California will release results of the February 2011 Bar Exam on Friday, May 13, 2011.  Results will be mailed to applicants.  Applicants will be able to access the pass list that evening, beginning at 6:00 p.m.  PST using their applicant number and file number.  The pass list will be available to the public beginning Sunday, May 15, 2011 at 6:00 a.m. PST.  For more information, visit the State Bar of California website.  Good luck to everyone awaiting the news!

Results from the February 2011 Louisiana Bar Examination will be posted on Thursday, April 21st, 2011 after 9:00 a.m. at the Supreme Court of Louisiana’s website and also on the walls of the Supreme Court.  Good luck to all the candidates!

Idaho will release results of the February 2011 bar exam to students after 9:00 a.m. Mountain Time on Thursday, April 14th, 2011.  The list of passing students will be arranged alphabetically by last name at the Idaho State Bar website.  The licensing and admissions packets will be mailed to  successful applicants on April 14th and the required paperwork and payments must be received by Monday, April 25th, 2011.  The admission ceremony will be Thursday, April 28th, 2011, before the Idaho Supreme Court and U.S. District Court of Idaho, at the Capital Building in Boise, ID.  Good luck to all the 2011 candidates!

The Kansas Board of Law Examiners released results of the February 2011 Kansas Bar Exam to candidates on Friday, April 1st.   Results are posted on the Board of Law Examiners website with a list of the passing applicants by examinee number.  Official results have been mailed to each applicant and the names of successful applicants will be posted to the site after April 29th, 2011.  Congratulations to all of those who passed!

Results from the February 2011 Illinois Bar Examination were released Friday, April 1st.  Results may be accessed by logging in to the Board of Admissions website.  Notices have been individually posted to exam takers on their personal accounts at www.ibaby.org.  All certified candidates for admission to the bar must appear in open court to take the attorney’s oath and receive their license.  We will update this post when more information is available to the general public.  Congratulations to everyone in our home state!

Today, Wednesday, March 30th, 2011, North Carolina released results of the February 2011 bar exam to students.  Pass/fail letters were mailed from Raleigh on Saturday, March 26th, 2011.  The list of passing students is arranged alphabetically by last name at the North Carolina Board of Law Examiners website.  It can be accessed by clicking this link, then “Exam Results” on the left side, and then selecting “February 2011.”  Please note there are a number of people who passed the bar exam, but have NOT yet taken or passed the MPRE and are not on the list.  Congratulations to all the successful 2011 candidates!

Adam Ferber is the former Examinations Director for the State Bar of California and grader of 40 California Bar and First-Year Law Students’ Examinations.  He provides intensive, individualized tutoring and coaching to applicants for both exams, as well as counseling and advocacy for applicants appealing their unsuccessful exam results. Contact Adam at www.ferberbarreview.com or on Facebook at Ferber Bar Review – Student Resource Group.

Based on the results of empirical studies relative to reliability, scores have been established for passing and failing after one reading of the examination. For those applicants whose scores after the first read (Phase I) are near the required passing score, all answer books are read a second time, and the scores of the first and second readings are averaged. The total averaged score after two readings is then used to make a second set of pass/fail decisions, providing there are no grading discrepancies of more than 10 raw points between first and second read grades on any question (Phase II). Any answers with grading discrepancies more than 10 raw points between first and second read grades are read a third time before making the third set of pass/fail decisions.” DESCRIPTION AND GRADING OF THE CALIFORNIA BAR EXAMINATION– GENERAL BAR EXAMINATION AND ATTORNEYS’ EXAMINATION

Here’s how this translates.  Based on statistical information, the Committee of Bar Examiners believes that certain combined MBE, essay, and written scores indicate performance that is clearly passing or failing, no matter how many times the applicant’s work is graded.  These scaled scores are respectively, relatively far above and relatively far below, the “passing score” of 1440.

Although the Committee would prefer no variations in essay and performance test scores assigned to the same answer by different graders, it allows for them by the device of the “second read.”  Applicants whose scaled scores fall within a specified number points above or below a passing score, but who have not clearly passed or failed have their answers read a second time.  The ”first read” and “second read” scores are averaged, scaled and added to the MBE to constitute a total scaled score. If “first” and “second read” graders have differed by more than 10 raw points, the answer is read a third time before the results are totaled up. Applicants whose “second read” scores are above 1440 pass the exam. A “final read”  is provided to applicants who are still under 1440 after second read, but by a narrower margin than previously.  This “reappraisal” can only help an applicant; it will not depress his or her previous score.

Phased grading has at least two implications for your essay and performance test preparation.  One, of course, is that you should write to pass on “first read.”  The other is subtler.  It is that you should expect your writing to be seen by at least two and possibly four separate graders. Write for all of them.

Copyright 2010 Adam Ferber and www.ferberbarreview.com.  Reprinted by permission.

Adam Ferber is the former Examinations Director for the State Bar of California and grader of 40 California Bar and First-Year Law Students’ Examinations.  He provides intensive, individualized tutoring and coaching to applicants for both exams, as well as counseling and advocacy for applicants appealing their unsuccessful exam results. Contact Adam at www.ferberbarreview.com or on Facebook at Ferber Bar Review – Student Resource Group.

Unsuccessful applicants may seek reconsideration of their grades based on arithmetic or transpositional errors in the compiling of their scores or a departure from established procedures.  They may not challenge the evaluation of their answers, although many attempt to do so.”  October 26, 2009 Memorandum to California State Bar Board of Governors

When I was the Examinations Director for the State Bar, I received hundreds of letters from unsuccessful applicants requesting reconsideration of their grades on the California Bar Examination.

Most struck me as the applicants’ understandable efforts to “cover their bases” to assure that their answers were properly graded and the results added up correctly.  The Examinations Department duly checked the results.  Not a single “arithmetic or transpositional” error was discovered while I was Director.

Many were challenges to the grader judgments.  Often they enclosed one or more essay or performance test answers, “regraded” by a favorite professor or tutor, in support of their requests.  Since these were “challenge[s] to the evaluation of their answers,” I did not have authority to consider them.  I agreed with this limitation. I believed in the integrity of the bar examination grading system.  I believed in the expertise and professional integrity of the graders, many of whom I’d graded with and known for years.

However, I always felt that one very narrow ground for reconsideration was underutilized and not fully understood by applicants.  “Departure from established procedures” is applicable most often to a disturbance at the applicant’s test site.  Examples are power failures and excessive noise from inside or outside of the test site.  When applicants report these incidents and seek reconsideration, the Committee of Bar Examiners pays attention.  It often requests that its psychometrician conduct a statistical study to determine whether the request has merit.  These sorts of studies rarely come down on the applicant’s side. However, one thing that the Committee does not do is investigate whether, notwithstanding the outcome of the study, the applicant suffered a unique, individual disadvantage.  I always thought that a properly documented request on this ground could succeed.

Test site incidents are rare, but they do happen.  If you believe that your grades suffered as a result, speak up

Copyright 2010 Adam Ferber and www.ferberbarreview.com.  Reprinted by permission.

The State of Maine Board of Bar Examiners released results of the July 2010 Bar Exam in mid-October.  The names of those who were successful are posted in alphabetical order by last name at the Board of Bar Examiners website.  Congratulations to all passing candidates!

New Hampshire released results of the July 2010 Bar Exam in late September.  The names of those who were successful are posted in alphabetical order by last name at the Judicial Branch website.  Congratulations to all passing candidates!