California Supreme Court orders return to Multistate Bar Examination, lowers bar pass score
The State Bar of California, still reeling from the disastrous February launch of its bar exam written in conjunction with Kaplan, was recently hit with California Supreme Court orders mandating the return to the Multistate Bar Examination in July and lowering the bar pass score for the February examinees.
On Monday, the state bar announced that 55.9% of February test-takers had passed, compared to 34% in February 2024. It is the highest spring pass rate since 1965, according to a news release from the state bar. The results were originally scheduled for release May 2.
However, a big reason why the percentage was so high was because passing scores were lowered as a remedy following the administration of the remote February test, which had widespread technical glitches and failures.
On Friday, the California Supreme Court directed that for the next administration of the bar exam, the state bar must scrap its new exam’s 200 multiple-choice questions and replace them with the MBE—the widely used exam developed by the National Conference of Bar Examiners. This follows the late April revelation that some of the questions were drafted by nonlawyers with help from artificial intelligence, unbeknownst to the state’s highest court.
Though the bar’s petition stated that the February exam contained a sufficient number of reliable multiple-choice questions, “the court remains concerned over the processes used to draft those questions, including the previously undisclosed use of artificial intelligence,” according to the order.
The NCBE has been in touch with the State Bar of California about using the exam in July, says Sophie Martin, the NCBE’s director of communications.
“To the best of our knowledge, no decision has been made by the court regarding future administrations,” she adds.
The Uniform Bar Exam, including the MBE portion, will sunset following the February 2028 administration and will be replaced by the NextGen Uniform Bar Examination.
This follows the California Supreme Court’s March 4 order directing the state bar “to plan on administering the July 2025 California bar examination in the traditional in-person format.”
The return to the MBE does not surprise some.
“Nothing that has occurred after the botched test would lead a reasonable court to believe that the problems will be fixed by July,” says Sean Silverman, owner of Silverman Bar Exam & LSAT Tutoring. “It would have been reckless for the court to decide anything other than a return to the MBE for this next exam.”
California moved to a hybrid and remote exam prompted by financial issues, and the state bar last summer signed a five-year $8.25 million agreement with Kaplan to write the exam. Launched in February, the exam was plagued with widespread technical and administrative problems.
“In California, the change was never about developing an exam that was superior to the MBE,” wrote Dean E. Barbieri, the former director of examinations at the state bar, to the ABA Journal. “It was always about trying to save money due to prior mismanagement and the desire to offer a high-stakes exam remotely.”
Additionally, the Friday court order approved the state bar’s request to adjust the raw pass score to 534, lower than the 560 recommended by the testing expert, for February examinees because of the multitude of technical and logistical issues that they faced.
“Despite this, many February bar takers will fail, not because they were not properly prepared or minimally competent but because the disruptions they encountered were too substantial to overcome,” says Mary Basick, the assistant dean of academic skills at the University of California at Irvine School of Law.
The state bar’s Committee of Bar Examiners discussed other nonscoring options its Monday meeting, including provisional licensure, a supervised practice pathway and special admissions for attorneys licensed in other states.
The Friday court order also came hours after Leah Wilson, the state bar’s executive director, announced that she will step down. Her last day will be July 7, retiring from work with the state.
More than 5,600 candidates originally had registered to take the new exam, but about 1,300 withdrew after the troubled run-up to the exam, according to the state bar.
See also:
California state bar sues vendor after troubled exam
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