Repeater Success Story:
I wanted to share my story too in case it helps. I do want to emphasize before I begin that as helpful as it is to read everyone's personal stories, it's important to take everything with a grain of salt and personalize the approach to your own needs.
A little about me...
I am a 1x repeater and went to school on the East Coast. I took the Bar 3 cycles ago in July of 2016 (one of the last 3-day versions of the exam). I did not take any of the Bar related courses (aside from the required 1L courses) in law school. Due to unexpected events in addition to overcommitments during the summer after graduation, I was very underprepared the first time and failed by about 90 points. I took Barbri my first time around and, although I crammed all my studying into a very short period of time, I believe I completed about 70-75% of the Barbri course. My essays were all average and within the passing zone, but I had one PT that I made a huge mistake on and I did very poorly on the MBE.
Broad Formula for Success:
My major recipe for success this time was 1) staying positive and prioritizing taking care of myself - listened to meditation music and positive affirmations on YouTube every night, 2) being honest with myself on what I needed to improve, 3) prioritizing my weaknesses, and 4) figuring out how to harness and harvest my strengths to the maximum extent.
What I did Exactly:
Overview: Spent about 2.5 months studying (the first month I was working full time in the beginning, drifted into working part time, and then had a whole 6 weeks to study full-time). I spent just under 2 months almost exclusively focusing on the MBE since it was my weak point. I did do a PT approximately every 2 days during this period too because I wanted writing them to be a reflex rather than a panic. I was reviewing all the topics slowly at this time, including state topics (after I finished reviewing all the Fed Law), but I actually did not start writing out essays until the 2.5 week out mark... I meant to give myself a bit more time than this and definitely felt like I was cramming at this point in my studies, but I do think prioritizing studying different skills rather doing it all at the same time was really helpful for me personally. It made me realize that the mental state and method of thinking about the law is completely different for the essays than the MBE, and I think this really helped me perform strongly this time around. I had two different self made outlines I relied on for the essays and the MBE which I designed specifically for getting into the right mindset for each different test - they were really just scribbled out handwritten notes/charts for myself, but they were what I found to be the quickest tool I had (once I'd reviewed several commercial outlines many times) to refresh my memory on where I needed to be mentally.
MBE: As mentioned, I started for the MBE very early since it was my weak-point and spent a significant amount of time almost exclusively practicing it rather than mixing in with essays too. I got passing scores on the essays last time with minimal effort, so I felt like this was the adjustment I personally needed. As far as my approach, I bought the MBE Goat and carefully followed her approach for preparation (basically entailing carefully charting your progress in each section and doing approx. 1500 problems minimum).
I would start by reviewing one topic at a time, I had various different commercial outlines and flash cards and would read everything I could about a topic in one half of a day, and would spend the second half doing practice problems. I tried to dive into the practice problems as early as possible, even when I felt like I wasn't ready, so that I could get a sense of my starting point and instincts in a particular subject. Total, I might have done about 1800 problems if I count the really early sets before I was prepared, but I did about 1600 under timed conditions after being more than minimally prepared.
I also gradually increased the number of topics I was practicing at a time. I.e., as soon as I'd made it through reviewing and memorizing for a couple topics, I'd do single-topic sets of both of them back to back a few times, then I would add the next topic a couple days later and do three single-topic sets on different topics back to back, etc. Once I had done this for all the topics, I started almost exclusively doing mixed sets for the rest of my practice unless I slipped up in a topic and then I would go back to doing single sets of it for awhile and re-memorizing the rules.
One of the most vital things during this time was that I kept handwritten notes to myself on every problem I got wrong and why, including both the rule of law and the logical trick or an issue with reading the prompt that I missed. I tried to re-read these notes in whole before every next practice set and slowly got a feel for the pattern of things I missed and got used to looking out for those tricks or rules. These notes are what became my outline for the MBE, and I read these again and again the morning of the exam in addition to skimming through the iPhone version of my Critical Pass flash cards of some of my worst topics while I was waiting in line for the auditorium to open. Some people don't like studying the day of and I don't recommend it if it doesn't work for you, but this is something I've always done as a warm-up for big exams so partially it was just a tradition, but partially I do think it helped so I wasn't starting cold.
