You can be inundated with a wealth of information, which in short will yield little to nothing in return. You can fill a hotel full of law outlines, attempt to memorize all of them, and then find yourself returning again for the next exam administration.  The truth is that most people can memorize the law, but few people truly know how to take the test.  Technique is at least as important as substance and usually more so as it relates to bar exam review.

A Contract is a Contract and a Tort is a Tort.  There are only so many ways that we can “spin” the definition of assault, but there are many different ways we can present it on an exam.  Think of it this way: If 100% of bar applicants can memorize the definition of an assault, then why do over 50% of the applicants fail the exam?  Obviously you are tested on more than just assault, but as a whole, the law and the definitions do not change.  If we can memorize it all, then in theory we should all pass.  Sadly this is not the case.  Presentation then becomes the key.  It is not about “What do I need to know?” but more about “How do I present what I know”.

The traditional bar exam preparation course does a proficient job in presenting you with the “What do I need to know” component.  It is however, a supplemental “crash course” that may offer you the key to success.  While the thought of taking yet another prep course may lead you to the edge, remember that what you do the last two weeks before the exam makes all the difference.

What’s my end game?  How do I tie it all together?  What exactly do I need to know?  How do I say it?  What do I do if I don’t know it? How do I maximize the time I have left? How do I retain the information?  What’s my strategy?

If you have an answer to all of the above, then you are ready to go!

If not, let those who know the answers help you out.

Be TOO prepared.

The California Bar exam is famous for being the most difficult exam administered in the United States.  Most law students approach graduation with mixed feelings; a sense of accomplishment after completing three to four years of hard work and dread for the three day exam that awaits them right after graduation. Those students are fortunate in that they are still in “study mode” and are often able to push through the three months of intense preparation for the bar as a continuation of their still ingrained study habits.

But what about those accomplished professionals and out of state attorneys who choose to sit for the California Bar Exam 15- 25 years post graduation?  Is it possible to learn how to study after being so far removed from a classroom setting?  In successfully preparing out of state attorneys and working professionals for the California Bar exam for over 17 years I am often presented with the question, “can I really do this”?  Yes you can, and in my experience, you will outperform those “kids” coming right out of school.  Experience has taught you that your time is precious and that every minute matters.  In designing a study plan specific to working professionals the Executive Bar Review Program maximizes your study time by tailoring a plan to your specific substantive and schedule requirements vs. saddling you with a cookie-cutter approach that does not approach you as an individual or a professional.

What tends to decrease as we advance in years is our ability to retain information.  Mainly because we simply have more information to store. This is easily overcome by presenting the bar exam applicant with short bursts of information.  ‘’Baby steps” I often joke, will help you to retain and understand the overwhelming amount of information.  The Executive Bar Review program presents a concept, reinforces it with a hypothetical, and then provides the tools necessary to imprint the information in a way that you can easily recall and implement on the exam

In preparing for the California exam, time management is essential.  That is why the Executive Bar Review program custom tailors a study program specifically designed for YOUR life.

A bit of advice:  If you are an out of state attorney seeking admission to California, or if you are a working professional planning to take the exam, give yourself enough time.  Cramming like a law student will not work.  It is much better to take a longer time period and gradually work towards mastering the material.

For practicing attorneys seeking admittance to the California Bar, the prospect of taking another bar exam can be can be tedious and daunting.  Seasoned attorneys choosing to re-locate to California or render advice to California clients find that “getting back to the books” is a challenge at best.  Having to memorize the fundamentals of contract formation while prepping for trial makes for a very irritated lawyer.  Common among practioners is the idea that after practicing for so many years, why in the world should one have to subject him or herself to an examination that neither proves relevant to their current field of practice or enhances their practical legal knowledge.  To add further insult to injury, California offers no reciprocity.  If you want to practice here, you must sit for the California bar exam.

There is some relief for those attorneys who have maintained an active status for a continuous five-year period. These candidates can opt for an abbreviated version of the California Bar Exam, The California Attorneys Exam which eliminates the MBE.  Even with the exclusion of the MBE, the pass rate for the California Attorney’s exam barely eeks above 30%, thereby creating a group of attorney applicants who attempt this exam more than once.  A host of theories account for such a low pass rate, but in reality the low pass rate is commonly due to the fact that professionals simply do not have the time to adequately prepare.  Traditional bar review programs offer no relief for time pressed attorneys.  Listening to hours of lectures and cutting out large blocks of time during the day simply does not work

Fedora J. Nick, founder and managing director of Executive Bar Review offers suggestions to mitigate the time constraints associated with bar exam preparation.  “Attorneys need to draw on their professional knowledge and skills to set themselves apart from the average bar exam candidate”, offers Nick.  “With the practice of law comes the ability to weed out the extraneous in favor of relevant law and fact.  “These skills are crucial to bar exam success,” adds Nick.

