Law School: How Many Hours a Week Should I Be Studying?

How much time will it take to prepare for classes and how much studying should you do for exams in law school? While this question has as many answers as there are law students, there is a formula that many professors advocate using. You will most likely want to plan to study for at least two hours for every hour of class. For example, in your first year, you will study Torts, Contracts and Criminal Law. Each class is 3 ½ hours a week. This means you should plan on studying and preparing for each class about 7 hours per week or 21 hours total.

This may sound fairly daunting, however, most of our students find that they can find a few early morning hours before work each day and they put in more concentrated study periods on Fridays, Sundays, and Mondays when you do not have class. These days can provide the balance of the hours needed to study. In addition, many of our students have found that they can reduce this number for classes that they find easier.

For our working students and parents, they have reported being able to squeeze in additional reading and studying time during lunch and other breaks on the job and while taking kids to sports games and practices. Listening to course CD’s while driving can be a huge help in memorization and exam preparation. You will get very creative in finding little periods of time that add up.

For our 1L students, we provide at no additional cost, a full Baby Bar review course and a comprehensive “Boot Camp” to prepare you to take the Baby Bar. We use Fleming’s Fundamentals of Law Baby Bar Review as Jeff Fleming is the undisputed master of preparing law students for this exam.

Are you interested in becoming a trial attorney? Our mission at CDTA College of Law is to educate, train, and develop extraordinary legal advocates. Your legal education will be comprised of bar-tested academic subjects, skills training, and values reinforcement. Upon completion of your 4-year course of study you will be fully qualified to take and pass the California Bar examination. Call us today at (760) 342-0900 or find out more online here.