All exams at the School of Law are computer-based. There are two types of exams: in-class exams and take-home exams. In-class exams will be taken on your laptop using specific software provided by NYU Law. Take-home exams can be taken on any computer, and require word-processing software and .pdf-reading software.
In-Class Exams
To prepare your laptop and make sure it is ready for taking exams, we have a few short steps that we require each student to perform. This includes general laptop maintenance, the installation of exam software, and taking a practice exam which will verify that the exam software works properly on your laptop. At the same time, this affords students the opportunity to become familiar with the exam software prior to a live exam environment.
- Make sure to install all operating system patches and restart your computer to apply these updates. (We recommend a fresh restart on any given exam day)
- Make sure you are running up-to-date anti-virus software
- Install the latest version of Exam4 (this changes each semester)
- Take the Practice Exam (you must do this each semester)
Take-Home Exams
To be prepared for take-home exams, students must be able to open a .pdf file. If you cannot open .pdf files, we recommend Adobe Reader. You will also need to compose your exam answers in a word processor. Current accepted exam-answer formats are: .docx, .docm, .doc, .wpd, .rtf, and .txt. If using other word processors than Word or WordPerfect, students must be sure to save exam answers in one of these supported formats.
There is additional information on the THES website from Academic Services that describes the take-home exam process, and additional exam-answer formatting tips.