Legal Commentary

Before grading comes (come?) office hours.  It's generally a low key time; you set aside time for the generally appropriate, sometimes excellent and, sadly, sometimes depressing questions from your students (including those of the "can you please summarize civil procedure to me" variety.)  One particularly interesting type of question is what I call the "jackpot" question.  Often in my exams I try (like I'm sure a lot of profs) to insert some tweak or twist to an issue that distinguishes the very best students from the merely very good.  It's not a trick; it's just a complexity that, if a student really understands the material, she will pick up on even though it's not obvious from the face of the question.

Once in a great while a student will ask a question in office hours that basically gets to the heart of that hidden issue.  Not in the factual sense; rather, the student will ask about the relationship of two doctrines in a way that mirrors what the twist is going to be.  I used to agonize about my answers to that kind of question, in particular, on the issue of how deep my explanation should be.  Explaining it as deeply as I usually try when I answer questions gives the twist away to the student (if she's paying close enough attention to take it in and remember it on the exam).  But holding back seemed unfair; she asked the question and deserves as deep an answer as I would normally give rather than a deposition-style minimalist answer.

I'm comfortable with it now.  If someone stumbles onto the jackpot I'll give them the golden key.  Of course I don't tell them that's what it is.  And as they close up their laptop and walk out I look at them and smile and wonder if they just realized what I told them.