Bar Pass Rates

Discussion in 'General Distance Learning Discussions' started by kajidoro, Nov 27, 2002.

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  1. kajidoro

    kajidoro New Member

    From the latest Bar results just released (NOT Baby Bar):

    "...Monday's statistics, which show that 68.5 percent of first-time applicants from California schools approved by the ABA passed the exam, while 66.5 percent of students from ABA-approved schools outside the state passed. By comparison, only 29.7 percent of the applicants from schools accredited by the State Bar's Committee of Bar Examiners passed the test. The pass rate for students from non-accredited schools stood at 20 percent. "
     
  2. tcnixon

    tcnixon Active Member




    In other words, for most folks earning a California law degree through an unaccredited school may not be a good choice. My guess is that you have to be better at learning the law than a traditional b & m law student. It's a lot to learn solely by reading books.



    Tom Nixon
     
  3. BillDayson

    BillDayson New Member

    One thing that strikes me is the relatively poor showing of the Cal Bar accredited law schools (some are RA, others CA-approved). These places came in closer to the flat-out unaccredited schools than to the ABA schools.

    I think that the situation might even be worse than it first appears, since a few of the Cal Bar schools maintain a pretty high pass rate and probably drive up the mean.

    San Francisco Law School (CA-approved and Cal Bar accredited) says:

    Approximately one-third of the students who begin successfully complete the program, and of those, roughly 75% ultimately pass the State Bar Examination.

    (BTW, SF Law has produced some pretty illustrious graduates, including former CA Governor Edmund G. (Pat) Brown (Jerry Brown's dad), former CA Lt. Governor Leo McCarthy, former Undersecretary of the US Dept. of Energy Joseph Salgado, former President of the California State Bar P. Terry Anderlini and a host of California judges.)

    According to the State Bar, California has 62 law schools, a surprisingly high number. 19 are ABA (all RA), 19 are Cal Bar accredited (some are RA, some CA-approved), and 24 are non-CalBar accredited (all CA-approved and one DETC). Of these 24, 12 are DL and 12 residential. Neither the ABA or the California State Bar Association are willing to accredit DL law schools.
     
  4. BillDayson

    BillDayson New Member

    Re: Re: Bar Pass Rates

    I wonder what the base-line pass rate for the bar exam would be:

    Suppose that students didn't go to law school at all. Imagine that they were just handed the syllabi for law school courses by their law student friends, provided lists of study topics and reading assignments, and were told to go buy some law books and get reading.

    Now suppose that they were allowed to take the Baby Bar, which would separate out those who were serious and who were actually willing to work. Now suppose that these totally independent-study law students took the bar. What kind of pass rate would they turn in?

    The non-CalBar schools turned in 20%. 1/2 of those schools are residential, which I would guess have a higher performance than the DL schools. Among the latter, Oak Brook drives up the mean.

    I'm just speculating, but I wonder how much better some of the 12 DL law schools are compared to receiving no law instruction at all. Apart from the formal matter of qualifying students to take the exams, is there really any value added compared to independent study?
     

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