The final exam for Law 627--Legal Research will be held on Wednesday, December 9th, from 8:30 a.m. to 11:30 a.m.
The location of your exam will depend on which section you are in:
Section 1 (Healey): Auditorium
Section 2 (Simmons): Room D
Section 3 (Healey): Auditorium
Section 4 (Davidson): Room B
Section 5: (Dewey): Room A
In order to take the exam you will need your computer and your exam number. Your computer must have the ExamSoft SofTest software installed. More information about this is available from Student Services. The exam will be open book, meaning that you will also be able to bring any notes or materials you have to the exam.
The final exam will consist of two parts. Part one will be a series of short answer questions. Part one is worth 30 points. Part Two will be an essay. Part two will be worth 70 points. During the exam you should allocate your time accordingly.
Part one of the exam will test your knowledge of concepts covered in the course. Part two will ask you to research a set of legal questions based on a set of facts that you will be given. In answering part two you must show how you did your research, including search terms and sources consulted, as well as providing a brief answer to the question itself.
Please be sure to arrive at your exam room AT LEAST 15 minutes before the start of the exam. It would be best if you plan to arrive at the building by 8:00 a.m. If you are late for the exam you may not be allowed to take it, and you will fail the course.
In studying for the exam, you should review all of the materials you read for class, including this Libguide, as well as your notes from class sessions. You should also carefully review your exercises and any feedback that you received on them.
You will want to be sure that you can both identify and use all of the tools you learned about including secondary sources, and the tools used to find, read, and update cases, statutes, and rules. Remember that part two of the exam will call on you to do actual research, so some practice in searching will also be useful.
This exam is your opportunity to demonstrate your knowledge of, and facility with, the tools and techniques of legal research. Part two, in particular will assess your ability to plan and execute your research thoroughly and accurately, and to present a final product that demonstrates sound analysis.
Your work product for part two should consist of a log of your research process, including citations to the sources you found and your analysis of the relevance of each of those sources to this case. You should NOT be writing as an advocate here; remember the purpose of your exam is to demonstrate your competency at doing legal research.You should spend the bulk of your time doing the research and logging your results, but be sure to leave enough time to polish up the log. Please arrange your sources in terms of the way you would write a memo to the assigning partner. In other words, outline your memo, but write out your analysis for each source.