Lowering the bar? California considers new bar exam passing score

Law students at schools such as UCLA could soon have a better chance of passing the State Bar. Law students at schools such as UCLA could soon have a better chance of passing the State Bar. Photo: KENDRICK BRINSON, NYT Photo: KENDRICK BRINSON, NYT Image 1 of / 4 Caption Close Lowering the bar? California considers new bar exam passing score 1 / 4 Back to Gallery

The State Bar of California moved forward Monday with a proposal to lower the passing score of the bar exam by three points — a change that could increase the rate of passing by about eight percentage points.

The State Bar made the proposal open for a public comment period until Aug. 25, with the goal of finalizing a recommendation in September.

Just 43 percent of test-takers passed the July 2016 California bar exam, fewer than any other state and the lowest figure for California in more than three decades. Soon after those results came out, the State Bar and Committee of Bar Examiners began discussing ways to reform the passing rate and commissioned a study by research firm ACS Ventures to make recommendations.

At 144, California has the second-highest score required for passing the bar in the country (Delaware has the highest). The median nationally is 135, the study noted. California’s number, referred to as a cut score, was set more than 30 years ago.

David Faigman, chancellor and dean of UC Hastings’ law school, called the study “fundamentally flawed.” He was one of 20 California law school deans who recommended the state lower its bar exam cut score closer to the national median of 135 — six points below what the report proposed.

As part of the study, a panel of lawyers was asked to determine a passing score that would set a standard for “minimum competence” as a lawyer.

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“We’re not trying to determine whether or not they’ve mastered the content — that’s a slightly higher bar,” Chad Buckendahl the psychometrician who conducted the study, said at a State Bar meeting Monday. “All we’re trying to determine is should they be eligible to enter practice at this point.”

The chair of the Committee of Bar Examiners, Karen Goodman, expressed concerns at Monday’s meeting about the study’s definition of “minimum competence.”

The State Bar has until Dec. 1 to submit its recommendations to the California Supreme Court, which has the final say on any changes to the state’s passing score.

If state officials act more quickly, as they are hoping to do, the change in the passing score could affect people who took the bar exam last week. The scores are typically released in November.

Janet Brewer, a member of the Board of Trustees for the State Bar, said the process was being rushed and voted against moving the proposal forward. “We are putting the (California) Supreme Court ... in an untenable position of potentially having to make decisions before they’ve gotten all of the information,” she said at the meeting. “Why the rush to do it for the July bar?”

Isha Salian is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: isalian@sfchronicle.com