My second article from the orientation week edition...
Are you a first year law student? Do you feel overwhelmed
by the reading load, the wankers wearing suits asking questions in five parts,
the overexcited lecturers, the pyjama wearing Ja’mie impersonators, or the fact that law is dry, boring and just
plain sucks? Well don’t worry, with this one weird old tip you’ll be coasting
to credits in no time.
Throw away the reading brick, the lecture recordings, the
textbook and tell all the overenthusiastic law nerds to go back to the library,
because all you need to do is get someone
else’s summary.
Most law courses come down to a final exam, and most
final exams are open book, so all you really need is a good summary. Now it
won’t do to get a perfect summary, because those are usually very short and to
the point. What you need is a diligent summary—something that summarises all
the course material into 100 pages or so.
You then take this gorgeous summary and turn it into a
lean, mean, flowchart laden, problem solving machine for the exam. In the
process, you’ll learn all the important stuff. In the exam, you will get the
cheap marks that come from knowing the fundamentals of the course – all the stuff
that makes you employable – while the law library crowd try desperately to cram
in one more reference to an esoteric judgement they came across in their
fiftieth hour of study in week two.
Now please note, don’t go getting that summary when the
exam period starts – that’s a little too close for comfort. Grab it at the
start of semester from one of those latter year students who haven’t heard of
strategic studying (do thank them properly for it – they are doing you an
enormous service). Lectures aren’t very important, but tutorials are. Your
summary will allow you to ace them without having to churn through pages of obit and hours of lecturer blather.
Will this technique get you a high distinction? Hell no!
Didn’t you hear? The law school bell curve is vicious – only 2 per cent of students
get a high distinction. For that you need to become one of those creepers who
hide books in the law library to get an edge over the competition.
But the law school is bound by the same demand-driven funding
model as the rest of the university – the more fails, the less dollars in
school pockets. So the credit zone of the curve is mighty fat. Snuggle into
that curve and sleep right through your 9am lecture. Your summary will tell you
everything you need to know.
Comments
Post a Comment