PT: Similar to the MBEs, I knew while writing is a strength for me, timing is a major weakness on the PTs and the timing had been cut in half since the last time I took the exam. I decided to therefore start preparing for the PTs very early as well. I thought this worked well since, although writing essays for me personally distracted from the skill I was trying to build in doing MBEs, the PTs were kind of a nice mental break when I was getting overloaded. I read and watched (i.e. YouTube videos) everything I could on what approach was recommended. I liked the blog post from "Make this Time Your Last" and think I followed that approach most closely. After spending one day very early on in my studies mastering my approach, I did a PT approx every two days just to prove to myself I could finish on time. I think I ended up doing about 20 PTs, which was excessive... but it did help me accomplish my goal of feeling confident on timing. I used the UBE PTs as I heard they were similar to the new CA Bar, and that proved to be true. They are actually slightly longer case files (seemed about 2pgs longer on average than the last two CA Bars), so that helped even more for timing. I also kept hand written notes to myself on my timing, what was making me slow down and what to avoid or do differently, and on whether I was responding to the task correctly and what broad concepts I had missed (not based on the facts, but based on bigger picture patterns). I ended up deducing down to three major overarching types of response formats and how to read the prompts to determine what one was involved. I also re-read these notes the weekend before the Bar and attempted to read them at the lunch break, but am pretty sure it just wasn't possible and I just skimmed them quickly.
Essays: Even though I waited a bit too long to start writing these out, I hit the essays hard when I did finally do them though. My goal was to do 10-12 on each topic, even if it just meant outlining. I would say I outlined at least a half a dozen per topic and I was very strict about only giving myself 15 minutes to outline and 20 minutes if it was a very tricky topic. I only used resources that provided model answers and I really tried to absorb writing exactly like the top writers. Not so much on exact format, as that varied, but what didn't vary was 1) major organization, 2) lots of issues spotting and very obvious issue headers, and 3) lots and lots of analysis to the point it seemed absurd. I would say everyone's approach should be different, based on your learning style and strengths, but I would say just listen to yourself and try to think of what is or is not helping you and what will take you to that next level of ultimate confidence during the exam. If I got something wrong, I re-wrote the rule again and again and again, sometimes typing it out, and sometimes writing it over and over again on a dry erase-board and erasing parts of it and re-writing the rest from memory. In the last two days of my studies, I made these crazy handwritten brain maps of everything I had learned from essay writing and many of them included at least two topics per page, sometimes three, when the topics had major cross overs. It had very condensed versions of the rule of law and created kind of the same effect for me as the check-lists people are talking about, but more in the format of a web or a flowchart. I read these again and again the morning of Day 2 and I think this tremendously helped with my issue spotting. From looking at different forums I think I spotted many issues others didn't, and it's because I trained myself through these diagrams to look at the law in a bird's eye view.
Positivity:
As many others mentioned, at some point you have to find a way to really embrace positivity during both your studies and taking the exam. For me it helped to make a game out of studying in my mind. I also listened to positive affirmations and guided meditations on YouTube every night while I was falling asleep. Also, I really prioritized my physical health this time and tried to do exercises on YouTube in my apartment regularly, even if they were only 20min. I also got a massage once a week for about 6 weeks because I severely hurt my back while studying early in my studies. Luckily there was a place across the street from my apartment that had packages of massages that were pretty reasonable. There's definitely a lot of deals like this online for both massages and exercise classes.
I also recommend just generally taking time to self reflect every day on if what you've been doing is working for you and switch it up or neglect a resource that you've been using whenever it stops being helpful.
Some Useful Tools:
- "Make this Time Your Last":
https://www.makethisyourlasttime.com/ This is a blog about passing the CA Bar which is really humorous and uplifting. There are also some helpful review materials you can buy. I ended up buying his "Magic Sheets" and "Appro Sheets", which were helpful, but in the end I mostly relied on my own handwritten short cheat sheets, but part of how I was able to formulate them and internalize the rules was based on reading these.
-Bar Secrets:
https://www.barsecrets.com/ Another blog website on passing the CA Bar that provides useful tips for tactically approaching the exam. They also predict the essays that will be tested every year and I think they've been about 70% accurate. Of course focus on all the topics, but I gave a little extra attention to their predictions.
- The MBE Goat:
https://www.amazon.com/Multistate-Goat- ... 1490943498 This is where I got my strategy for practicing for the MBE and it also has all the OPTs in it. Sadly, it's gone up in price by like $30 since I got it, so if anyone wants mine please feel free to reach out.
Reviews of Other Resources:
-Barbri: I used this my first time and failed... but I did mention I didn't give myself enough time on top of never having taken some of the hardest topics in law school (like BA, Wills/Trusts, Community Property, etc). I still don't know if this was the best or most efficient tool for me. I did not buy it this time around, but used the MBE problems again.
Pros: Most of the lecturers are really interesting and funny. There is a ton of material and many resources for different learning styles. I liked the MBE book as it was shorter single-topic sets that progressively get harder, so it was good for me early in my studies the second time to practice improving at one topic at a time.
