Secrets of the Sections

OMG! Guess what I found out!? Hm. Probably shouldn't have given the answer to that in the blog title.... Anyway, so I know this former CWSL professor and I was venting about this whole grading bullshit and he says something to the extent of "Yeah, sounds like something they'd pull." My curiosity piqued, I employed subtle techniques of information gathering learned through years of study and experience:

So, section 1(the section I was in) is characterized by a high number of scholarship recipients. Quite a percentage of us had scholarships. And we had the hardest professors, "Hello, Yeager" (Speaking of Yeager, did you know that when he first started in the '90's, Yeager had long blond hair ?)

HELLLLOOOOOO, DANNY!

So, yes, turns out the Section 1 students were marked by a bunch of scholarships. A bunch of BIG scholarships. I'm sure there are plenty of us that chose CWSL based upon said scholarship. Truth be known, even though I had my eyes on CWSL for some time now, I was torn between CWSL and another "more-reputable" school. But, one cannot argue over a 50% or 75% tuition discount.

But here's the catch: CWSL loses a bunch of money by tempting students with all these scholarships: How do they recoup their money? Set up section 1 students with the most difficult professors who give closed-book, closed note exams.

A good number of those students are bound to drop out and/or reapply and pay full tuition without the benefit of their scholarships. Think about it - you've spent all this money, thus far, just to get dropped. Then, to reapply to CWSL (cuz no other school will take you at this point) you have to take your entire 1L over at full-cost.

"

"It's unfair and irregular to set it up this way, but Cal Western seems to get away with it." he explains. Most law schools have open book/open note exam policy. That is why so much emphasis is placed upon outlines. You're supposed to be able to bring them in as your notes for the exam. The decision is left to the individual professor, with whatever pressure the law school wishes to place upon them, to decide whether or not to have open note exams.

"Apparently," I explain to Professor Cooper* "Cal Western had open note exams. At least the professors I had used to. They all said the same thing, though. That former students who had taken the bar exam wished that Cal Western had closed book/closed note to better prepare them for the bar exam." The second it came out of my mouth, I realized how stupid it sounded.

*obviously names have been changed to protect whatever

Cooper looked at me incredulously, "Like the previous 15 years of taking closed book exams didn't prepare you enough for it? Trust me, it's not the fact that Cal Western has open book exams that didn't adequately prepare them."

FOR THOSE OF YOU WHO CARE ABOUT RANKINGS

The difference between the sections got me thinking...."Aren't we being ranked amongst the entire class? So, if I'm in Section 1 and I have to memorize everything about freehold estates - and someone else is in Section 3, and they could use friggin notes and their goddamned textbook, that hardly seems fair. I mean, as far as grades go, fine, we're still graded on a curve only to the others in our particular course - but the ranking is against our entire 1L class. That doesn't seem right...