The Executive Bar Exam program custom tailors bar exam preparation with the busy attorney in mind.  Attorneys are paired with a licensed California bar exam expert, and a study plan is designed specifically for each exam candidate.  “We approach each attorney individually, working strictly on a one-on-one basis.  We know exactly when your motions are due, when you are scheduled to go to trial, and what transactional deadlines you are up against”, adds Nick.  “Most importantly, we know that schedules are bound to change without notice, and we go the extra mile to accommodate challenging calendars.  Our program works with each attorney, not the other way around.”

“Most importantly, we only teach you what you need to know to pass the exam.”

A? B? C? D? Tough call. All four answer choices seem plausible. This is a very common tale among bar exam applicants sitting for the Mulitstate Bar Exam, better known as the MBE.  The MBE is a 200 question multiple-choice exam administered in almost every state as part of each state’s own bar examination.  Covering 6 major subjects, the MBE tests substantive law and an applicant’s ability to comprehend the given fact pattern and correlate it with a given answer choice.

I have tutored bar exam applicants on a one-on-one basis for over a decade in preparation for the California Bar Examination.  Although most students are able to grasp the written aspects of the exam, they tend to find the MBE more consistently problematic.  Too often students tell me that even after they practice 5000 questions (yes, really 5000) they are barely able to score above a 65%.  The MBE is tricky; however it should be somewhat comforting to know that because it is an objective exam, there is only one right answer.  This is very important to note because if an answer choice is partly correct, or is subject to ambiguity or debate, it is by default the wrong choice.

Mastering the MBE is all about how one approaches the studying. As with most things, quality over quantity is key.  Learning how to take a multiple-choice exam is just as important as memorizing the law necessary to achieve a successful result.  Over the years I have developed proven techniques for success on the MBE. My first piece of advice is to not attempt it alone. Bar exam preparation courses are there to assist you with everything from subject matter outlines to work with, sample questions to practice with, and scheduling advice on how to best allocate your time.

As a private bar exam tutor and partner in a leading bar exam preparation course for over a decade, I have found that students have a very limited amount of time available to them to allocate to bar exam study and preparation.  Students are busy: families to support, hectic work schedules, etc.   Specific to the MBE, I recommend that all candidates start with a basic overview of the substantive law. Much too often candidates spend way too much time memorizing outlines and too little time practicing technique.  Mastering the law is important, but your ability to summarily dismiss certain answer choices that are clearly not correct is also key.

Here are some basic strategies on how to approach the MBE:

Study tip 1: Review one MBE subject at a time. For example, read a Tort outline and then focus on Tort MBE questions. Your first run through of an outline should be somewhat cursory; no more than 8 hours total. Remember that you already completed your coursework in Torts in law school, so although you think you do not remember the subject, it will start to come back to you.

Study tip 2: Know your definitions. Much of the MBE tests your knowledge of the black letter—memorize all your intentional torts by definition, followed by the elements of Negligence, followed by the elements of Defamation, etc.

Study tip 3: Verbalize your knowledge. The quickest way to memorize the law is to talk it out. Enlist the services of a friend, or simply talk to a mirror. If you can essentially “talk out” a subject, you will retain it.  I also suggest that my students record their own outlines, and then listen to their own voices for easier retention.

Study tip 4: When approaching an MBE question, read the call of the question first. It is the quickest way to get a handle on what the subject matter of the question is.  DO NOT read the answer choices yet. The key is to figure out the correct answer to the question before you even look at the answers.

Study tip 5: Read the fact pattern quickly and try to determine the central issue. For example, the central issue in a crimes fact pattern may surround a larceny.  The MBE tends to supply you with too many facts – many of which have little or no relevance.  In determining whether a larceny did or did not occur, you need to quickly look up from your paper, and say the definition of larceny to yourself.  If larceny is defined as the tresspassory taking and carrying of another’s property with the intent to permanently deprive, then you must quickly go to the answer choice which correctly identifies this point of law.

Study tip 6: Who wins? Based on the above, before going to the answer choice, determine who wins.  If the call of the question reads “Is A guilty of larceny” determine, based on your definition, if he is in fact guilty. If the answer is yes, then cross out the answer choices that state that he is not.  This method should narrow your choices down to two.

Study tip 7: Law always wins. If you are able to narrow your choices down to two, the problem is often that both remaining answers look good.  Another comment I often hear from students is “I can narrow it down to two choices, but I always pick the wrong one”. The general rule is that if an answer choice contains an accurate statement of the law, then it is the right choice.  If it is only a partial statement of the law, it is an incorrect choice. If one of the remaining answer choices contains an accurate statement of the law, and the other choice contains a correct factual statement, law wins.  Pick it and go to the next question.

