What should first-year law students know about grading?
Every law professor grades a little bit (or a lot) differently. If you haven’t already asked your professor how they evaluate you, immediately find someone who was smart enough to ask. Some professors want you to cite cases and compare facts, some just want you to know rules and see how you apply them. Does the professor subtract points for wrong answers or irrelevant tangents? Do they expect a clear, tightly-written exam, or are they more tolerant of rambling? That would affect your strategy. What should students do if they just draw a blank and panic? I suffered through exams once, too. I’ve had that happen and I was a decent exam-taker. I think if you studied, you should take a deep breath, remind yourself that the material you learned is somewhere on the test, and start looking for issues. Focus on the big topics. Run through the course sequence in your brain and look at the test again — and start with the questions, not the facts. If you didn’t study, or didn’t study properly, I t
