Why BarGraders?

Thank you to those who read my blog who are fellow bar sufferers. I recently received a comment on the perks of Bar Passers. So here goes...

With Bar Passers, you can buy a package of essays. The website is set up for first time takers and repeaters. However, since I didn't feel I needed 40 essays (for repeaters), I called and they said that I could sign up for 20, and I only needed to sign in through the first-timers page.

I heard about the course when I failed the second time. I can't recall if it was a mailing or something else. But I attended their free exam review session, which was filled with a bunch of people who needed more help than these people could give. Some people were asking SHOCKINGLY stupid questions. But I stuck it out until later than I had planned. And for attending, I got a 10% discount code for any purchases I made.

I bought 20 essays and a 2-day essay course. (I think it was 2 days, but it may have been 3. I can't remember.) They offer a PT course as well, but I still advocate John Holtz for the PT.

During the in-class essay course, they went over specific things they were looking for when they were actual graders. They demystified the process. They also clued you in to the things that they want, a large part of which is in direct contradiction to what BarBri tries to preach. Me? I wanted to do whatever it was the graders were looking for, and I don't care what BarBri's 70% market share was doing.

On the 20 essays, I admit that I didn't use all of them, and I didn't do subjects that I thought were extremely unlikely for this bar exam. I did, however, do at least 1 in any subject I thought was possible and 2 in my weaker subjects.

You sign onto the website and you have the option of choosing the subject of your essay or having the system choose at random. I never picked at random. I figured it would be more productive for me to perform essays in the subjects I had just studied in an attempt to cement the concepts in essay form.

You pick your essay, then they give you 3 minutes to print it, then it is a timed essay that you have to do online. Once you're done, you submit it or you run out of time and it submits it for you.

About 1-2 days later, they email you that it's ready for review. The feedback is excellent. They break down the IRAC for each issue you spotted. You also have the ability to look at a model answer, which is immensely helpful. They generally make a comment or two per paragraph, but the feedback they give both tells you (1) what you did wrong, and (2) how to fix it. BarBri will forever tell you that you suck, and write "no!" on your essays, if they ever give them back to you. (A year later, I'm still waiting for the last essay I turned in.) The "how to fix it" is extremely helpful, as I just needed someone to tell me how to fix what I was doing wrong. For the most part, I hit all the issues, so I couldn't figure out why my essays averaged about 60.