Welcome to NLP!

Welcome to the Naked Law Professor (NLP) Blog. This a forum that will provide naked, no holds barred insight about law school success and strategies from a law professor’s perspective. I have a background in teaching across the law school curriculum; I also have a background in bar exam preparation.

For those of you who will begin law school in the fall, congratulations! You are beginning a new adventure, and with it will come a rollercoaster of experiences. Take this summer to get yourself into the mindset of dedicating blocks of hours to studying, but also find time to carve out time to reset. Building a support system and a routine of self-care can impact law school success, so now is the time to put people and routines in place. Future posts will include tips on case briefing, note-taking, and outlining.

Also, check for=>    Thoughts on Law School Mindset

For those of you studying for the bar exam, remember the cliché that this is a marathon and not a sprint. Ideally you should already be in a bar prep course; those courses should have begun by now. Stay on top of the schedule your respective course assigned. It is easy to fall behind and then difficult to catch up. Reserve a couple of hours a day to regroup. That can be exercise, lunch with a friend, or some other brief activity. Avoid losing too much time on social media – it can be a black hole time suck. Also, I recognize that July 4th is universally recognized by bar takers as the date after which things get serious, but take that advice with a grain of salt. You should be keeping up with questions during the entire study process. There is a reason that commercial bar prep companies create an intense schedule throughout the summer; you will need that time! Believe me, you do not want to play an intense game of catch up after July 4th. I wrote a song for my students that basically sums it up!

All bar exams include the Multistate Bar Examination (multiple choice) and essay portions, but most states – and the Uniform Bar Exam – also include the Multistate Performance Test. I will discuss the respective portions of the bar exam in more detail in future posts; I will also occasionally share bar study tips that I include when I tutor students for the bar exam (https://legallywrite.org/).

I have been a law professor for many years at many law schools, so this blog is a way for me to share some of the wisdom I have acquired in that capacity; it is also a way for me to substantively address some of the frequently asked questions I regularly answer about law school. Over the last several years, I host sessions where I invite upper-class students to share their experience and insight with my 1Ls. Much to my amusement, in the last couple of years, students have coined those sessions “Pindergarten Sessions.”

I will post again soon, but in the meantime please feel free to reach out with topics you would like for me to address.