Exam Week

It's so different. 5 hours, open notes, take home, honor code and the least stressful week of the entire quarter - exam week in Darden is a whole new experience. Maybe it was planned that way. After all aren't we supposed to 'Trust the process'? I mean, the week before it was hell! Consulting conference, GMO conference, company briefings, networking dinners and of course, cases. Cases which ran for 30 pages and had scores of Exhibits. Cases which were supposed to be cracked without the aid of the learning teams. And then suddenly it's Friday night and you almost feel a void. You study because others are. You go through the review notes and try and organize all the stuff in folders for easy reference. You say to yourself that you havent been slacking off during the last 2 months so you will be okay even without studying for the last 2 days. No. Don't get me wrong. I'm no rock star and I'm solidly in the middle when it comes to the unique Darden phenomenon called class participation (trust me, other B Schoolers - it's different here!). It's just that studying before exams is not my thing. Till high school, I was supposedly a smart kid and didn't need to study before exams. In undergrad, I was way too screwed up to make any significant improvements by studying in the last week (though the night outs made sure I never got an F! and over years I learned the art of optimizing my study hours to just make that mark). Here, its neither of the two. And yet. I cant sit down and study. So, it's not my thing. QED!

The marketing exam was a mix of emotions. I used my old strategy to start off with the last question. It helped that it was an easy one so I felt good after the first 15 minutes. Couldn't say the same for the rest of the 4 hours and 45 minutes though. So at the end, I had a lot of margins and percentages and numbers and dollars floating around the word doc and I was hoping that at least half of it made sense to the professor. Hope, like they say, is a strategy.

Accounting tomorrow. And then 3 more papers. And then the 100 case party. And then Metallica. And then Quarter 2 from Monday. I love Darden.