It's Time to Replace the California Bar Exam
"When all of the options are carefully evaluated and no workable solutions exist, it is time to move into the modern age and chart a new path—one without an exam," says Susan Smith Bakhshian, professor and director of bar programs at LMU Loyola Law School.
July 16, 2020 at 07:09 PM
5 minute read
A fair bar exam cannot be administered today. The State Bar and the California Supreme Court have spent months unsuccessfully searching for a way to offer the bar exam. This must stop. When all of the options are carefully evaluated and no workable solutions exist, it is time to move into the modern age and chart a new path—one without an exam. The focus on an exam to the exclusion of all other solutions has left California with no plan at all.
Law schools and their graduates have waited patiently hoping for an announcement that would be more thoughtful and workable than some of the jurisdictions who rushed their plans and later had to change course. But the delays continue and no plan emerges for California. Meanwhile, graduates do not have unlimited money to support themselves, or unlimited time to wait for their licensing process to be complete.
The lack of leadership by the California Supreme Court and the California State Bar is an embarrassment. To insist upon a licensing exam that has been under attack for years is indefensible as a pandemic rages on. No one has produced any data to support the notion that somehow a high-stakes licensing exam leads to better attorneys. No one has suggested a way to offer an exam without serious health risks. Yet the State Bar and the Supreme Court remain steadfast in their commitment to an exam.
This content has been archived. It is available through our partners, LexisNexis® and Bloomberg Law.
To view this content, please continue to their sites.
Not a Lexis Subscriber?
Subscribe Now
Not a Bloomberg Law Subscriber?
Subscribe Now
NOT FOR REPRINT
© 2024 ALM Global, LLC, All Rights Reserved. Request academic re-use from www.copyright.com. All other uses, submit a request to [email protected]. For more information visit Asset & Logo Licensing.
Trending Stories
- 1The Law Firm Disrupted: For Big Law Names, Shorter is Sweeter
- 2Wine, Dine and Grind (Through the Weekend): Summer Associates Thirst For Experience in 'Real Matters'
- 3The 'Biden Effect' on Senior Attorneys: Should I Stay or Should I Go?
- 4BD Settles Thousands of Bard Hernia Mesh Lawsuits
- 5First Lawsuit Filed Alleging Contraceptive Depo-Provera Caused Brain Tumor
Featured Firms
Law Offices of Gary Martin Hays & Associates, P.C.
(470) 294-1674
Law Offices of Mark E. Salomone
(857) 444-6468
Smith & Hassler
(713) 739-1250