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State Bar announces results for July 2016 California Bar Examination

July 2016 Bar Exam Results

California Bar Exam Pass Rate Summaries

SAN FRANCISCO, Nov. 18, 2016 6 p.m. – The State Bar of California's Committee of Bar Examiners reported today that 43 percent of the applicants passed the July 2016 General Bar Examination (GBX). If the 3,332 people who passed the July 2016 exam satisfy other requirements for admission, they will become members of the State Bar, and therefore licensed to practice law in California.

Preliminary statistical analyses show that of the 7,737 applicants who took the GBX, 66.7 percent were first-time takers. The passing rate for the 5,164 first-time applicants was 56 percent overall. The passing rate for the 2,573 applicants repeating the examination was 17 percent overall.

Preliminary statistical analyses show the first-time and repeater percent passing the GBX (rounded to whole numbers) by law school type as follows:

School Type	First-Timers	Repeaters
California ABA	62%	23%
Out-of-State ABA	60%	20%
California Accredited (but not ABA)	21%	9%
Unaccredited: Fixed-Facility	32%	5%
Unaccredited: Correspondence	13%	7%
Unaccredited Distance Learning	26%	9%

 

The applicants not included in the above totals either were attorneys admitted in other states who either chose or were required to take the GBX, attorneys admitted in foreign jurisdictions, law students in the Law Office/Judge’s Chambers Study Program or law students who qualified to take the GBX through four years of law study. More detailed statistics will be made available in approximately four weeks and published on the State Bar’s website at calbar.ca.gov/admissions.

The three-day General Bar Examination is given twice a year in February and July. The exam consists of three sections: a multiple-choice Multistate Bar Examination (MBE), six essay questions and two performance tests that are designed to assess an applicant's ability to apply general legal knowledge to practical tasks. The mean scaled MBE score in California was 1421 compared with the national average of 1403.

In addition, the committee announced that 149 (36.3 percent) of the 410 lawyers who took the Attorneys' Examination passed. Out of the total taking the Attorneys’ Examination, 17 were disciplined lawyers who took the examination as a condition of reinstatement; two disciplined lawyers passed. The Attorneys' Examination, which consists of the essay and performance test sections of the GBX, is open to lawyers who have been admitted to the active practice of law in good standing for at least four years in another United States jurisdiction.

Successful applicants who have satisfied other requirements for admission – those who have not been reported by local district attorneys for being in arrears with family or child support payments, who have received a positive moral character determination and who have passed the Multistate Professional Responsibility Examination – may either take the Attorney's Oath individually or participate in admissions ceremonies held throughout the state during December 2016.

The next administration of the California Bar Exam will be Feb. 21, 22 and 23, 2017.

Once applicants have met all admission requirements and have taken the attorney’s oath, they become members of the State Bar of California, licensing them to practice law in this state, and their names will appear on the bar’s website via the attorney search function. The list of successful applicants will not be released to the public in compliance with the limitations imposed by Business and Professions Code section 6026.11, which makes the State Bar subject to the California Public Records Act, and the associated Admissions statute (B&P Code § 6060.25), which prohibits the release of information regarding bar admission applicants. Test-takers may log on to see whether their names appear on the pass list.