California’s HIGH BAR EXAM CUT SCORE IS FAILING COMMUNITIES OF COLOR
“California’s unjustifiably high cut score has a disparate impact on people from underserved and middle-class communities.” - Jeffrey L. Bleich, former State Bar president, U.S. Ambassador, and special counsel to President Barack Obama.
UPDATE 07.16.20: SUCCESS!
Last fall, 60 organizations joined us in advocating for a more inclusive bar that is representative of the people and values of our state. Today, the California Supreme Court took action on our request by permanently lowering the cut score of the bar exam to from 1440 to 1390. This will have significant impact on access to justice and diversity and we are very happy the Court made this bold move.
Based on a study commissioned by the bar in 2017, lowering the cut score to 1390 (which is what the Supreme Court decided yesterday) would increase bar passage rates overall by 20.3%--but by racial group, it would increase passage by 40.4% Black test-takers, 26.1% Latin@ test-takers, 23.5% Asian test-takers, 17.3% white test-takers, and 26.9% “Others.” So, the decision by the Supreme Court is huge to advance diversity among the legal profession in California.
California’s HIGH CUT SCORE is FAILING COMMUNITIES OF COLOR
California’s “cut score” to pass the state bar exam is the second highest in the country, far above the national median and states with similar legal markets. Yet evidence overwhelmingly shows that the cut score has a discriminatory impact on aspiring lawyers of color, without any proof that they are less prepared to take the exam or become attorneys. Each year, over 1,000 California bar applicants fail the exam with scores that would qualify them to practice law in New York, Texas, Pennsylvania, Illinois, and many other states.
Test-takers who fail the bar often lose job offers and go deeper into debt while they take it again. Many abandon pursuit of a legal career altogether. The high cut score perpetuates California’s predominantly white legal profession, which does not reflect the diverse racial and ethnic make-up of our state. Many leaders in our community, like former State Bar President Jeff Bleich, have called out the harmful impact of California’s inexplicably high bar exam cut score.
The ACLU of California, California ChangeLawyers, and The Impact Fund are teaming up with bar associations, civil rights organizations, and prominent lawyers in California to demand change to the bar exam. We are asking the California Supreme Court, which oversees the State Bar, to align the cut score with the national median score while it reevaluates the content and scoring of the bar exam. By law, the bar exam must measure whether someone is “minimally competent” to become a licensed attorney. It should reflect actual lawyering, and not serve as a barrier to entry that discriminates against people of color.
Voices Calling to Adjust the California Bar’s Cut Score
Comments from ACLU California, Change Lawyers, and The Impact Fund to the State Bar of California’s Task Force on Access Through Innovation of Legal Services (Sep. 23, 2019)
Jeffrey Bleich,Former State Bar President, We must set a reasonable standard for passing the bar, Daily Journal (Aug. 7, 2019).
L. Song Richardson, Dean of UC Irvine School of Law, quoted in Cheryl Miller, Critics Link California’s Bar Exam to Lack of Bench, Bar Diversity, The Recorder (May 15, 2019).
How Can California Increase the Diversity of the Legal Profession and the Judiciary? Hearing Before the California Assembly Comm. on Judiciary (May 14, 2019).
Jennifer Mnookin, The Time Is Now For California To Lower Its Bar Exam Pass Score, Above The Law (Jan. 15, 2019).
David L. Faigman, Stephen C. Ferruolo & Jennifer L. Mnookin, Op-Ed: Why is it so much harder to become a lawyer in California than in New York?, Los Angeles Times (Nov. 29, 2018).
Letter from Professor Deborah Jones Merritt, John Deaver Drinko Baker & Hostetler Chair in Law at the Ohio State University, Moritz College of Law, to California Supreme Court, Docket Number S244281: In re California Bar Exam (Oct. 1, 2017).
Declining Passage Rates on the California Bar Exam: Possible Explanations and Impacts,Hearing Before the California Assembly Comm. on Judiciary (Feb. 14, 2017)
Letter from the Deans of 20 ABA-accredited law schools in California to the Supreme Court of California, Re: The California Bar Exam (Feb. 1, 2017).
Additional Resources
RJ Vogt, Could Changing the Bar Exam Help Close the Justice Gap?, Law360 (Aug. 11, 2019).
State Bar of California, Advancing Diversity and Inclusion in the Legal Profession (May 14, 2019).
Selby Kia, California lawyer hopefuls disadvantaged by unnecessarily high cut score, Daily Bruin (Jan. 14, 2019).
Sawsan Morrar, Should state adopt lower passing score for the bar exam? Current one may harm students of color, Sacramento Bee (Jan. 7, 2019).
Letter from the Supreme Court of California, Re: S244281—In re CALIFORNIA BAR EXAM (Oct. 18, 2017).
State Bar of California, Report to the Supreme Court of the State of California: Final Report on the 2017 California Bar Exam Standard Setting Study (July 28, 2017).
Dominic Fracassa, California bar exam’s passing score should be lowered, critics say, S.F. Chronicle (Mar. 13, 2017)
State Bar of California, Exam Statistics.
