Open Book Exam Courses

[sirjake]

To LawSchool2011:

One at a time here... I'll answer the others in due course.

Counselor: were these open-book exams multiple choice or did they require written responses? There's a world of difference between the two. Or did this possibly only make up a portion of their grade whereas their grade was made up in large part by either written responses or a normal final? I suspect that this is apples to oranges.

You're looking toward law school, so I'll give you a conditional statement: IF they were multiple choice tests, AND your entire grade was made up of these tests alone (or a very large percentage), AND they reused these exams for virtually every class (like they do with these online courses I'm referencing), THEN I would say that that is not making a good faith effort to make sure the students are learning the required material. AND, if I were a graduate of the school or even a student who had not graduated yet, I would speak to the administration about the issue because in my opinion that would be lowering the value of my degree. I can't see how such a circumstance would not lend itself to cheating (especially to a group of people as hell-bent on getting good grades as LS students). I seriously doubt that virtually any of that is the case, so I probably would feel safe about the integrity of my degree. In the courses I'm referring to, every bit of your grade or ability to pass is made up by open book exams that are relatively easy to cheat. PFC classes may not fall into this since they reportedly do require at least one proctored exam.

Also, law school is in and of itself different because you have to pass a major exam at the end. You don't have that at any of the above schools. You have to prove your knowledge there or you're, well, screwed. If you mess around because you can get by with good grades by cheating, you'll have a rude awakening at the bar (again, not that I think you can actually cheat in LS and get good grades).

PLA is, again, apples to oranges. It is far, far easier to falsify something that has that much original work required than a multiple-choice test. To pull off cheating on it would require a much higher level of sophistication. There is no comparison.

And I know something about getting into law school--I've done it. I was admitted with good scholarships to two top 25 schools. They do care more about your LSAT score, true, but they also care that your degree is legitimate. What I am trying to do is to keep my degree (and yours, should you get one) legitimate so that you have the opportunity to use the great equalizer (a standardized test) to get in. If our degrees start to lose favor in the public eye, how quickly do you think law schools will start paying attention? Rather fast, I'd wager. Further, it doesn't take much. If you take two students who both score well on the LSAT, but one has a "normal" degree and one has a degree with a higher level of suspicion, and their soft factors are similar, who do you think they're going to take?

Good luck to you on your law school quest. It's an interesting game.