Posted by Orin Kerr:
Law Professor Takes on Law School Exams:
Northwestern Law Prof [1]Steve Lubet, who I believe runs the clinical
programs at Northwestern, has an article in the [2]American Lawyer
arguing that traditional law school essay exams are in need of major
reform:
There is almost nothing about the typical law school examination
that is really designed to test the skills involved in law
practice. And many aspects of exams are positively perverse. Take
time pressure, for example. By their nature, exams are
time-limited, usually to about three or four hours, during which it
is necessary to assess the problems, decide on the answers, marshal
the material (whether strictly from memory or from an "open book"),
and then write, hopefully, coherent answers. There is no
opportunity for reflection, research, reconsideration or
redrafting. You simply dash off your answer and hope you got it
right.
He continues:
The dirty secret (if it is a secret) is that law schools rely on
exams primarily because they are easy to grade. The intense time
pressure guarantees that the answers will be relatively short and,
even more important, that quality will differ significantly. Exams
do a great job of dividing test takers into measurable categories,
even if those categories measure nothing more than an ability to
take tests in an artificial, nonlawyerly setting.
I have worried a lot about about this same dynamic, although I don't
think the situation is quite as bad as Lubet suggests. I suspect the
reason for the traditional dominance of in-class three-hour law school
exams is less the need to generate short and varied answers than it is
to limit opportunities for cheating. Take-home exams give students the
opportunity to reflect at length on their answers, in a way that is a
bit more like most types of legal practice. But take-home exams also
create a window for unethical students to bend (or break) the rules.
With that said, I don't know why law schools couldn't increase the
amount of time allowed for in-class exams and then impose word limits
on answers. Most law students take their in-class exams on laptops
these days, which would make the shift to word limits easy to
administer. This approach would be fairer for students who perform
less well in the highly pressured atmosphere of a three-hours exam,
and wouldn't impose a substantial burden on professors.
Any thoughts? Should law schools switch from traditional three-hour
in-class exams to five-hour or six-hour in-class exams with word
limits on answers? I am assuming the exams are open book (which I
think is the most common approach, and obviously the approach that
most closely resembles legal practice).
I have enabled comments. Thanks to [3]CrimProf Blog for the link.
References
1. http://www.law.nwu.edu/faculty/clinic/Lubet/Lubet.html
2.
http://www.law.com/servlet/ContentServer?pagename=OpenMarket/Xcelerate/View&c=LawArticle&cid=1109859525933&t=StudentArticle
3.
http://lawprofessors.typepad.com/crimprof_blog/2005/03/northwestern_la.html
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