Eh, it matters to me how well I did. I'd be pretty upset with myself if I didn't give it my best shot, regardless of what my grades turned out to be.

I don't think he was referring to his effort. I think he was getting to the overall point that even if he did his best ever, he may still not get an A, or he could feel like he only did OK, but still get an A.

I'm taking for granted that I gave it my best. I did what I could, and it's over. My point was just that my best isn't what matters, what matters is how my best measures up to everyone else's attempt in my class.

Gotcha.

I really don't know what to think. Our crim exam was 2/3 multiple choice and I honestly feel like I got a perfect on that part. Everything else was essay though, and I do not feel good about any of them. Knew the material well, but organization was horrible, missed issues on every hypo, and made a couple mistakes. I obsessed so much over the material that I never made time to take practice exams and it seriously cost me. I'm just going to assume median and try like hell not to think about it.

So you are going to take it personally if you did everything you could and still couldn't beat others in your class? If that's how you judge yourself, you have a long tough road ahead of you in law school. I put in enough effort to be competitive in each class. With the subjectivity of grading exams, the curve, and given how smart my classmates are, if I put myself in a position to execute on exam day I don't beat myself up over the fallout. You are going to get some strikes called balls, dude. Nature of the business. You just have to be mechanically sound.

I'm not the one that decided to judge my performance on a curve based on the performance of my peers. It was the law schools that did that, I'm just commenting on the system. It exists that way, I did my part, now all I can do is sit back and wait to see what happens. I'm just acknowledging the reality of the system.

I don't know where you got that I'm going to take it personally or beat myself up if I don't do well. I did my best given what I knew this semester, both about the subject matter and how to take law school exams. If I end up grading poorly, it means I was doing something wrong (or at least, not as well as my peers) and I need to correct that next semester. That's all. I'll still put in the same effort next semester, I'll just try to find an approach that will yield better grades from it.

That's where I got that from.

Second, you must understand that at a certain point you can't work yourself up over other people. The best you can do is put yourself in a position to execute on game day, and there are so many variables in there that at some point it is not worth working harder. I've taken exams where the difference between an A and a B- was 6 points. Given holistic grading, I'm not sure what could be done, if anything, to assure yourself of a better spot on the curve.

That's just an expression of things based on a curve. I did my part. Now it's going to be measured up against how everyone else did. What grade I get is now entirely out of my control at this point. That's all I was saying. I can't worry about it because it really has nothing to do with me now.


That's one hell of a tight curve, and that sucks. But I think in that case, I'd still want to look at what those six points were and why I might have missed them, in the hope that I'll be able to learn something from the experience. Maybe I wouldn't be able to, but I'd rather try than just accept it was a tight curve and there was nothing I could do.

That's not me taking things personally, it's just me wanting to learn what I can. I'm just wired that way.