Being There

Well my original goal was to update this blog at least every other day with a post that didn’t just chronicle my daily life but instead discussed something more substantial. The only problem with this is that I’ve started my bar review course in preparation for taking the Oregon Bar in July, and all of my free time has suddenly disappeared! Well, not entirely, but spending my free time on things other than exercising, hanging out with my boyfriend, or playing with my cats makes me feel guilty. You’re lucky I decided to work through the pain and write up this post, reader(s)! Ha.

Anyway, I thought I’d share a little bit about just what it’s like to take one of these $2500 (that’s right) bar review courses. The company that runs the course, Bar/Bri, is very protective of their “monopoly” on the process of studying for the bar. It’s an unspoken rule of law school that you pretty much have to take a review course to pass, though some rebels try to go it on their own. And I put “monopoly” in quotes above because not only is Bar/Bri pretty much the only option, but the company is getting sued in court for antitrust violations. Unfortunately I didn’t sign up for the course in time to be part of that class action.

Other protective measures by Bar/Bri include requiring identification to enter the class each day, and requiring a hefty deposit for their books, which you can recover only by returning all the books to them at the end of the course. They say this is for recycling purposes, but obviously it’s so the materials don’t get out there on the free market very often. And the books are really the most valuable part of the course. Outlines of every subject you need to know, and loads of practice questions both essay and multiple choice, are really the key to memorizing and learning enough to actually pass the bar.

Another funny thing about bar review is that not all the classes (we have one every morning for about 3.5 hours) are taught by live professors. The past two days I’ve been taught criminal law and procedure by a guy named Professor Whitebread who spoke to me via a large projection screen. He liked to refer to us as “all you out there in tape-land.” And surprisingly, he was exceptionally entertaining for a lecturer on law. The tape seemed to perfectly capture his weird mannerisms and the funny way he growled out “burglary” or “plain view.” I’m hoping the rest of our taped lectures live up to Ol’ Whitebread (seriously, what kind of name is Whitebread? Is that weird or common?).

Bar/Bri not only gives us books and classes to attend, but they also give us a detailed study schedule to follow. The suggested study time is at least 8 to 12 hours a day (including class). Yikes! I’ve never studied that much in my life, and I’m not hitting that mark now, but hopefully I’ll be getting that much done around midway through the course. I’m picturing hitting some sort of comfortable yet intense studying stride somewhere around the beginning of June. But I’ve already learned to reschedule the homework around what I need to do to balance out the study in my life (play soccer! watch TV! go shopping!). And I think the real key to this whole “intense two months of studying for the most important exam of your life” is keeping things balanced and not freaking out! For this I’m thankful that I’m not a type-A perfectionist. Whitebread finished his lecture today by telling us that only a “glib understanding of the topic” is required to pass the bar, and I’m going to take that statement for all that it’s worth. 

Well that was particularly boring, but informative, perhaps? Anyway, I’ll try to keep the updates coming but don’t get used to any sort of pattern because who knows how much time I’ll have until after July 30th. :)