Cons: They don't have quite enough MBE problems to get to where you need to be in my opinion. I think they have just barely 1000 if I remember correctly. I also feel like although they have an abundance of resources for studying, they push ALL of them on you and it makes studying really inefficient and makes you stuck feeling like you're always behind or feeling like you have to complete tasks that aren't helping you. Also, I was very disappointed in their sample essay answers. They are not nearly detailed enough to get the passing score you need or at least to do above average. If you use them, I recommend always looking up the model essay answer on the CA Bar website.
-BarMax: I bought BarMax this time around as I wanted the comfort of a full review course without paying thousands. I wrote the public interest essay for their public interest scholarship (really just a 1-2 page personal statement) and was able to get the whole course for $500. Pros: they had a ton of problems, but more than anyone could realistically do even if they started 4 months in advance. They only used model answers and they compiled PDFs of the essays with the models answers in two formats: by year and one format by topic type, which had every question and model answer asked on that topic back to 2002. Even though you can definitely get all that online, it would take a long time to download all the PDFs and merge them into one PDF like that. I liked that every time I was stuck on writing about a topic, I could just CTRL + F the document for that issue and see exactly how it had been broken down in essay responses in the past and get a feel for the formula that was graded most highly. I also liked the essay writing workshop lecture. Cons: I thought the MBEs had sparse answers and I didn't like doing them online. I also thought the lectures were not that great on average and the notes cannot be printed unless you hand-type them, which was annoying. I also noticed a few errors in statements of law in the outlines.
-Flash Cards (Critical Pass and Bar in a Flash): I am not a flash card person, but decided to give some commercial ones a try since many people swore by them. Here are my feelings on the two I bought (I bought two because I liked the format of Critical Pass better, but they didn't have state topics and Bar in a Flash did, and it was actually cheaper just to get the whole set rather than individual topics).
For
Critical Pass, I really liked the format and found it really organized, but had a couple qualms. 1) it was really like a mini outline on each major topic crammed into a flash card, and if you are a major flash card person, I don't see this working well for memorization. It was nice if I was unfamiliar with one topic to just find that flash card and read everything major I needed to know about it, but I couldn't just memorize it that way. 2) I felt like there were some heavily tested rules that were missing or discussed in minimal detail.
For
Bar in a Flash, I liked that there were smaller chunks of rules at a time, which was much more digestible for those who want to use them in the traditional flash card way. I did have some problems with these cards however. 1) I found quite a few errors in statement of the rules whereas I really didn't see any obvious errors on Critical Pass. This made me waste a lot of time looking up the law to confirm my suspicion was correct. 2) I felt it was actually slightly more detailed than needed and sometimes had you memorizing rules that didn't seem like they'd ever been tested.
Personally, flash cards in general are not helpful for me. I recognize that I'm the kind of person who memorizes better with a self-made brain map/flow chart because I internalize it better when it's in my own handwriting and because, at least for essays, I really need to see how the rules are interrelated to best issue spot rather than see small chunks of rules at a time - all this does for me is confuse issues and miss the big picture. So while I read through all these cards a couple times to jog my memory, I didn't find them the most critical piece of my personal success and turned away from them as soon as I realized they were not helping. Happy to sell them to anyone who would find them useful though!
-Strategies and Tactics for the MBE (Emmanuel's):
https://www.amazon.com/Strategies-Tacti ... dpSrc=srch I thought the outlines (which are really just filled with tips a tricks on how to approach each topic) were immensely helpful and I noticed a major improvement in my score in a topic every time I read one of these outlines before doing a problem set. I didn't end up doing all the problems because I felt they seemed less realistic and by the time I turned to this resource it was late in my studies, but I do think it would still be good preparation because they have VERY lengthy explanations for wrong and right answers and provide really good insight on how to think about the problem, it's not just a statement of the rule of law.
-Essay Writing for the California Bar Exam:
https://www.amazon.com/Essay-Exam-Writi ... Bar+essays Similar to the resource above, I really liked this book specifically for their outlines. The outlines really broke down all the essential rules of law in a manner that mirrored how I needed to spit them out on a test. I did like the way the answers were broken down into bullet point format for issue spotting and then there was a full written answer too. Similar to my issue with Barbri for essays, however, I did not think the sample answers were even half-way detailed enough to get a high score on the essays. Possibly just enough for a passing score, but it's really important to be shooting for the best so you can land somewhere safe if you don't quite reach that, rather than prepare for mediocre. If you do use this resource, I recommend looking up the model answer too on the CA Bar website.
I hope this helps!
