Florida has canceled the upcoming administration of the bar exam, which was slated to take place July 28 and 29.

Instead, the state will give an abbreviated online version of the test on August 18, according to an announcement Wednesday by the Florida Board of Bar Examiners. That announcement did not offer a reason for the change, but the number of COVID-19 cases in the state has surged in recent weeks, prompting renewed calls for alternatives to the two-day, in-person attorney licensing exam.

The Board of Law Examiners and the Florida Supreme Court had come under increasing criticism from recent law graduates and legal academics over its plans to hold an-in person exam this month. Examinees have sent several petitions calling for the state to adopt an emergency diploma privilege or move the test online. Florida State Representative Carlos Smith took to Twitter last month to question the wisdom of holding the bar exam in person.

"We've heard from lots of people rightfully concerned about taking the Florida bar exam (while packed together with 1K+ people for two days) as new COVID cases continue to surge in our area—especially among young people," reads his tweet. "Why are we doing this???"

Brian Heckmann, a recent graduate of Florida International University College of Law who planned to take the July bar, said Wednesday that bar officials waited far too long to cancel the exam.

"This may be too little too late," he said. "There were already a significant number of applicants planning on deferring and unable to effectively study for the last 3-4 weeks while the [Florida Board of Bar Examiners] failed to publicly respond to the situation."

The state board of law examiners announced on May 6 that it would move forward with the July test, making it the largest bar exam jurisdiction to stick with the traditional July date without a backup administration of the test in September. In 2019, 2,688 sat for the bar there. Officials at the time said they were adding an additional testing site in Orlando, on top of the usual location in Tampa.

The new one-day online test will consist of 100 multiple-choice questions and three essay questions, according to the board's announcement.