New Patent Bar Online Exam - Prometric

Started by John Watts, 07-27-04 at 07:26 AM

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KBB

I am studying for the Patent Bar Exam to hopefully take  at the end of this year. Does anyone have home study course materials or any other study materials that I could buy for a fairly inexpensive price? The price of the courses that I found online are too expensive for me at this time. Please email me if you have any study materials that you found helpful. Thanks so much! kbeagles@fhcrc.org

John Radi

I have a May set of patbar material that someone gave me.  Does anyone know if the "new" material which now costs $800 is worth the money?  I'd hate studying with outdated material that might cost me points, on the other hand - $800 is a lot of money.

Does anyone have an idea of when they'll switch to the new mpep?  That'll really kill me if it's in the middle of my studying.

Can someone talk a little more about what the online mpep is like?  I have an mpep in adobe format, is that similar or is their version harder to work with?  (slower, less responsive to searching, no hyperlinks...)

thanks!

-john

tony

Has anyone that took the computer-based test received the test result?

Scott Evans

I haven't received mine yet, and I took the test on the morning of July 26th.  Good luck on your results, Tony.  I think all of us could use some.

Regarding the previous post, the online MPEP wasn't slow, but you couldn't search because of the lock-up issues.  I got too used to flipping to sections by feel in the hard copy, which made the online version a little clumsy.  Once they clean up the search issues, it will probably be even more efficient than the book because you'll be able to use a keyword search to quickly locate some of the more obscure subsections.  It will probably be enough to make up for not being able to bring any notes into the test.  (By the way, despite the sadistic appearance of that act, I'm pretty sure the USPTO had no other choice because of the other tests that are administered in the same facilities that don't allow any crib sheets.  I'm probably pointing out the obvious, and it won't be much comfort for those are planning to take the test, but the realization was a sliver of comfort for me.)  My suggestion would be to practice with the computer version and wait to take the test until they give some confirmation about fixing the lockups.  Good luck.

Jimi

I just took the test on September 3rd, and had absolutely no problems with the computer I was using.  It was very quick, and had no lockups.  I also thought there were a lot of repeats, and not too many tough questions.

Don't let all of the above posts scare you too much.  Most of you should be OK on this exam because it appears that the problems may have been worked out.  The difficulty of the test is a little harder than that of the previous tests, but not too much harder.  I would say that your score would probably be around 5 points lower on this new computerized test compared to the old tests.

Jimi

gregboyd

How about the longer "case squib" questions on the new test?  I had heard they were going for less of these.  I mean the ones that take about 10 minutes just to read through.

Are there still as many (or any) of those?

Tod Waldrop

I took the test on Friday, 9/10/04.

First, on the technology aspects.  The test center I went to in Charlotte, NC was equipped with what appeared to be relatively new Compaq computers (Pentium III's or newer) with 17" monitors.  I had no problems with the search function hanging up in the MPEP.  Overall I couldn't complain heavily about anything in the technology.  

There are a couple of things that would make it easier, like being able to keystroke toggle between the  test and the MPEP. The MPEP doesn't lose your place when you go back to the test every time, but it does reset sometimes. I never figured out why it did reset.  Maybe, on changing questions, I just didn't take the time to think about until after I was through, and I couldn't test it at that point.  Also, being able to split the screen with the test on top or bottom and the MPEP vice versa.  You can resize the MPEP window over top of the test window, but this resizing isn't remembered when you close and reopen the MPEP.  And you have to close the MPEP to answer the question.  Again, the overall rating would be positive for the technology.

Now the content of the exam.  I would say that at least half of my exam dealt with the following three topics: appeal, reexamination, and the PCT.  Also, there were several questions about references being available as prior art.   I didn't have any questions that were extemely long, only two or three that even required scrolling the screen to see all 5 answers.

The first 50 questions seemed straight forward, but the second 50 gave me trouble.  I assume I will be taking it again in the near future, but maybe I passed it.  To give a perspective of my level of knowledge and experience, this was my third try (two paper and one Prometric). My educational background is technical, no legal education other than on the job over the past eighteen months or so.  In summary, I didn't find this test to be extremely different than the two paper tests.  In fact, I preferred it being computerized rather than on paper.  Good luck to everyone!