Study tip 8: Implement “fact matching”. If the two remaining answer choices contain only factual information, meaning information from the fact pattern, try to match them up.  If the words in the answer choice appear in the fact pattern, this is most likely the correct response.

Study tip 9: Take a break. If you find yourself missing question after question, you are doing too much. You should practice no more than 50 MBE questions per sitting before taking at least a 30-minute break.  In addition, complete the 50 questions, and then look at the answers. You are not getting an accurate assessment of your score by bouncing back and forth between question and answer.

Study tip 10: Focus on the questions you miss. After completing a series of questions, take each question missed and write out a note card on the central issue. Figure out whether you missed the question based on the rule of law, or whether you missed it due to reading comprehension.  Isolate your area of weakness and then select additional questions within that area for practice.  
These study tips are simply a guideline to help increase your score.  With patience, and proper technique you can and will pass the MBE.  Good luck on the exam.

Fedora J. Nick is the managing director of Executive Bar Review. She has long been recognized nationally as a leading expert in the bar preparation field. Ms. Nick works with general bar exam and attorneys exam candidates through private one on one tutorials. She is the author of the NBR Performance Review, co-author of the NBR Hypothetical Enhancer Method and has lectured at top law schools and consulted for national bar exam programs including Emanuel Bar Review.  Ms. Nick received her JD from The American University Washington College of Law in 1995, where she served as the editor of American Jurist Magazine. She clerked for the Federal Communications Commission and worked in NBC’s Law & Government relations division. She is a member of the State Bar of California and is admitted to practice before the Ninth Circuit, Northern, Central, and Southern Districts of California. In June of 2000 she was admitted to practice before the Supreme Court of the United States.

Karen Sloan
October 28, 2010

What happens to law school graduates who fail the bar exam?

Scholars and researchers have largely ignored the topic, but a new paper in the Journal of Legal Education examines that question.

The paper, titled “Marooned: An Empirical Investigation of Law School Graduates Who Fail The Bar Exam,” concludes that, during the first five to 10 years out of law school, those who don’t pass the bar lag far behind their peers who do in areas such as earnings, job stability and marriage and divorce rates. Non-bar passers close that gap somewhat in the latter half of their careers, though they never fully catch up with most of their classmates who passed the bar. The paper concludes that the consequences of not passing the bar tend to dissipate around age 35.

Author Jane Yakowitz, who is the director of Project SEAPHE (The Scale and Effects of Admissions Preferences in Higher Education), analyzed data from the U.S. Census Bureau, the Law School Admissions Council, the National Association for Law Placement and the State Bar of California from the past four decades. She also conducted interviews with law graduates who failed the bar. One reason little research has been done on the subject is that those who fail the bar are very difficult to track, according to the paper. They are less likely to fill out law school alumni surveys, and state bar associations have little reason to track them.

“There are probably on the order of 150,000 law school graduates in the United States who have taken but never passed a bar exam; this amounts to one in 10 JDs and the risk falls disparately on black, Hispanic, and Asian law school graduates,” the paper reads.

Yakowitz warns that the traits that can contribute to failing the bar, such as a lack of motivation, may also be a factor in career success, thus it’s difficult to separate out what is a direct result of failing the bar.

A breakdown of median salaries showed that those who did not pass the bar and were under the age of 30 earned less than bar passers and college graduates. However, between the ages of 30 and 39, those who never passed the bar eclipsed the median earnings of college graduates, though they still lagged behind lawyers.

“Law schools owe it to their most at-risk prospective students to provide candid information about the probability and costs of failing the bar examination,” the paper reads.

By SHERRI M. OKAMOTO, Staff Writer

This district’s Court of Appeal yesterday sternly rebuked a Maryland lawyer who sued the State Bar of California over its exam grading review procedures after failing to gain admission for the third time.

Div. Two, in an unpublished opinion by Justice Judith M. Ashmann-Gerst, ruled that the sole venue in which attorney Joel D. Joseph could seek a hearing regarding the grading of his Bar exam was the California Supreme Court, and dismissed his assertion that this review procedure was unconstitutional as being “unfounded, and, quite frankly, offensive.”

Joseph told the MetNews yesterday that the he was only aware of one case in the past 150 years in which the California Supreme Court addressed the issue of attorney admissions, remarking:

“I can’t think of a more illusory remedy.”

The attorney, whose website indicates he has been practicing law for 36 years and is licensed in Maryland and multiple district and appellate courts, said he recently relocated to Los Angeles and took the February 2009 exam.

Fewer than 34 percent of the 4,084 applicants who took that test passed it, representing a seven-year low, according to figures released by the Committee of Bar Examiners.

