Florida, California, and most recently, New York, have announced that they will be administering online bar exams. Testing
The Florida Board of Bar Examiners announced, on July 1st, that the bar exam would be moving to an online format that would be administered on August 18th. Then, on July 3rd, they announced that the online exam date would be changed to August 19th due to an election day conflict.
Both California and New York will be administering online bar exams on October 5-6. On July 16th, the Supreme Court of California directed the State Bar to “implement…a temporary supervised provisional licensure program” for 2020 graduates. This program would be “a limited license to practice specified areas of law under the supervision of a licensed attorney.” On July 23rd, the New York Court of Appeals announced that it “developed a temporary practice authorization program permitting eligible law school graduates to engage in the supervised practice of law, which is now up and running in each of the Appellate Division Departments.”
With most jurisdictions moving towards online testing, on July 27th, Massachusetts announced that it entered into agreements for reciprocity with Connecticut, Kentucky, Maryland, New Jersey, Tennessee, Vermont, and Washington D.C. The press release stated that “the Board of Bar Examiners is continuing to work with a number of jurisdictions that will administer the same remote exam [on October 5-6] to expand this list of reciprocal jurisdictions.”
Jurisdictions proceeding with the July 28-29, in-person administration of the bar exam include:
Jurisdictions opting for diploma privilege include Utah, Oregon, Washington, and most recently, Louisiana. On July 22nd, Louisiana became the fourth jurisdiction to grant diploma privilege. The Louisiana Supreme Court announced that “qualified candidates” would be admitted into the bar without having to sit for the 2020 bar exam.
For detailed updates on all jurisdictions, the NCBE has been tracking them here.
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