The Academic Success Program is designed to support student learning throughout their Law School journey and in preparation for the bar exam. The Program is grounded in current research about the ways in which law students receive, store, and process information. The Program promotes self-regulated learning, provides opportunities to refine legal writing and analysis for exams, and employs spaced repetition and retrieval practice to reinforce learning.
The Academic Success Program consists of several complementary components:
- 1L Capacity-building Workshops
- Peer-facilitated Study & Review Sessions
- Introduction to the Bar Exam Workshops
- Evidence for Law School and the Bar Exam Workshops
- Multistate Performance Test (MPT) Workshops
- Equitable Remedies Course
- Richardson Bar Success Program
In addition to the formal components of the program, students at all stages of their Law School journey are welcome and encouraged to meet individually with the Director of Academic Success. Meetings can be scheduled for a variety of purposes: help with specific academic skills or courses; course planning; bar preparation; or just to talk story.
If you have any questions about the Academic Success Program, or if you would like to schedule a one-on-one academic navigation meeting, please contact Director Liam Skilling: lskillin@hawaii.edu or call (808) 956-3000.
1L Capacity-building Workshops
Academic Success Workshops provide direct instruction to first-year students about academic expectations and effective learning strategies. The workshops are designed to help prepare students for the academic rigor of legal education, to promote self-regulated learning habits, and to help students become acclimated to the Law School assessment paradigm.
Annual Workshops:
- How to Read and Brief a Case Workshop (Orientation)
- Reading and Briefing to Organizing and Outlining Workshop (Fall)
- Exam-Taking Workshop (Fall)
- Lessons Learned and Challenges Ahead Workshop (Spring)
Peer-Facilitated Study & Review Sessions
Each semester, a team of Academic Success Program Teaching Assistants are selected to provide academic support to students taking their first-year foundational courses. The Teaching Assistants conduct weekly Study & Review Sessions for doctrinal courses in the fall, and biweekly sessions in the spring. In the fall, when first year students are most overwhelmed, the review sessions reinforce substantive knowledge and emphasize exam preparation strategies; in the spring, more emphasis is placed on building analytical agility and efficiency.
The Academic Success Program utilizes knowledgeable and experienced Teaching Assistants as guides and mentors to help first year students navigate the law school learning environment.
Introduction to the Bar Exam Workshops
If you are a law student, then the bar exam is probably in your future. Whether you are a 3L steeling yourself to take the bar exam this summer or a 1L making decisions about course planning, this workshop can help you feel better informed. Come learn more about the bar exam: what subjects are tested; what kinds of questions are asked; when you need to start preparing in earnest; and what it takes to prepare for and pass on your first try.
This workshop is offered twice each year – once at lunch and once in the evening – and will focus only on the substance and format of the bar exam, not the bar application process or the character and fitness component of the bar.
Evidence for Law School and the Bar Exam Workshops
The Academic Success Program offers a series of mandatory workshops each fall semester for students enrolled in the Evidence course. The workshops are required for students taking Evidence because it is the area of law most heavily tested on the bar exam that students take after their first year. Students who have already taken Evidence are welcome as well. The Workshops are designed with three intersecting goals:
- to review and reinforce the substantive law of Evidence,
- to explore practices and techniques to help students maximize their academic capacity
- to preview the format and content of the Hawaii State Bar exam.
Multistate Performance Test Workshops
The Multistate Performance Test (MPT) is a component of the Hawaii State Bar exam that tests analytical writing and reasoning. Test takers have 90 minutes to prepare a simulated legal document based on a closed universe of facts and law. The MPT accounts for more than ten percent of a bar taker’s total score (very important).
In addition to helping law students familiarize themselves with the format of the bar exam, the MPT provides an opportunity to hone their legal writing and analysis skills. Since all the necessary background information is provided in the problem, no prior knowledge or studying is required.
Equitable Remedies is offered every Spring as an early bar preparation course. Equitable Remedies is a fascinating area of law and well worth studying in its own right. This course, however, is intended not only to introduce a substantive area of law, but also to help students prepare for the process of studying for the bar exam. Equitable Remedies is an ideal vehicle for this purpose because the subject intersects with a number of substantive areas of law that are heavily tested on the bar exam. The course uses actual bar exam material and includes a significant amount of writing practice and coaching specifically focused on the type of writing demanded on the bar exam.
Richardson Bar Success Program
The faculty, staff, and administration at Richardson are all deeply committed to our graduates’ success on the bar exam. The Academic Success Program offers a variety of events and programs to support graduates in the challenging study and preparation process.
Offering workshops and practice opportunities leading up to the bar exam supports success in several important ways. Face-to-face sessions with Richardson faculty, as compared to prerecorded lectures from bar vendors, help graduates as they learn substantive law and hone the analytical and writing skills they need to succeed.
Perhaps just as importantly, the sessions provide a gathering point for graduates who might otherwise be preparing largely in isolation. They provide an opportunity to gauge progress, share strategies, commiserate, and encourage each other. One of the strengths of the Richardson community is our cohesion; let’s bring this asset to bear on the challenge of the bar exam.
Components of the Richardson Bar Success Program include:
- Bar Preparation Orientation and Kick Off Event
Provides an overview of the bar preparation process, a guide for how to maximize your preparation time and effort, and answers to any questions you have about format and substance of the Hawaii bar. - Substantive Law Workshops w/ Faculty
Sessions reviewing doctrinal areas of law, led by a Richardson faculty member. - MPT Practice & Review Sessions
An opportunity to write an MPT under simulated test conditions and then immediately review the essay and the underlying substantive law. - Bar Preparation Finishing Line: Tips & Tricks for Test Day
Every point matters on the bar exam. This workshop will review strategy and tactics for maximizing your score on the exam. - One-on-One Coaching and Support Meetings
Individual sessions to address your questions and concerns about the bar exam, review substantive law, motivate, encourage, console, cajole, or reassure as necessary. This is a long and daunting process, but you do not need to do it alone!!!
