December 6th 2008: Boalt Sleeplessness Week
The Changina Blog echoed sentiments common to Boalt 2/3L's this week: What's with all the take-homes?
My understanding is that because the Boalt construction schedule calls for massive demolition over Winter Break, the school has encouraged professors of non-1L classes to avoid in-class exams. I suspect the plan was to shoo as many proctored exams out of the building as possible, front-load exam week with 1L classes, and hopefully milk a few extra days of demolition out of the whole affair. (I envision DE on December 16th, personally grinding through the courtyard in a D9 Caterpillar with a hard hat, a maniacal grin, and an unshakable bead on the stinky trees. Exactly how unrealistic is that?)
Anyway, take-home exams are misery-generators. Sleeplessness week, here we come.
My understanding is that because the Boalt construction schedule calls for massive demolition over Winter Break, the school has encouraged professors of non-1L classes to avoid in-class exams. I suspect the plan was to shoo as many proctored exams out of the building as possible, front-load exam week with 1L classes, and hopefully milk a few extra days of demolition out of the whole affair. (I envision DE on December 16th, personally grinding through the courtyard in a D9 Caterpillar with a hard hat, a maniacal grin, and an unshakable bead on the stinky trees. Exactly how unrealistic is that?)
Anyway, take-home exams are misery-generators. Sleeplessness week, here we come.
Labels: Exams
posted by Patrick Bageant at 6:08 AM
22 Comments:
I agree. Our only hope is that professors limit them in hours. Like 5 or 6 hours. Or possibly 10. But 12, you have to compete for grades with people who WILL stay up all night working on it.
I meant "But 24" instead of "But 12" above. 24-hour exams are where people will stay up all night to finish them. Professors think they're giving us flexibility--we already have flexibility to download it whenever we want.
I can say anonymously that I had a 24-hour take home last year that I spent about 12 hours on. Anecdotally, I've heard that just about everyone else spent 18-22 hours. (At least everyone else I've talked to.) And I now know I performed better than at least 60 percent of the class. (I'll let you figure out what that means.)
Moral of the story: more time and less sleep does not necessarily a better grade make. (And no, I'm not one of those freakishly smart, head-in-the-clouds types that Berring talks about. At least not that I know of...)
Really - 24 hr take homes should be banned.
A big thanks to J*hn St*ele for electing to go with the 8-hour take-home.
thanks for posting. that is fucking ridiculous that the construction is leading to a change in pedagogy. i can handle construction affecting where i have class, but it affecting how i'm graded is just too much. what about family or religious obligations?
i am a 3L, and I am NOT happy about this at all.
could they do a takehome that has the same time limits as a regular exam (i.e. four hours)?
oh, and that same 3L here - i spent 22 hours on a 24 hour takehome. to use the prior posters shorthand, i did better than 90% of the class but nearly killed myself doing it.
I don't think this is such a bad thing. First, Profs CAN select a specific time limit. e.g. immigration law last fall had a four hour take-home. So, profs can give the same test they would have given.
I think one of the biggest problems with our in-class exam system is that there is a good possibility that people have to take tests on consecutive days or otherwise in close succession. This seems to me like a fairly large competitive disadvantage. But, if we have mostly take-homes then people all have basically the same amount of prep time between exams.
I absolutely HATE takehomes. Especially 24 hour ones. I once had a 24 hr takehome that took me 17 hours, and I am most definitely not one of those people who was spending that much time on it to get a better grade. It really just took me that long.
I just really hope the profs don't make their exams any longer than they otherwise would solely b/c they know they can give us more time. Really, it's torture.
What I hate about take-homes is word limits. They are done so that you can't just write for 24 hours but what do is force you to pick and choose your argument. Your grade becomes not what issues you could spot or how well you could argue back and forth but instead if you could pick the issues the professor cared the most about.
It punishes creative/innovative thinking....
Then Local Rules downright murder creative/innovative thinking. Are you guys serious? Really? Whining about take homes?
Armen, don't you have work you're supposed to be doing? Only *your* whining is legit?
I'll demur on the former. On the latter, I whine about important things such as crossing over messages from facebook to gchat. Oh and if you spend more than 6 hours on a take-home exam (plus or minus an hour the next day to proofread/revise) you're a neurotic little nerd who has no place at Boalt. How's that for whining? Discuss.
Haha, Armen I'm calling BS. There is no WAY you never spent more than 6 hours on a 24 hour take-home.
No way.
(But you are right about local rules.)
Uh, yeah you'll lose. But I did say 6 hours +/- 1 hour the next day. I never had any issues limiting my studying/exam prep to what was essential. Those who can't limit themselves are like 2:34 above, often found in the library.
And WTF do you write about after 6 hours? I only took that long to read the material that I had never bothered to read during the class. (Sorry Buxie). What the hell could you possibly write? "It was the best of times, it was the blurst of times?" These exams aren't any longer than in class ones. Why would you lose any sleep? What's wrong with you people? Who are you? Where are my Boalties?
To be clear, my comment is true for all take home exams...first year and beyond. My first ever was Crim with Doc Brown. Back then the take home exams worked differently. You could not download the exam, you had to physically pick it up and return it 24 hours later. But Prof Frowning-Eyebrows limited us to 4 hours during that 24 hour period. I took my 4. Rumors swirled about some collaborating, or taking more than 4. But whatever. I think spending more than 4 hours discussing criminal prosecutions resulting from a Michigan-UT bar brawl is punishment enough.
Armen, you clearly didn't take Patent Law with Merges. That's the only 24 hour take home of which I'm aware that basically requires at least 16 hours work. Many people worked through the night for that class.
But I don't think it's whining to point out that encouraging take homes may not be the best approach. Forcing students to memorize the law and write exams under high pressure situations may be one way that Boalt can improve its CA bar passage rate. In my entire time at Boalt, I had only two closed book in-class exams.
Recent graduate here:
I agree with the general sentiment that 24hr take homes are not the best way to do all of the 2L and 3L exams. I refused to stay up the whole time for the few I had and I, perhaps arrogantly, think they cost me a higher grade:) Personally, I prefer the shorter time take home exams, but maybe that is just because I did better on them.
I am curious, is Fletcher going to do a take home? That was a brutal exam, such a race horse. I can't imagine it as a take home.
Also, having at least completed, but not necessarily having *passed* the bar, I think in class exams are good practice for the big test.
Fletcher announced on the first day that he'll be probably be giving a take-home exam--although he seemed reluctant about it.
Couldn't we just have exams in other buidlings? I don't particularly care about taking my exams in boalt.
Yeah, why not do exams in other buildings?
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