Oak brook How do they do it?

Just curious how OaK Brook School of Law has these crazy pass rates? What do they do...

Are they internet based like Concord/ALU?

 

You can search for OBCL, they've been discussed numerous times.

In a nutshell, though, OBCL requires its students to attend a week-long (?) orientation/indoctrination seminar. The other correspondence schools don't have a similar method of weeding out the people who won't be as dedicated to studying.

 

My guess is that the type of student who is attracted to OBCL is quite different than is attracted to the other schools. I would not be surprised if that is one factor.



Tom Nixon

 

Higher pass rates

Like most law schools with unusually high pass rates, on or off campus, they strongly teach to the exam.

 

teaching to the exam

This is a very interesting comment.

Conventional law schools theoretically don't teach to the exam, in fact, don't really lay much stress on the practical skills of lawyering, unlike medical schools which are at least half clinical experience.

This is called the "graduate school model of legal education." It has some consequences.

In the UK, the LL.B. is an undergraduate degree that does not qualify the graduate to practice or teach. Professional education is in the hands of the legal professions, not the universities. An aspiring law teacher or academic must seek an advanced degree or degrees in law.

In the U.S., the J.D. does it all. It is the entire professional education as well as being the entire academic background necessary to teach or do research. Teaching to the exam is, at least in theory, a disservice to the student, the profession, and the academy.

In theory, anyway.

 

Last I saw, Oakbrook's pass rate wasn't particularly 'crazy'. It was about the same as NWCU and Taft, and overlapped the low end of ABA law schools in California.

I certainly wouldn't choose them, in part because they would probably reject me on religious/political grounds.

Why do they do well? Perhaps part of the reason is that they have a pretty strong agenda. They exist to train religious-right activists and probably attract, and select for, people with a sense of mission. That's compared to DL law schools that attract a lot of students who just want a career change and think "Maybe I'll become an attorney". The Oakbrook students might be more motivated to put in hard work and to stick with it.

Another thing that can really effect final bar-exam pass rates is midcourse attrition. Schools can kind of artificially manipulate their graduates' overall pass-rate by either flunking out or passing low-performing students. I suspect that many of these non-accredited DL law schools are profit-making enterprises and are prone to passing and ultimately graduating students that are unlikely to ever pass the bar exam, just so long as the tuition keeps flowing in.

Finally, it's possible that Oakbrook offers good instruction and a well thought out DL law program.

I'm inclined to suspect that all three of these reasons apply: a more motivated student body with a sense of mission, the likelihood that weaker students are culled before they attempt the exam, and good instruction, at least by comparison to the competition.