Blog Entry 93

October 18th, 2010
Wow…I’ve been just a little busy lately. 

Let’s see, since I’ve last updated, I have: finished and submitted my evidence paper, caught up on all of my reading (go me!), attended a cousin’s wedding, helped out at an admissions “prospective student” event, cleaned my room (kind of…), completed a sourcecheck for law review (and, in turn, had the closest thing I’ve ever had to an all-nighter: 2.5 hours of sleep), bought a pumpkin, helped run a successful “Bowling Against Cancer” fundraiser for the Karmanos Cancer Institute, and even started outlining! 

This past weekend was delightful, if not unproductive. I cannot even begin to describe how delighted I feel when I turn a page in my planner…and see nothing. Of course, I had plenty of homework that I could have been working on, and I did get quite a bit accomplished, but my focus was on getting refreshed and ready to tackle another week.  

Now, it’s back to the real world of classes and homework. This week, my big project is working on a draft of one of my arguments for my advanced advocacy brief. We will submit our draft on Thursday, and then next week, we will again have the opportunity to meet with our professor in conferences. She will provide us with feedback, and then we have 24 hours to submit a revised draft for grading. I have to say, I love this form of grading. Having the opportunity for feedback is terribly important in the learning process, yet practically every time I turn in an assignment, I don’t really even care about it after I get my grade…I just move on to the next item on my “to do” list. By providing us with the incentive (i.e. a higher grade) to really put the effort into seeking feedback, I think it makes the students both happier and more intelligent. 

Fortunately, we have already completed a “research report” that was pretty much an outline of the arguments we are planning to make, so I’m hopeful that my argument draft will come together smoothly enough. Now, I just need to finish an ungraded evidence quiz, and do my reading for my classes tomorrow, and then I can really get started! I suspect it’s going to be another long week…Thursday night cannot come soon enough!