by Imran Malek, 🐤twitter.com/imran_malek

<aside> 📆 Update 2020-04-11-1930: Initial publishing

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• Table of Contents (click the > to expand)

Introduction

Well, it's time. Your (online) law school semester has come to an end; and you're about to confront something you may have never experienced before - a law school take-home exam. A take-home exam is an entirely different beast from a "traditional" exam. You have no proctor, you (likely) have complete access to your computer and the internet, and you likely have much more time to complete the exam.

This isn't going to be a cakewalk, however. You're going to need learn and apply a different set of skills to make it out the other side. At least you don't have to deal with a commute in order to faceplant into your bed after your exam!

A law student after they upload their take-home exam response (image via Daily Mail)

Who this is for

This guide is generally geared to law students who have never taken take-home exams before. If you already know your way around a take-home exam (and you already have a system that works for you), feel free to use the table of contents above and bounce around to sections that you might feel interested in reviewing.

<aside> ⚠️ This guide is meant to offer advice and ideas on a system that might work for you. If you already know what works for you then trust your gut - don't let me tell you how to live your life!

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Exam Preparation

While there is a smorgasbord of material online on the topic of "how to prepare for a law school exam", here's a checklist that you might want to use in the weeks leading up to your take-home exam:

• Things to ask your professor:
  • [ ] How much time are we going to have to write the exam?
  • [ ] How much time should we take in order to write the exam? (Professors often give way more time than they think you'd need to finish take-home exams).
  • [ ] How will the exam question be structured (e.g. one long fact pattern, short answer, multiple choice. etc.)?
  • [ ] Is there a particular way we should write our answers? (e.g. IRAC, bullet points, etc.)
  • [ ] How do you expect us to utilize cases that we read? Should we cite them directly? What should the citation format be?
  • [ ] What secondary materials (e.g. Constitution, Model Penal Code, UCC) should we have in front of us while taking the exam?
• Things to ask your school's registrar (assuming your registrar handles exam administration):
  • [ ] What credentials do I need in order to login and download the exam?
  • [ ] If I have errors uploading the exam, what should I do?
  • [ ] How should I label and name my exam?
  • [ ] What format should I upload the exam as? (word/pdf/text/etc.)
  • [ ] How will I know how much time I have left while taking the exam?

Your desktops and you

When working on a take-home exam, you've got two "desktops" to think about. Your physical desktop, where your computer rests as you take the exam, and your digital desktop, where all your windows, icons, and digital tools are organized.

Your physical desktop

Getting the word out

While acknowledging that this is a luxury that some may not have, you should do your best to communicate to everyone that you're sharing your living/working space with that you'll be working on an exam and that you accordingly won't be available. Make it clear that the fact that you're on on your computer doesn't mean that you'll be as accessible as you usually are. This is especially important if you have friends/family members that you keep up with on social media/messaging applications who may wonder or worry why you've gone offline for an extended period. Make sure to let people know what you're up to!