Joseph remarked that “obviously something is wrong with this Bar exam if seasoned professionals and law professors can’t pass it,” pointing out former Stanford Law School Dean Kathleen Sullivan had failed the July 2005 test.

“I taught law school at George Washington University, I’ve written 10 books on law, I’ve had many cases go to the U.S. Supreme Court,” he said. “I know I passed, [the exam] was just graded wrong.”

When the State Bar declined to have Joseph’s exam answers reread or provide him with an opportunity to review the graders’ notes, the attorney filed suit in the Los Angeles Superior Court, claiming violations of due process and equal protection.

Judge Norman Tarle sustained the State Bar’s demurrer to the complaint, finding that issues regarding examination fees and scoring were encompassed by the Supreme Court’s inherent power to control attorney admissions.

Ashmann-Gerst agreed, explaining that the State Bar “acts as the California Supreme Court’s administrative assistant or adjunct in the areas of admissions and discipline of attorneys” but the Supreme Court “controls the admission process as part of its inherent power.”

Citing Business and Professions Code Sec. 6066—which provides that challenges to State Bar certification denials shall be “reviewed by the Supreme Court”—and case law “confirm[ing] that the Supreme Court’s jurisdiction over the attorney admissions process is not only original, but also inherent and plenary,” Ashmann-Gerst concluded that the superior court was an improper forum for Joseph to seek relief.

She further noted that Joseph was “well-aware” of the appropriate appeals procedure since he had previously—unsuccessfully—filed a petition for a writ of mandate with the California Supreme Court challenging the results of his July 2008 exam.

The justice went on to chastise Joseph for his “inflammatory and unsubstantiated comments…peppered throughout [his] briefs,” opining such remarks were “unnecessary and unprofessional,” and that “an experienced attorney should know better.”

Rachel Grunberg, one of the attorneys representing the State Bar, said that the court’s decision was “pretty much expected” since “people often try this avenue and are just repeatedly unsuccessful.”

Joseph said he will appeal the decision to the California Supreme Court, and, if necessary, to the U.S. Supreme Court.

The case is Joseph v. State Bar of California, B221236.

Copyright 2010, Metropolitan News Company

“Law practice bears little resemblance to the bar exam,” commented Fedora J. Nick, Execbar’s managing director and nationally recognized bar review expert. “A focused regimen designed around each bar exam applicant’s specific individual needs makes all the difference. Our unique one-on-one program offers our bar candidate clients a focused study plan designed to integrate with their individual work schedules.” Executive Bar Review’s California bar tutors are attorneys and bar exam experts that focus their law practice exclusively on the bar exam.

BEVERLY HILLS, Calif., May 12 / — The State Bar of California

requires that lawyers from other jurisdictions obtain a California license

before practicing in the state in almost any capacity. Lawyers with fewer

than 4 years in practice must sit for the full California bar exam while more

experienced attorneys must pass the shorter California Attorneys Exam. In

response, The Executive Bar Review Tutorial program, http://www.execbar.com,

has expanded to offer its exclusive California bar exam review services

nationally.

The Executive Bar Review tutorial program is the onlyCalifornia bar review

program designed specifically for the working professional and the

out-of-state attorney. Executive Bar Review applicants benefit from a

one-on-one, individually tailored tutorial program that allows them the

opportunity to participate privately from the convenience of their homes or

offices.

“Our unique one-on-one program offers busy professionals, out-of-state

attorneys and foreign lawyers a focused study plan designed to integrate with

their individual work schedules,” said Fedora Nick, Execbar’s founder and

managing director. “We recognize that busy professionals have personal needs

that may not be satisfied by lecture and group bar review programs like Barbri

and Barpassers.” Currently, the Execbar program provides custom bar review for

applicants sitting for the California, New York, DC, Texas, Nevada and Arizona

bar exams.

Fedora Nick has personally tutored and prepared partners and associates from

the largest and most respected national firms as well as high profile

candidates for the California Bar exam. She was a partner and director of

California’s premier one-on-one bar review program for over a decade, as well

as a tutor and MBE course lecturer for the Emanuel Bar Review program. She is

recognized as a leading expert in the bar preparation field and is the author

of the NBR Performance Review, co-author of the NBR Hypothetical Enhancer

Method and her definitive volume on strategies for the Multistate Bar Exam

will be released later this year. Ms. Nick received her JD from The American

University Washington College of Law in 1995. She specialized in Civil

Litigation before focusing on bar exam preparation as her area of practice.

She is a member of the State Bar of California and is admitted to practice

before the Ninth Circuit, Northern, Central, and Southern Districts of

California. In June of 2000 she was admitted to practice before the Supreme

Court of the United States.