This is 4 of 10 posts on exams, also known as “The Exam Series,” created by collaborators Amanda Bynum (Professor of Practice, Law | Director, Bar & Academic Success | The University of Arizona, James E. Rogers College of Law); Shane Dizon (Associate Professor of Academic Success | Director, Academic Success Program | Brooklyn Law School); Halle B. Hara (Professor and Director of the Academic Success Program | Capital University Law School); Jacquelyn Rogers (Associate Professor of Law | Academic Success & Bar Preparation | Southwestern Law School); and Sarira A. Sadeghi (The Sam & Ash Director of Academic Achievement | Dale E. Fowler School of Law at Chapman University).
Whether you are working with a hard copy of your course outline or an electronic one, there are some effective organizational strategies you can employ. Options include the following:
Create a table of contents for your outline. Using a table of contents will allow you to quickly flip (if using a hard copy) or click (if using an electronic copy—you can hyperlink the page numbers in your table of contents) to the legal issue that you need without wasting any time. What follows is a sample table of contents from a Constitutional Law course. In reviewing this example, note how the table of contents can also serve as a concise checklist of the larger legal issues that might be tested on the final exam, as well as the sub-issues that flow from the larger legal issue.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Incorporation……1
Equal Protection……2
Suspect Classification Analysis……2
Discriminatory Purpose Rule……2
Strict Scrutiny……3
Race/National Origin……3
Examples……4
Alienage Classifications……10
Exceptions to the General Rule……11
Rational Basis Review……12
Persons with Disabilities……13
Create and use labeled tabs. Related to your table of contents, you may also find that using labeled tabs on your outline (if you intend to have a printed copy of your outline) will also help you flip to issues much more quickly.
Consider setting up your outline in an essay exam template format. Consider setting up your outline in a fashion that complements an organizational paradigm like IRAC. For example, you might have your rule statements written out exactly as you wish to state them on the final exam. You can further break down sub-issues and/or factors to ensure that you completely and thoroughly discuss the entire issue on the final exam.
Determine if your professor would like to see case comparisons and distinctions. If your professor would like to see case comparisons and distinctions used in an essay exam, consider writing concise case parentheticals in your outline, so that you are prepared to do the same on the final. Try to keep them to 1-3 sentences. Here is one example:
(See McCleskey, where a criminal defendant who was sentenced to death alleged capital sentencing process administered in a racially discriminatory manner).