California Bar exam failure sparks lawsuit, legislative inquiry

California Bar Exam Meltdown Sparks Lawsuits, Legislative Inquiry, and Retake Offers

The February 2025 California Bar exam has descended into chaos after catastrophic technical failures prevented thousands of test-takers from completing the exam, leading to lawsuits, a legislative inquiry, and unprecedented retake offers.

Approximately 5,600 people registered for the two-day exam on February 25-26, but many encountered severe technical issues ranging from crashing software to sections that wouldn't save and poor connections. The problems primarily affected California's new bar exam format, which debuted in February after the state moved away from using components of the national bar exam administered by the National Conference of Bar Examiners.

"These technical and support issues were and are unacceptable," the State Bar of California admitted in an email to examinees. Leah Wilson, the State Bar's Executive Director, noted that one of the most troubling issues was "the lack of cut-and-paste functionality" for in-person test-takers.

A proposed class action lawsuit was quickly filed in federal court in San Francisco against Meazure Learning, the company that administered the test. "Thousands of test-takers saw their hopes of passing the CA Bar Exam dissolve as Meazure's test platform crashed, and crashed, and crashed again. The exam software simply did not work," wrote Annick M. Persinger, lead attorney on the case.

The litigation seeks damages exceeding $5 million on behalf of the affected candidates, many of whom made significant financial sacrifices to prepare for the exam. One test-taker reportedly paid $2,600 to travel from Africa to take the test, while others took leaves of absence from jobs or borrowed money to study full-time for months.

Senator Tom Umberg, Chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, announced a detailed examination into the situation. "I will be seeking an audit of the State Bar by the California State Auditor to fully understand what went so spectacularly wrong with the administration of the February Bar Exam," Umberg said in a statement.

Law school deans across California have also weighed in, with Berkeley Law Dean Erwin Chemerinsky calling the exam an example of "stunning incompetence from an entity that exists to measure competence." A group of deans sent a letter to California Chief Justice Patricia Guererro requesting her intervention.

The State Bar initially offered March 3-4 retake dates but later rescheduled to March 18-19 due to "a prohibited online disclosure of an essay question." The Bar had previously announced that those who fail would be offered free retakes in July, and had already offered full refunds to candidates who wished to withdraw before the exam.

The disaster may have significant financial implications for the State Bar, which had projected saving approximately $4 million with the new exam format. However, those savings could quickly vanish in the face of potential litigation costs and remediation expenses.

As one bar exam preparation instructor observed, "Maybe I'm overstating this, but I feel like if someone were to have predicted the worst-case scenario for the rollout of the new California bar exam, that prediction would have been slightly better than what ended up as the reality. What a mess!"

California Bar exam failure sparks lawsuit, legislative inquiry; dailyjournal.com

California fails new bar exam, offers retake; Julianne Hill; abajournal.com

California bar hunts for who leaked bar questions, applicants sue test administrator

Updated Feb. 28 at 7:23 a.m. to change the proposed retake dates.

Write a letter to the editor, share a story tip or update, or report an error.

California bar exam meltdown on Tuesday prompts offer of March retakes; Karen Sloan; reuters.com

 

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