Tod

S James

Has anybody that took the exam the first week received their results yet?  Its been six plus weeks and I didn't know if I should check with the Office regarding my results.

BenL

I took it Aug 2nd and still haven't heard anything.  I talked to PLI the end of last week and they said that no one has gotten results yet.  

If anyone has gotten results, please let us know!

Iris

Just spoke with Harry Moatz, the director of OED, about the test result.  He said just hang tight.  They don't have enough people to process the results, but they are sending them out as soon as they can.  No dates have been given as to how much longer it will take.
Iris

Guest

I am reading Iris's comments to mean either one of two things.  1) that the PTO does not have sufficient staff to process the exams.  2) that not enough people have taken the exam to do statistical analysis (and thus discard bad questions).  which is it?  based on the way the exam is administered, it seems like the second scenario is most likely.  which raises some questions.  i took the exam on august 9th.  i called OED about a week later to ask an unrelated question, and they told me that only about 50 people had taken it thus far (when the exam had been available for about 3 weeks).  only 50 people!  that's nationwide.  therefore, by now, its probably somewhere in the range of 80-120 or so.  when the written tests were given, about 1000 people took it at a time.  so, what i'm wondering is, what is the threshold here?  how many scores do they need to process the results? Harry Moatz wants us to sight tight, but for how long?  are we talking a couple more weeks, or more like 6 months?  it all seems very unreasonable.  i think i'm going to try to call Mr. Moatz tomorrow.
Ryan

S James

Please let us know what you find out.  I may be naive, but how can it take so long to process a computer-administered test.  I know the GRE and other similar tests give you results instantly.  What is so different with the patent exam software??  I'm not sure if the USPTO understands (or cares) that some people's job prospects are based on the results of this exam.  Sorry, just venting a little frustration.  This whole process seems to just keep dragging, starting with the test being administered in late July instead of April.

Isaac

The exam has been completely computer graded since about
1997 or so when the got rid of the claim drafting exercise.
I suspect that the delay is more likely associated with
resolving problems with bad questions in the exam.  With only a few people
taking the test rather than over a thousand, perhaps the indicators
of bad questions are not so clear.

After the test has been given enough times so that all of the
questions have been exercised, perhaps the results can be reported
instantly.
Isaac

Otto

I concur with Mr. Clark.  

I took the exam last Thursday.  While there were only a couple of questions that struck me as really "bad" in terms of how they were worded, those two were pretty awful.

I think we'll probably not be seeing the "instant results" the USPTO predicted would soon be available to exam takers   Looking at the 10/2003 exam,  it seems that two questions were negated because the PTO had to accept any answer as correct, two questions accepted more than one answer as the most correct, and one was deleted due to superseding changes in the law.  I doubt that the current pool of exam questions will be completely free of similar issues.

BTW, for those curious-  Mr. Waldrops's description (supra) of the exam subject matter pretty much characterizes what I saw on the exam I took on the 9th.  My advice for those who are about to take the exam is to PRACTICE LOOKING THINGS UP IN A PDF COPY OF THE MPEP WHICH IS BROKEN DOWN SUCH THAT EACH CHAPTER IS A SEPARATE DOCUMENT.  I took the PRG course in June, and probably spent about 200-300 hours studying this summer before the exam.  If I do pass the exam (and I honestly have no idea whether I think I did or not), it will be due to the 10 hours or so I spent playing with a PDF of the MPEP broken down as described above.  This test went into minutiae that were not covered in the Kayton course,  and seemed very focused on one's skill in perusing the MPEP.






Dave B

Has anyone taken the exam at either of the 2 Prometric locations in Manhattan ?

Where and when did you take the exam ?

Was the monitor/display OK to read ?

Did the MPEP search function work properly (without freezing up ) ?

Any other comments on the experience ?

Thanks for your help !

Dave




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