MinnLawyer Blog

There is an interesting conversation going on in the comments section of a prior post on the topic of whether or not the Minnesota bar exam is too easy.

Here’s an interesting statistic from a 2007 report by the National Confernce of Bar Examiners. Minnesota had the third highest bar pass rate in the nation that year (89 percent). Only Wisconsin and Montana had higher pass rates in 2007 (both 89 percent). One jurisdiction, the Northern Mariana Islands (a commonwealth of the United States), was tied with Minnesota at 88 percent. Every other jurisdiction had a lower pass rate. The lowest pass rate was in California, where only 49 percent of bar exam takers passed in 2007. Does this mean our exam is easier — or are test takers here, in the words of Garrison Keillor, just all above average?

Interestingly, the conference also broke the statistics down, providing separate pass rates for test takers from ABA accredited schools and those from schools not accredited by the ABA.  Perhaps not surprisingly, grads of ABA accredited schools fared much better on the whole. I suppose that $30K plus a year for tuition ought to be worth something …. For the full report, click here.

And of course there’s always the bigger question: Should bar exam results — which have no direct correlation to whether or not someone is a good lawyer — be given any weight at all? Or are they merely an artificial barrier to entry in the legal profession to keep out those who do not test well?