could go out and buy a fifty inch plasma!

Full post as published by CALI's Pre-Law Blog on January 03, 2008 (boomark / email).