Abraham Lincoln said, "Always bear in mind that your
own resolution to succeed is more important than anything
else."
FROM BARWRITE®: HOW TO MANAGE TIME ON THE NEW YORK DAY
OF THE NEW YORK BAR EXAMINATION
The time structure for the New York day of the New York
bar examination is your lifeline for excelling on the bar
exam. Focus on time. Grip your external time cues,
including your watches, your clocks, and your notes to
yourself that tell you when each part of the exam will
begin and end. Time is key. The structure of the exam is
time.
Avoid thinking about constructs in your own mind, like
your lifetime goals. Avoid thinking about family fights.
Avoid noticing events in the outside world, like the
actions of your seatmate or the activities of the
proctors. Your structure is time.
MORNING SESSION: 9am - 12:15pm. The morning session is
three hours and 15 minutes long. It begins at 9am and
ends at 12:15pm. There will be 50 New York multiple
choice questions (NYMC) and three New York essay
questions. Stay on time. Keep a steady flow of
raisins or other small fruits moving through your
system for fuel. Nothing crunchy, please.
NEW YORK MULTIPLE CHOICE: 9am - 10am. Start with the
NYMC, and move through the questions, one foot in
front of the other, at a steady pace. Treat the NYMC
with respect, but do not dally. I suggest that in order
to have 45 minutes available for each essay, you should
allow 60 minutes for the 50 NYMC, finishing at 10am.
That is 1.2 minutes per NYMC question, or three-tenths
of a minute less than the New York Board of Law
Examiners suggests. Do use all 60 minutes, but do not
go over time. Do not second-guess yourself. Keep
moving. Promptly at 10am, switch to the first essay
question.
FIRST NEW YORK ESSAY: 10am - 10:45am. Pick up the first
question in your packet, whatever it is. Forget about
trying to pick an essay that is easy for you. Just begin
with the first essay question. You have a production job
here, producing paragraphs, so get in position on the
assembly line and execute your job. At 10am, start reading
and outlining. At 10:15am, start writing on the first page
in your test booklet. You will spend five or six minutes
on each paragraph. Finish the first essay at 10:45am.
Remember. You must stay on time. If you are not finished
by 10:45am, do something drastic. Put together whatever
law, facts, and conclusions you can, jam it all into
one sentence, and write it on the page. Bits of blood,
hair, nails, are fine. Just finish. Get out of there!
SECOND NEW YORK ESSAY: 10:45am - 11:30am. At 10:45am,
start reading and outlining the second essay. At 11am,
start writing on the first page in your test booklet.
Finish the second essay at 11:30am.
Remember. You must stay on time. Bits of blood, hair,
nails, anything! Just finish. Get out of there!
THIRD NEW YORK ESSAY: 11:30am - 12:15pm. At 11:30am,
start reading and outlining the third essay. At 11:45am,
start writing on the first essay page in your test
booklet. Finish the third essay at 12:15pm.
Remember. You must stay on time. Bits of blood, hair,
nails, anything! Just finish. Get out of there!
LUNCH: 12:15pm - 1:30pm. Remember to Eat the Right
Food.
AFTERNOON SESSION: 1:30pm - 4:30pm. The afternoon session
is three hours long. It begins at 1:30pm and ends at
4:30pm. There will be two New York essay questions
and one Multistate Performance Test (MPT). Remember. The
exam is about sticking to your time structure. Time is
your lifeline. Check your watches before you begin
the afternoon session.
FOURTH NEW YORK ESSAY: 1:30pm -2:15pm. At 1:30pm, start
reading and outlining the fourth essay. At 1:45pm, start
writing on the first essay page in your test booklet,
five to six minutes per paragraph. Finish the fourth
essay at 2:15pm.
Remember. You must stay on time. Throw in bits of blood,
hair, nails, anything! Just finish. Get out of there!
FIFTH NEW YORK ESSAY: 2:15pm - 3pm. At 2:15pm, start reading
and outlining the fifth essay. At 2:30pm, start writing on
the first essay page in your test booklet, five to six
minutes per paragraph. Finish the fifth essay at 3pm.
Remember. You must stay on time. Throw in bits of blood,
hair, nails, anything! Just finish. Get out of there!
MULTISTATE PERFORMANCE TEST (MPT): 3PM - 4:30PM. The MPT
is entirely about following directions and managing time.
At 3pm start tearing apart the Partner Memo into the little
bits of information and analysis that the partner wants to
find in your work product, and outline your task. Do
your research. Write your headnotes in your test booklet.
No later than 3:35pm, start to write your MPT task. Leave
the first page of the test booklet blank. See below.
Make sure that you place ample landmarks at the tops of
the pages in your work product. Use headnotes, numbers,
and letters, so that the grader can see by looking at your
page what is going on in there.
At 4:25pm, take the last five minutes to write the opening
page and closing page of your work product. Go back over
the partner memo for one last reading, checking to make
certain that you have done everything the partner asked
you to do. Review the format. Make sure that a memo has
memo format, a brief has brief format, etc.
Finish the MPT at 4:30pm.
CONGRATULATIONS! You've completed the New York day, and
you've done it on time!
***
AFTERWARDS, send BarWrite® a brief email, please. Let us hear how it goes. Staff@BarWrite.com.
Tell your friends about BarWrite®.
We're rooting for you.
Wishing you the greatest success on the bar exam,
MCG
