Posted on 03/14/2017 7:38:53 AM PDT by george76
The State Bar of California has agreed to launch a comprehensive assessment of whether the minimum score needed to pass its bar examination should be lowered to allow more prospective attorneys to pass.
In recent weeks, a growing chorus of voices — from state legislators to law school deans to court officials — have registered urgent concerns that the lowest score needed to pass the exam, commonly referred to as the “cut score,” is too high, flunking would-be attorneys who would qualify to practice law nearly everywhere else in the country.
That sense of urgency has increased since November, after it was revealed that the passage rate for the state’s latest bar exam had tumbled to a 32-year low, with just 43 percent making the grade — nearly a 3 percent slide from the previous exam.
California’s bar exam tests law school grads with a mixture of multiple-choice questions, essays and a performance exam that assesses practical skills, like writing a legal brief or analyzing a contract.
...
Critics also say that the state’s high cut score is warping legal education to emphasize passing the bar exam, rather than promoting practical knowledge and legal skills, and that it disproportionately disadvantages lower-income and minority law students.
“Having an appropriate standard for who can become an attorney is important because it means we have the broadest number of people practicing law as possible,” said Assemblyman Mark Stone, D-Monterey Bay, who chairs the Assembly Judiciary Committee.
(Excerpt) Read more at sfchronicle.com ...
1. Do you vote Democrat or Republican?
If answer was "Democrat", welcome to the BAR!
If answer was "Republican", please answer the following 2,000 questions and complete the 50 essays in the 2 hour time limit. Someone may or may not contact you.
Why have any standards at all. With such a poor education system it makes no difference.
...as if California didn’t already have enough stupid, scuzzy lawyers.
They’ve done the exact same thing with entrance exams to some of the elite schools. Not enough non-Asian minorities getting in to make the race-baiters happy. So the problem can’t possibly be with the applicants; it has to be the exam. Let’s dumb it down, then lower the passing score, then select from a much larger pool of candidates and choose all minorities in the pool first before opening up slots to those with the highest scores.
I will NOT go to a black or hispanic doctor. Because of bigotry? No. Because I have no way of knowing if they were an affirmative action admission to medical school. Get rid of AA (or maybe post SATs and MCATs for all your doctors) and I will be willing to see a minority doctor based in part on my assessment of their IQ.
Why?
It’s not like there is a lawyer shortage.
Another way to say “White Privilege”, hard work and discipline.
The racists are at it again assuming minorities don't have the intellectual capacity to meet high standards.
What do you call a doctor / lawyer who ranked 499th out of 500 in his class?
Doctor / Lawyer
law schools are now open enrolment and allow even the most unqualified into admission. (student loan free money)
the exam WAS a minimum competence test.
the lowering of the passing score is just a quota issue.
Increase the cut score simply by changing the testing to an “ouch”/”oops” format. “Ouch, that’s a hard question.” “Oops, let’s ignore that one and go to the next question.”
The pass rates were so low because of an abundance of law schools that had no standards, that let just about anyone in, in order to take their money. A lot of those schools got sued for fraud when their students, the ones who did pass, couldn't get jobs.
The part about having to study for the bar instead of taking courses on helping poor people is ridiculous, too. I went to a school on the east coast that had no preparation for the California Bar. Took a bar prep course like everyone else did, and studied the material for a few weeks over the summer. There is very little in the exam that is specific to California.
I have come across a LOT of lawyers in my time who are not very good. Some are terrible at writing cogent briefs in court, or at understanding logical arguments. That's in addition to the ones who are bad for non-intellectual reasons, like they can't get to court on time, are lazy or alcoholics, thieves or drug addicts. If the ones I have seen can get in, the standards are already low, and shouldn't be lowered further.
Standards are standards only if you maintain them. "Lowering standards" means you have no standards anymore.
Only ten percent in my son's commercial pilot classes and flight school passed. Studying was part of it, talent the other. "Ace," (my son) also graduated with honors, and he credits that with some of his success.
He's been flying, at near the speed of sound, into the New York City airports for some time now. Not a place for incompetents.
A black friend described what may be driving this: Her daughter was an affirmative action student who wanted to be a lawyer, and after all that school couldn’t pass the bar exam. She now works a gubmint job and owes all that money...
My lawyer friends tell me there are two factors that explain declining pass rates on the California bar exam, one general and one specific to California.
1. A few years ago, in the face of declining applications, many law schools (especially the less prestigious, private ones) lowered their admissions standards to maintain the size of the entering class.
2. California allows graduates of non-accredited law schools to take its bar exam, and an increasing proportion of exam takers are from such schools.
Yes, so litigation prone California can implode faster by having worse, ambulance-chasing lawyers, filing frivolous lawsuits against every deep pocket. That will either drive or destroy all the deep pockets in California and that will cause the tax/political system to collapse. Go For It, lower that bar!
Just what California needs, more Goddamn lawyers.
And stupid ones to boot.
Probably homeboyz and wetbacks.
They obviously are dumber in the rest of the country since they need a lower score then in California to pass. Maybe a national score for all states is a better way. Why should Mississippi need to get 250 points lower then California to become a lawyer? That’s nuts!
why not just do away with the bar exam? let anyone who wants to be a lawyer start practicing right away, no need for pesky exams or even going to school. That way they would ensure more diversity among lawyers.
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