Post bar life

A few photos from the last week:

Because I live in Tacoma and the bar is in Bellevue, I got a hotel room for the bar and Ray shared it with me. The week before, consumed by stress, we both decided to go a day early so we could try to have a couple of uninterrupted nights' sleep before the exam (something about 3-year-olds and sleep doesn't mix, apparently). Here's how we spent the day before the bar:



Here's a photo from Megan's facebook page -- I certainly didn't have the presence of mind to take a picture, but yes, this is the room where 800 people sweated out the bar for three days:



Afterward we had friends over to our hotel room for champagne. Ray's husband came with her daughters, wearing T-shirts her law firm had made for them:



Friday, I took the kids out for ice cream IN THE MIDDLE OF A WEEKDAY -- scandalous! -- and took this picture, which I emailed to my husband at work to make him jealous. It worked.



Ahh, post-bar life. Nothing to do but clean the house to unearth three years worth of crap, punctuated by trips to the local frozen custard stand. And beer! How I've missed you, beer. Life is good.

Barbri/Rigos/Tesdahl

How to choose a bar prep course? Here are a few thoughts on what I observed the last few weeks of Barbri v. Rigos. I hope others will add their comments and corrections, too. (I think Tesdahl is great too, by the way -- I have a neighbor who did it a few years ago -- but I don't know anyone who used it recently.)

Overall, my conclusion was that I wished I'd done Rigos. I think you can pass with either course. But the Rigos method seemed less stress inducing. I heard from both Barbri and Rigos studets who noticed the difference. Plus, Rigos sent encouraging, pump-em-up type messages in the day before the bar and held a party afterward. Not that you should base your decision on the availability of alcohol afterward, but it seems emblematic of the attitude.

• Both courses consist generally of listening to lectures, outlining and taking practice exams.
• Lectures are by SU or UW professors, by local specialists or (for Barbri) a couple of people who go around the country giving specialized lectures. Hard to guess which course had better lecturers -- they both seemed to have some great ones (Rigos has Donaldson, Barbri has Calandrillo) and some not-so-great ones.
• Rigos focuses a lot on outlining. Students are recommended to spend about five hours a day outlining, and three hours taking practice exams.
• Rigos is heavy on mnemonic devices. Barbri has few mnemonics other than the ones you've heard already (OCEAN, etc).
• Barbri focuses more on taking practice exams. Barbri recommends two hours a day outlining, and then practice exams until you collapse from exhaustion. (It's only been a few days since the bar and I've already forgotten the daily study schedule, how awesome is that?)
• Rigos had 26 graded essays, Barbri had 21. Barbri's feedback was handwritten, Rigos came through email. Lots of good feedback either way.
• Both programs have practice questions that are actual bar questions released by the bar association in past years, and include a sample passing answer, also released by the bar. Barbri also includes a "model answer" for the first 4-6 essay questions of each type. Rigos does not. The model answers are a mixed blessing. They include almost every point you could think of to address in the question. This is good if you want to learn to be thorough, and we all want to pass, so we all want to be thorough, right? However, it also can be discouraging if you didn't get all the points, or drive you absolutely nuts if you're trying to drive yourself to learn everything. As an example, I took a practice question on a subject I'd studied pretty thoroughly, and compared my answer to the model answer, and felt like a complete failure because I'd missed half the points. Then I compared my answer to the sample passing answer and felt like a law savant.
• Both curricula have you turn in sample essays periodically to be graded. The schedules are different, but I couldn't say which is better.
• With either program, the real key is figuring out how you memorize the best. (Not learn. Memorize.) That might be flashcards, speaking aloud, repeated test-taking, rote repetition... you pretty much have to figure that out on your own.

What else, y'all?

Graduation photos

Hey PALS, graduation photos, finally! I don't have many pix from graduation but the few I have are posted below. If anyone has more please feel free to add them or email them to me and I'll post them.

Ray thought to bring her camera on stage, clever woman, and snapped these of her, me, Louis and Laura just as we were about to cross the stage:

Karen and Nathan after the ceremony: (I stole this off Facebook)

Laura and Allegra:

These are the professional photographer's pix of me with my daughters getting their pretend diplomas, and Louis posing on stage with his son:

The ceremony itself was great (for me, anyway -- my 3-year-old was trying my husband's patience, but I knew nothing of that, blissfully partying on stage with my buddies). At times the speeches seemed to run a tad long, but actually the ceremony ended right on time. Dean Hicks was a great emcee, I really liked him and thought, dang, I should've taken a class from that guy.

Tips for next year's 3Ls: Dress as light as you can because those robes get HOT under the lights. Carry a little passport wallet with your camera (and a snack! I would've passed out if not for Ray's Luna bar). If you're going to have your kids walk with you, when you are lining up back stage, finagle your way to the front so you can walk across early, so your kids don't have to wait around until the end of the ceremony. Mine walked the stage with me, then my husband took them straight out to the lobby to play until the ceremony was over.

And, by the way, note of appreciation for our administration -- I have a friend at Gonzaga, and there, kids aren't ALLOWED on stage at graduation. Man!