Nuts and Bolts

Per Mrs. Priest's request, here is a summary of what the bar exam is:

The exam is held twice a year in February and July, and it is held the same week across all fifty states. This year the July administration is 7/29-31/08. The exam varies in length between two and three days, but the vast majority of states have two days of testing. The first day is six hours of multiple choice questions (100 mults in the morning, 100 in the afternoon) which cover law that is common to the majority of the fifty states. Every state gives the same exact set of multiple choice questions. The second day is essays, the number of which varies from state to state. The essays cover state-specific law. (States also vary on which they give first, the essays or the mults, but more on that later.)

California, however, has decided to throw in a third day. Day One is three hours of essays in the morning, then three hours of what they call the Performance Test in the afternoon. The performance test does not test any substantive knowledge. Rather, the PT tests your ability to follow directions. This sounds easier than it is. You're given an assignment ranging from anything to "write a memo" to "draft a will" to submit to a fictitious supervising attorney. You're also given a set of facts and fictitious law to shape your answer. This can be tricky because the fictitious law you're given is not necessarily what the law is in the real world. So you could know a real rule but be told that it's the opposite rule on the PT. On the PT, you apply the fake rule despite what you've learned in law school and despite what you've filled your head with studying for the bar. What's even trickier is that very, very few law school graduates ever have done the things asked for on the PT. I, for one, never have had to draft an affidavit or a business contract, but the PT doesn't care. If affidavits are what they want, then affidavits are what I'll give, even though I've never even seen one. To date, California is the only state in the union that has a three-hour PT. Thirty other states also have a PT, but theirs are only 90 minutes each. Massachusetts does not have a PT, and I like to remind my MA friends about that.[FN1]

Anyway, back to the schedule. CA's Day One is essays and the PT, Day Two is the multiple choice, and Day Three is essays and the PT, just like Day One. What's interesting about Day Two is that every other state in the country is ALSO giving their multiple choice exams that very same day. Why? Because some people want to take two exams at once. (People do this. Really.) They can do this if the two states they've picked 1) give two-day exams, and 2) have test schedules such that the state-specific essay days don't coincide.

Here's an example: Start in NY, where you take the NY essays on the first day and the national mults on the second day. The night of the second day, drive to MA so you can take the MA essays on the third day. (Since you've already taken the national multiple choice questions in NY, you don't have to take them again in MA.) Again, this works out only if the two states you've picked don't hold their essay days on the same day. NY and MA do not hold their essays on the same day because, well, we have lots of crazy people up in here. MA and NJ do hold their essays on the same day, however, so if you want to practice in both states, you'll have to wait until the next time the test is held to take the exam.

Oddly enough, you would think this works only when the states are contiguous, too. Nuh-uh. Ms. J has told me of a student in her class who is taking the Florida essays on Day 1 and the national mults on Day 2, then flying up to Massachusetts for the MA essays on Day 3. I suppose some people just don't want to have to study for the bar more than once.

I respect that.


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FN1. MA does have to hand-write their exams, though. CA gets to type. Thank God.