With apologies to Tina Turner and anyone who does not
appreciate the beauty of ‘80’s music. But really, what does luck have to do with exam taking? When I send my students off to take their
exams, I feel like they want me to say good luck (or break a leg for the undergrad
theater majors). But I don’t want to. Why? Because
after all the time and effort they have put into studying, I am not sure luck
has much to do with it and I don’t want students to feel that their performance
on the exams is out of their control.
I have a student who has been coming to see me everyday
since classes have ended; she says that I am her study group. She has worked exceptionally hard at
answering old exam questions under test conditions and we go over them
everyday. We have discussed reading
questions carefully, outlining before answering, issue spotting, completeness
of answers and organization. We have not
discussed rabbit’s feet, numerology, astrology or the idea of setting up an
alter to the gods of Constitutional Law (whoever they may or may not be) in the
exam room (not to mention that proctors tend to frown upon lit candles during a
paper exam). Today is her Con. Law exam
and as she left my office to do that last minute read through of her outline,
she said, “wish me luck.” And I said no;
she looked crestfallen, but then I explained my dilemma.
What is the right thing to say to my students before
sending them to the lions, I mean into exams? “Go get ‘em tiger,” seems glib and condescending. “Show ‘em what you got,” is also glib with
hints of stripper inappropriateness; and “Hrrr,” the pirate warrior cry seems
just odd.
This is not to say that there cannot be any luck
involved. I have been lucky every now
and then on exams: like the time I had a friend contemplating a surrogate parenting
arrangement in Massachusetts just prior to the bar. I did a bunch of
research for her and lo and behold it was a question on the bar a few weeks
later. It happens, but you cannot rely
on that luck when you can’t possibly know it will happen until you are actually
taking the exam. You need to be prepared
for the questions you don’t happen to know the answers to already and that
involves knowing the law and answering the questions so that the professor
agrees that you do.
So, what I said to my student today was, “go show the
professor what you know and organize it so he/she knows that you know it well.”
And then I added, “I would say good luck, but you don’t need it because you
have worked hard to know the material and you know how to take this exam.” While this is bit longer winded than a
simple, “good luck,” I think it was a better way to prepare this student for
the exam-by putting the power to ace it in her hands and not someone else’s. (ezs)
