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by Professor Jim Gray of the Bar Passage Task Force
The start of a new academic year always reminds me
of an incident several years ago when a new 1L wanted to
take Evidence on top of the normal Fall course load so
that he could have more time to study for the bar at the
end of his third year. I advised him that he had started
studying for the bar at Orientation and that mastering his
first year courses was the best head-start he could have.
This column has at various points summed this up as:
"Bar preparation starts during orientation and success is
the product of perspiration, inspiration, and calculation.
One needs to figure out: (1) the rules and strategies that
one must know to gain points on the MBE, Essay and
Performance sections of the bar, (2) make effective and
efficient use of the study materials provided by the bar
preparation course(s), and (3) practice, practice,
practice."
I like the title of a new book put out by Hein Publishing
about a year ago: 1000 Days to the Bar--But the
Practice of Law Begins Now. The author, Dennis
Tonsing, summed up in that title the relationship between
1L performance and eventual admission to the profession.
Studies done here at UDC-DCSL and at other
schools show a strong correlation between law school
performance as measured by GPA and bar passage. In
plain English, people who do well in law school tend to
do well on the bar. Duh!
But the really important point is that law school
GPA is a better predictor of bar passage than the LSAT
and/or Undergraduate GPA. That means that one’s actual
performance in school is far more important that how one
did on an artificial, speed-based test of purported analytical
abilities.
The bar also has its artificial components but it is
there to make a preliminary determination whether you
have sufficient knowledge, skills and abilities to be
unleashed on the public as an "attorney at law." That
license permits you to write a will, draft a contract, sue a
defendant, represent a criminal defendant, and represent
the community as a government lawyer. In most instances,
it is also the license that leads to positions on the
bench as judges deciding people’s lives and fortunes.
As 1Ls, you are beginning the process of developing
these legal skills. You are also beginning the process of
learning the substantive rules of several critical areas of
law. To pass the bar, you need to be able to:
- read a case,
- recognize significant and non-significant facts,
- identify issues,
- understand rules of law and exceptions to the rules,
- apply rules to facts, and
- communicate your reasoning skills.
Beginning in the Fall of your first year, you should be on the
way to learning these fundamental skills. Over the succeeding
months, you are getting to know the different areas of the law
and the types of issues that arise in each area.
Two and a half years later, you take a bar preparation
course to show you how to pass the bar. But what were you
paying tuition for the last three years? Virtually everybody
takes one or more bar prep courses.
The "full service" courses do three things. First, they
guide you in reviewing the material that you did in fact learn in
law school. Second, they provide you with a "crash course" and
"quick and dirty" coverage of areas that you did not get to in
your law school course (there are always such areas). Finally,
they give you insight into what the specific law is in your jurisdiction
and what the local bar examiners are looking for in the
essay portion of the test. Some bar courses specialize in helping
you pass the multiple choice part or the essay part.
Bar Studies 101
So what is this thing called "THE BAR?" Hopefully, the
following material will give you a basic understanding.
First thing to know: there is no such thing as THE Bar !!!!!
- The bar exam differs from state to state.
- Most jurisdictions offer the bar twice a year:
July and February;
- There are three possible components to any bar:
- The MBE (the Multi-state Bar Exam),
- The Essay Section and
- The Performance Test.
- The MBE is now on almost every bar exam and is uniformly
administered across the country on the last
Wednesday of July and of February.
- The majority of states give the Essay section on the
Tuesday before the MBE; several, however, give it on
the Thursday after. If one chooses the right states, it is
possible to take two bars at the same time, but there are
dangers in doing so.
- Each jurisdiction has its own rules about whether to
treat the MBE and the Essay sections equally, as well as
what is an acceptable passing score.
- Most jurisdictions test for two days. Approximately a
quarter of the states, however, have bars that last into a
third day. One state is a day and a half.
- The MBE is used as part of "the BAR" in all but three
jurisdictions — Louisiana, Washington and Puerto Rico.
More Bar Counsel on the next page...
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