The Goodson Blogson

With July bar exams right around the corner, a weekend of panic is perfectly normal. We hope you’ve kept up with your study program, and consulted our additional tips for bar exam success from earlier this month. But if you just can’t shake that sense of dread, here are some fun (or maybe not-so-fun) facts about bar exams in other jurisdictions to help put things into perspective. The ABA’s Comprehensive Guide to Bar Admission Requirements (Reference KF302 .Z9 C65 2011) is chock-full of statistics about the bar exams in other states and U.S. territories, and it just might reassure you that the grass is greener than you think. Take, for example, the length of exams , which is compared in Chart 6 on page 23. California has long been famous for its grueling 3-day bar exam, but did you know that Mississippi and Palau also triple the fun? Nine other states also use a two-and-a-half day format, which might as well be three for those souls who must hole up in a hotel. Suddenly that 2-day f...

“Try before you buy” isn’t just good advice for car shopping – the Duke University Libraries share that motto when purchasing shiny new research toys, too. The Duke community has always been able to test-drive Trial Databases at http://library.duke.edu/apps/dbtrials/ , but this summer offers two trials which are particularly interesting to the Duke Law community, since both can help a great deal with federal legislative research. First, there’s the U.S. Congressional Serial Set, 1981-1994 . The Serial Set is an essential resource for legislative history research, as it reprints House and Senate committee reports and other congressional documents. The Duke University Libraries already subscribe to the online serial set from 1817-1980, and the additional years featured in this trial could help fill gaps in our online access through other sources to congressional reports and documents (outlined in our Federal Legislative History research guide). This trial of 1981-1994 runs through Augu...

With the bar exam now less than three weeks away, the Goodson Law Library staff have noticed an increase in questions about additional study resources. In our online catalog, try a subject keyword search for “ Bar examinations—United States—Study guides ”. This will retrieve some helpful resources for any state’s bar exam, including a 2010 edition of Strategies & Tactics for the MBE (Reserves KF303 .W345 2010) and other titles like The Essential Rules for Bar Exam Success (KF303 .F75 2008). If you have a hole in your bar exam study outlines from a particularly confusing area of law, check out Part III of our Law School Success guide for an overview of popular law school study aids. Many of these series, like Examples & Explanations and the West Hornbooks, can be found on Reserve. ( Tip: Although Reserve Collection items are loaned in 4-hour blocks, arrive at the Circulation/Reserve desk less than 4 hours before our 5:00 p.m. summer closing time to borrow a Reserve Collecti...