Looking back at comps, I prepared for several months by writing short essays every morning on topics that I made up based on my readings. I think my answers stunk, but I passed. Students think I’m some sort of super student for having done that, but I just wanted to pass my tests, that’s it. And I could follow advice. I’m sure someone told me to do what I did because I’m smart enough to follow directions, not to come up with that sort of an idea.

Thanks for opening up the question, Chris, and I think the KISS strategy is really, really important, especially for high-performing students — on earlier essay assignments, I’ve seen super-smart students try and shoot the moon, and fail.

And like Bardiac says, practice, structure, and examples are key.

But they are not preparing for it. Maybe the weekend before the comp I will get one student who writes the first answer and asks what I think.

I teach 1-2 of the classes in the program and they have to each week write mini-comp essays in class (I give them a scenario, they have to apply content to it, arrive at solutions, etc.).

Two have not passed twice — third time and they are out of the program. I want to help them — have offered weekly review sessions, etc., but they won’t take me up on it. What else can I do? I want them to pass.

I spend a fair bit of time towards the end of the semester asking students to write possible essay exam topics, and then share them around and do some informal practice writing (brainstorm, thesis statement, a quick outline of what examples they’d use). I often hand out an old exam, and we discuss what sort of response the exam asks for, what kind of thinking, and how to do well. Using well developed examples isn’t a secret strategy, but it’s something my first year students sometimes don’t think about during exam situations, so making sure they know to think about such things is important.

(I don’t recycle exams, so handing out an old exam seems fair and reasonable, and reassures students about format stuff. It also means that frats or other organizations with exam files don’t have an unfair advantage.)

this seems a good question to pose to recently ABDed folks. comprehensive exam writing seems about as high stakes as it gets - to me anyway. at Temple there is a policy in our English grad program that says, roughly, if you fail either portion of your exam a second time you are dismissed from the program.

on my first attempt i didn’t compose a passing response. needless to say, i was on edge the entire rest of the time i was studying (roughly 8 months).

to the point: what advice?
1st, practice writing responses. if you have the luxury of having sample questions practice answering them.

2nd, k.i.s.s - keep it simple, stupid. one of the problems i ran into in my first (failed) exam was trying to do too much with my responses. instead of focusing on one argument, one thesis, i tried to touch on everything under the sun so as to demonstrate my “comprehensive” knowledge of the material. don’t do that. instead, try to show a nuanced understanding of the point you’re arguing…

one way of k.i.s.s.ing is just the thing you advise about the intro and conclusion. state your argument clearly in the intro with the 2 or 3 main points you intenend to make throughout. when you get to the end…well, what you said.

i’ll post something over at Dissertation Boot Camp; i’m sure the folks over there might have a few dimes to add to my $ .02.