Bar passage rates improve for ABA-approved law schools

Data released Feb. 18 by the American Bar Association Section of Legal Education and Admissions to the Bar indicate that 9 of 10 recent law graduates are passing state licensing exams within two years, and the first-time bar passage rate jumped 5 percentage points over the previous year.

That’s good news for the 200 law schools nationally accredited by the section’s Council under an agreement with the U.S. Department of Education. Last year, a simplified and stronger bar passage threshold, known as Standard 316, took effect that requires 75% of a school’s graduates who sit for the bar to pass it within two years.

Approximately 5% of the ABA-approved law schools nationally fell short of the threshold and could be asked to develop plans to achieve compliance within two years.

Barry Currier, the managing director for ABA accreditation and legal education, said the report provides “important consumer information for students considering whether and where to attend law school and for others with an interest in legal education.”

Specifically, the new data shows that collectively 89.5% of 2017 law graduates who sat for a bar exam passed it within two years of graduation. The two-year “ultimate” aggregate success rate is slightly better than the 88.64% comparable figure for 2016 graduates. First-time takers in 2019 achieved an aggregate 79.64% pass rate, which is nearly a 5-percentage point increase over the comparable 74.83% pass rate from a year earlier.

Currier believes there is “no other single outcome that better measures whether a law school is offering a rigorous program of legal education” than a school’s bar passage rate, which is collected and published annually by the Council. 

Related links:

• ABA Section of Legal Education releases comprehensive report on bar passage data
  
• ABA required law school disclosures
• ABA law school standards
• ABA Journal: Law schools see an increase in bar passage rates, new ABA data shows
• Standard 316 memorandum, and Standard 316 Q&A, ABA Section of Legal Education and Admissions to the Bar (May 6, 2019)