I passed the bar on my second try. I was so convinced I had failed after I finished the second day. My strategy on exam day was to start with the PT and then complete the remaining essays. To my surprise, the PT was a bit confusing, so I spent way more time on it than I planned. When I finally checked the time, I had about 1 hour and 20 minutes left to complete essays 5 and 6.
I spent around 40 minutes on Essay 5, and when I turned to essay 6, I was terrified to see it was community property. I only had 30 minutes left and didn’t come close to finishing it. On top of that, I’m pretty sure essay 5 wasn’t my best work because I was rushing and struggling to think clearly. When the proctor called time, I felt completely defeated and went to my car and cried. I truly believed I had failed and just hoped that spending so much time on the PT would somehow pay off.
I wanted to share this to encourage anyone who feels the same way: it is absolutely possible to pass even if you don’t finish an essay!!
This time around, my strategy was to focus on mastering the MBE, the PT, and the PR essay. Every day, I would do a set of MBE questions, then spend a lot of time reviewing them and really understanding why I got questions wrong. I kept a wrong answer journal and reviewed it daily. I completed all the Adaptibar questions, and I think that deep review made a huge difference because the questions felt much more manageable on exam day.
After MBE practice, I would move on to essays. I aimed to do three per day, and one was always a PR essay. I used baressays.com to compare my answers with high-scoring ones (65+). I also made it a point to complete 2–3 full, timed PTs each week and review those as well.
Trust the process. It can feel like you’re not improving, but by exam time your performance really does come together. Focus on mastering the MBE, the PR essay and the PT!