CA bar passage rates

[jamiejamie]

I never realized how many unaccredited, accredited but not ABA approved, and correspondence law schools there are (at least in CA). Below is a link to the CA bar passage rates for July 2004:

http://www.calbar.ca.gov/calbar/pdfs/admissions/GBX/JULY2004STATS.pdf#search='general%20statistics%20report%20july%202004%20california%20bar'

It appears that some schools have almost no one passing the bar exam! Imagine if a prospective student asked the admissions staff at the University of Northern California, Lorenzo Patino School of Law about the bar passage rates, and they had to tell them that 0 of 20 first time takers passed the last exam, but on a positive note 2 of 18 repeat takers were successful! 

[BoscoBreaux]

I never realized how many unaccredited, accredited but not ABA approved, and correspondence law schools there are (at least in CA). Below is a link to the CA bar passage rates for July 2004:

http://www.calbar.ca.gov/calbar/pdfs/admissions/GBX/JULY2004STATS.pdf#search='general%20statistics%20report%20july%202004%20california%20bar'

It appears that some schools have almost no one passing the bar exam! Imagine if a prospective student asked the admissions staff at the University of Northern California, Lorenzo Patino School of Law about the bar passage rates, and they had to tell them that 0 of 20 first time takers passed the last exam, but on a positive note 2 of 18 repeat takers were successful! 

it is ironic: California has the toughest bar in the country BY FAR, and at the same time, you can graduate from an unaccredited school and take it all the same.

[InVinoVeritas]

i think the CA bar is as difficult as it is precisely because non-ABA school graduates are allowed to sit for the exam.  since the ABA can't serve as a standardizing body for law school quality and hence, law school graduate quality, the bar exam has to fill that roll instead.

[bruin]

That certainly sounds like a reasonable explanation. Though I think part of the reason for the difficulty of the CA bar is simply wanting to limit the amount of new lawyers in CA, from these non-ABA schools as well as from out -of state schools.

[ronin3782]

CA for natives only! UT and UNC both help in-state applicants by quota filling...why does UC have to be so nice? Keep California tanned, beautiful, and fat people free. Down with the influx of out-of-staters! 

[RocketBot]

Hehe, Emory's 90% passage rate beats out every other school but Stanford.  Then again they only had 10 sitting.

[RocketBot]

Interesting

For those considering University of Michigan, more Michigan grads sat for the CA exam than any non-CA school except for Georgetown.  Obviously has something to do with the school size, too...  but nothing wrong with a solid alumni network to pave the way.

Michigan certainly does seem to place well on the West coast, which is why I'll give an acceptance next year quite a lot of consideration

[Highway]

What was most interesting on that site was that the correspondence schools have a better bar passage rate than the non-ABA schools with actual sites!

[gobig]

Thanks for the link jwaxjwax. What's particularly interesting to me is that the U.S. news and world report rankings use the bar passage rates for schools to determine their place in the tiers. Certainly I'm not advocating that they not look at the figures, but why don't they average say, the last three years or even two years for each school? USF dropped down thirty places in the rankings from last year to this year. That drop is due in large part to the fact that ten more students failed the bar this year than last year. Those ten students can change the passage rate substantially but does that mean that the school's ranking should be so heavily affected? On another note, Golden Gate at 32% OUCH. GGU already has an incredibly high attrition rate something like one-third. Then only one-third of those that make it through the three years to sit for the bar actually pass! Talk about the odds being stacked against you. When this year's 1Ls get to GGU on the first day they should take a look around and realizing that most, the vast majority, of the people sitting with them won't ever become a practicing attorney.

[kristay]

Thanks for the link jwaxjwax. What's particularly interesting to me is that the U.S. news and world report rankings use the bar passage rates for schools to determine their place in the tiers. Certainly I'm not advocating that they not look at the figures, but why don't they average say, the last three years or even two years for each school? USF dropped down thirty places in the rankings from last year to this year. That drop is due in large part to the fact that ten more students failed the bar this year than last year. Those ten students can change the passage rate substantially but does that mean that the school's ranking should be so heavily affected? On another note, Golden Gate at 32% OUCH. GGU already has an incredibly high attrition rate something like one-third. Then only one-third of those that make it through the three years to sit for the bar actually pass! Talk about the odds being stacked against you. When this year's 1Ls get to GGU on the first day they should take a look around and realizing that most, the vast majority, of the people sitting with them won't ever become a practicing attorney.

USF did NOT drop 30 places.  They were 94 (I think) last year.  This year they are 3rd tier.  The 3rd tier is not ranked.