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Exam Preparation Resources

NYLS Academic and Bar Success

NYLS Exam Archive

The sample and practice exam archive consists of exams released to the Library by NYLS faculty. Please note that professors are not required to release exams to the Library, and many choose not to do so. Consequently, you may not be able to find an exam for either your class or your professor.

Sample and practice exams are indexed by professor’s name and course taught.

All exams are in Adobe PDF format and are viewed using the free Adobe Acrobat Reader, which has been installed on all PCs in the Library and the Electronic Research Classrooms.

Paper copies of sample and practice exams for the current semester only are kept at the Circulation Desk.

The exam archive is maintained by the Circulation Department. Questions regarding available exams should be directed to Elina Oyola, Circulation Librarian, at 212.431.2148, or by email at: elina.oyola@nyls.edu.

To access the exam archive on the NYLS Portal:

- Login to the NYLS portal

- On the portal home page, locate the Student Resources drop down menu

- Click on the Exam Archive link

Articles

Books about Exams and Law School Success

See also, Law School 411: Books & Films on Law & Law School


For a larger list of exam preparation titles available at the Mendik Library, conduct the following subject search in our catalog: Law examinations -- United States

Additional Resources

Examples & Explanations study guides.  Many of these study guides are available at the Mendik Library and via Google Books. Often, a large portion of the text will be available via preview on Google Books.

Hornbooks and treatises, See NYLS's Treatises by Topic or our New York Treatises by Topic pages.Treatises are works written by legal scholars that provide exhaustive coverage of a legal topic. Links to treatises on Bloomberg Law, LexisNexis and Westlaw take you directly to those services. You’ll need your login credentials to access them.Digital Study Aids Collection, LexisNexis Digital Library

Access helpful LexisNexis Publishing study aids, including the popular Understanding Series as well as the Questions & Answers Series. Borrowing is via the OverDrive platform. These may be accessed via your NYLS network login or by signing in as a campus guest. Read content in a web browser or download to an e-reader app. 

Study Aids (Mendik Library research guide) 

New York State Bar Exam (NYS Board of Law Examiners): Past Exam Essay Questions with Sample Candidate Answers (2005-2017).

CALI Lessons and Advice About Exam-Taking Skills

The CALI Library of Lessons is a collection of over 1,000 interactive, web-based tutorials written by law professions and geared toward law student. Each lesson focuses on a specific aspect of a legal topic, asks questions in a variety of formats and then provides immediate feedback.
 
Lessons may be viewed and run in your web browser. Please note that you must register to use CALI lessons. Registration will allow you to create your own password to use the lessons. In order to register, you will need an authorization code, which can be obtained by contacting the Mendik Library Reference Desk (email: reference@nyls.edu).
 
To access CALI lessons about exam-taking skills, first log in to CALI.  Then, click the Lessons link on the upper left side of the screen. Select By Topic and, under 1L - First Year Lesson Topic, select Legal Concepts and Skills. Scroll down to the lesson(s) of your choice among the following:

 

Top 10 Tips for Successfully Writing a Law School Essay
Jennifer Martin

Writing Better Law School Exams: The Importance of Structure
William Andersen

Assessing Your Own Work
Allie Robbins

Outlining Basics
Nicole Robin Lefton

Reading Comprehension Strategies for Exams
Nicole Robin Lefton

CALI offers indexes of lessons by subject outline or casebook. The CALI Lessons By Subject Outline index matches up traditional subtopics within courses to the corresponding CALI Lessons.

The Lessons by Casebook suggest CALI Lessons based on where you are in a casebook. See if your casebook is available. Then click your casebook to see which lessons correspond with specific pages in the book.

Barbara Glesner Fines, Law School Materials for Success (eLangdell Press)
The first year of law school is, for many people, one of the most significant transitions of their adult life. Law school demands a lot as it helps you make the transition from your prior identity as student (or as some other occupational role) to your new identity as an attorney. To meet the demands of law school, it is often helpful to have the big picture before you begin – a sense of what it is you are trying to do as you prepare for classes, participate in those classes, review and prepare for exams, take exams, and then begin the cycle once again.Law School Materials for Success is designed to give you the essentials of that process.

Exams from Other Law Schools on the Internet

Writing answers to professors’ old final exams is an excellent way for students to prepare for exams. Use these with caution. Your professor may have a different approach to exams. A few law schools/law libraries maintain freely available collections of their school’s exams:

Contact Us

Reference Desk
Email: reference@nyls.edu
Voice: 212.431.2332
Chat with the Reference Desk in Microsoft Teams 
Login with your NYLS network ID and use Microsoft Web App to connect 

 
Circulation
Voice: 212.431.2333
Email: circulation@nyls.edu