Does anybody really know what time it is? – A Time Keeping Exercise for Law Students using Excel

            John Lennon sang, “Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans”. How do Law students plan and spend their time? The Time Keeping Exercise was created to help our Lawyers as Leaders students find out.

      In this session, I will discuss how we brought to life the professor’s vision of a standardized time keeping system complete with data analysis and a respect for student privacy. Learn how we created our Excel Spreadsheet, the problems encountered, solutions discovered, and the improvements made though five years of the Time Keeping Exercise. Additionally, I will highlight how the Time Keeping Exercise is an example of non-traditional Library service put together by a non-teaching member of the Library staff.

Included in the discussion will be:

• A brief overview of the Lawyers as Leaders course and the goal of the Time Keeping Exercise
• Why we chose to create our own Excel Spreadsheet vs. using a ready-made product
• Technology and submission related issues encountered and resolved
• How we analyzed the students’ time
• Enhancements that evolved through student feedback
• A bit about student reactions to seeing how time was spent: Idealized priorities vs. reality
• Bonus! Excel tips and tricks I picked up along the way

 No special knowledge is needed by sessions attendees, although modest familiarity with Excel may be helpful.