The bar exam is an important outcome measure of whether our graduates are learning the basic competencies expected of new lawyers. As the ABA Managing Director reminded us in his memo of June 2015, however, it can no longer be the principal measure of student learning. Thus, we’re directed to look for other evidence of learning in our programs of legal education, hence the new focus on programmatic assessment.

Nevertheless, the ABA has wisely retained a minimal bar passage requirement in Standard 316, described in greater detail here. It is an important metric for prospective students. It is also an indicator of the quality of a school’s admission standards and, indirectly, its academic program. Indeed, it has been the subject of much debate recently. A proposal would have simplified the rule by requiring law schools to demonstrate that 75% of their graduates had passed a bar exam within two years of graduation. For a variety of reasons, the Council of the Section of Legal Education and Admission to the Bar recently decided to postpone moving forward with this change and leave Standard 316 written as-is.

With that background, Friday afternoon the ABA Associate Deans’ listserv received a message from William Adams, Deputy Managing Director of the ABA.  In it, he described a new process for collecting data on bar passage. A copy of the memo is on the ABA website. This change was authorized at the June 2017 meeting of the Council.  Readers may remember that the June meeting was the one that led to a major dust-up in legal education, when it was later revealed that the Council had voted to make substantial (and some would say, detrimental) changes to the Employment Questionnaire. When this came to light through the work of Jerry Organ and others, the ABA wisely backed off this proposed change and indicated it would further study the issue.

The change that the ABA approved in June and announced in greater detail on Friday is equally problematic.   Continue reading →