You can make it into law school, but can you pass the bar?

So, the 2010 Bar Exam results for the state of California are pretty interesting.

You can see a break down by school, which is the best way to judge similar schools in the same state.

Personally, I find it a little disheartening. I also think that the only reason that the overall pass rate is so high is ONLY because Stanford has a 98% pass rate. And when you look at the TTT and TTTT schools and the number of people who have to retake after graduating (and the percent of retakes that pass!) it's pretty scary.

I work at my local Bar Association (after being laid off during a round of budget cuts at a mid-law firm here in town...the legal field is DEFINITELY not safe from the economy, people!) and so I get to meet a lot of attorneys and support staff from all over the city, in all sorts of jobs and practice areas. If you're interested in getting some good advice about law school and the bar exam, start attending events through your local bar association, or with the local Young Lawyers sections...it's pretty great, and often free for students.

Recently I had a lot of contact with someone identifying themselves as a law clerk at a well-known firm in town. Being that it's the middle of the school year, and that there aren't any law schools here in my fair hometown, I was a little curious about him, and so at a recent event where I met this person I thought I might pick his brain a little.

He went to a T4 law school in California a few years after his undergrad, after working at a law firm for a year or two as a legal assistant (sounds familiar). He figured he wouldn't have any problem getting a job, so the fact that he didn't have a good GPA or a great LSAT didn't bother him, so he went to law school anyway.

Honestly, with his connections (the legal market where I live is pretty insulated, and if you work for a few years at a firm and make a good impression it doesn't really matter where you go, you're in like Flynn), he probably could have gotten a decent(ish) job post-grad.

If he had been able to pass the bar.

I felt sorry for him when he told me he's taken the exam 5 times since graduating six years ago, and hasn't ever been able to pass. And then I realized that it's probably a pretty common story. I mean, it's obviously common enough that Grey's Anatomy worked it into their story line. I remember that there was an episode about a girl who had taken the bar 4 times and failed each time, and then when it came time to take it for the fifth time had some sort of breakdown and couldn't subject herself to failing yet again, so rather than just give up she pretty much mutilated her hands in order to have a legit reason to skip out of the test.

Can we say cray-cray?

Ultimately, you have to go somewhere that not only teaches you the law, but will also prepare you to pass the bar. You can take as many bar prep classes as you want, but if you don't have a solid foundation upon which to build, you'll never be able to make it through the two-day endurance test/hell that is the bar exam.

I know that this is a MAJOR case of crossing a bridge before you come to it, or counting your eggs before they hatch, or whatever, but it's definitely something to think about when choosing a law school.