This article originally appeared in The Bar Examiner print edition, Fall 2023 (Vol. 92, No. 3), pp. 1-2.
By John J. McAlaryGreetings from upstate New York. As I write this in late October, the region is aglow with the stunning colors of autumn.
October in New York also means July bar exam results. When once we used to issue bar exam results in mid-November, with the cooperation of our graders and staff, New York now routinely issues results in October. It is a huge undertaking for us, as we examine close to 10,000 candidates each July. It involves our grading teams reading nearly 80,000 papers for the Multistate Essay Exam (MEE) and Multistate Performance Test (MPT). After we receive our final Uniform Bar Exam (UBE) scores from NCBE, our support staff must then generate result letters for all candidates and send score reports to roughly 180 ABA-approved law schools whose graduates take the bar exam in New York. Despite this challenging undertaking, it is immensely rewarding to issue passing letters to graduates who have worked so hard during law school and are about to embark on a career in this rewarding profession.
I am profoundly honored and humbled to serve this year as chair of NCBE’s Board of Trustees. I am grateful for the faith my fellow trustees have placed in me to lead them this year. I am well aware that I have big shoes to fill as I follow in the footsteps of many accomplished lawyers, judges, and bar exam administrators who have served in this capacity.
I would like to thank Timothy Wong of Minnesota, who preceded me as chair. Tim is one of the most intelligent, thoughtful, and accomplished lawyers I have met in bar admissions. Thank you, Tim, for your leadership this past year. I would also like to thank NCBE President Judy Gundersen for her unwavering stewardship and dedication to NCBE and bar admissions in general.
This year marks my 25th year with the New York State Board of Law Examiners (NYBOLE), the last 19 of which I have been its executive director. When I started with NYBOLE in 1998, I did not expect that I would be doing this work for a quarter century, and I certainly didn’t anticipate I would one day ascend to serving as chair of the Council of Bar Admission Administrators (CBAA) in 2011 and now as chair of NCBE’s Board of Trustees. Prior to becoming involved in bar admissions, I served five years as a staff attorney on the Attorney Grievance Committee for the New York Supreme Court Appellate Division, Third Judicial Department. Trust me when I say that admitting attorneys to our profession is much more enjoyable than suspending or rescinding their licenses.
We are a profession that is sometimes maligned, yet we are a self-regulating profession that sets standards for legal education through the work of the American Bar Association (ABA), standards for bar admission through the bar exam and the character and fitness investigations process, and standards for practice through the ABA Model Rules for Professional Conduct. We take our public protection roles earnestly and hold would-be lawyers as well as practicing lawyers accountable for their actions.
In my 30 years in attorney regulation and bar admissions, I have been fortunate to meet so many dedicated and extraordinary administrators and law examiners from Maine to Hawai’i and from Alaska to Florida, who have served, and are presently serving, our profession and the public. They work tirelessly behind the scenes to ensure public protection and to improve the legal profession.
I recently attended the CBAA Fall Meeting in Washington DC, where bar administrators from across the country gathered to discuss a variety of current and emerging issues in bar admissions. As a longtime administrator, I am personally familiar with the daily challenges of preparing for and administering the bar exam, and I thank the administrators across the country for the work they do.
During my time in bar admissions, I have witnessed many changes. I remember when we first piloted using laptop computers in New York, with 500 candidates selected through a lottery. Today using a laptop is the norm, with over 90 percent of New York exam takers doing so to type their MEE and MPT answers. The use of laptops for the written portion of the exam allows us to provide graders with electronic copies of the answers and eliminates the need to ship paper copies, which has reduced the time it takes to complete grading, thereby accelerating the release of bar exam results.
Another significant change was the introduction of the UBE, first administered in 2011, which was a game changer that permitted candidates to take one exam and, if they achieved a qualifying score, transfer that score to other UBE jurisdictions. In parts of the country where attorneys may practice across adjoining state lines, transferring a score saves considerable time and expense. When I graduated from law school in New York in 1991, we were encouraged to take the bar exam in New York and an adjoining state to improve our marketability. I took the New York exam on Tuesday and Wednesday and then traveled to take the local component of the Connecticut exam on Thursday. After commencing work that fall, the law firm where I was employed encouraged me to also seek licensure in New Jersey. I took the New Jersey exam the following February. Thankfully, I passed all three exams on the first attempt, and I did not have to take a bar exam again. I remember the challenge of finding time to study for the bar exam while working as a new associate. In retrospect it seems nonsensical to have had to expend time and resources to take three bar examinations to obtain licensure across three neighboring states. Fortunately, new lawyers today can take the UBE and transfer that score within 41 UBE jurisdictions, including Connecticut, New Jersey, and New York.
Bar admissions will experience further change with the NextGen bar exam set to launch in July 2026. The NextGen bar exam will integrate foundational concepts and principles with foundational skills that will more realistically test candidates’ ability to practice law. It will test less broadly and deeply within subjects and place greater emphasis on lawyering skills while ensuring fairness and accessibility to all candidates and retaining test score portability.
Aside from the ongoing work on the NextGen bar exam, during my year as chair NCBE will:
- continue its work to review the NCBE Character and Fitness Application and to recommend possible revisions, with a focus on ensuring that jurisdictions can collect the information they need to make sound determinations without collecting information that may have lost its relevancy in today’s bar admissions environment;
- explore opportunities to streamline the character and fitness application process for candidates seeking admission through UBE score transfer;
- further its work with the Council on Legal Education Opportunity Inc. (CLEO) on providing programs that support law students from underrepresented communities (see this article); and
- undertake a review of resources that assist the jurisdictions in developing their own standards, policies and procedures.
I am excited about the work of the Conference, and I greatly appreciate the opportunity given to me this year to have a role in charting the future of bar admissions. Please feel free to reach out to me, Judy, or other staff at NCBE to share your feedback and ideas as we continue this important work together.
Kindest regards,
John J. McAlary
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