The California Bar has released the results of the July 2024 bar exam. The overall pass rate was 53.8%, up 2.3 percentage point from last year’s exam. For California ABA-accredited law schools, the pass rate for first time test-takers was 81%, up 5 percentage points from 2023.
| School Type | First-Timers | Repeaters |
| California ABA | 81.0% | 34.2% |
| Out-of-State ABA | 74.5% | 28.3% |
| CA Accredited (Not ABA) | 36.5% | 15.8% |
| Unaccredited – Correspondence | 30.0% | 13.3% |
| Unaccredited – Distance Learning | 20.0% | 11.1% |
| Unaccredited – Fixed-Facility | 25.0% | 4.8% |
| All Others | 31.2% | 20.9% |
| All Applicants | 68.2% | 23.5% |
The State Bar of California reported today that 53.8 percent of applicants passed the July 2024 General Bar Examination (GBX). As a result, the 4,458 people who passed the July exam will be eligible for admission to the State Bar as soon as all admissions requirements are satisfied. …
California’s General Bar Exam pass rate of 53.8 percent is up from last year’s July pass rate of 51.5 percent, and 2022’s July pass rate of 52.4 percent. Preliminary statistical analyses show that of the 8,291 applicants who completed the GBX, 67.7 percent were first-time takers. The pass rate for these 5,614 first-time applicants was 68.2 percent. The pass rate for the 2,677 applicants repeating the exam was 23.5 percent.
The Recorder, Pass Rate on California’s July 2024 Bar Exam Ticks Up to 53.8%:
Like California, states across the country saw their July bar exam pass rates jump year over year. Sixty-nine percent of those who sat for the New York exam passed, an 11-year high. Texas‘ pass rate inched up to 74.5% from 71%. Georgia‘s overall pass rate of 70.4% was the highest in a decade.
The higher scores were also reflected in results on the July multistate bar exam, the 200 multiple-choice section that California and most other states administered. The national mean scaled score on the test produced by the National Conference of Bar Examiners was 141.8, an increase of about 1.3 points from the July 2023 sitting.
In a statement issued in August, NCBE director of psychometrics Rosemary Reshetar credited the higher test scores and overall state exam pass rates to double-digit increases in law school enrollment in recent years. When law school admissions are more competitive, accepted students tend to have higher Law School Admission Test scores, which are a good predictor of bar exam scores, Reshetar said.
California’s July exam is the last that will use the MCBE, as the state transitions to a new multiple-choice section prepared by testing company Kaplan starting in February 2025. The state bar on Friday administered, through a vendor, a limited, experimental version of that exam as a sort of test run. The practice test sittings continue on Saturday.
Editor’s Note: If you would like to receive a daily email with links to legal education posts on TaxProf Blog, email me here.
