|
|
|
|
The
Pennsylvania Bar Examination will be held on the last Tuesday and Wednesday
of February and July at locations in Philadelphia,
Pittsburgh, and during July examinations, Harrisburg. Specific
locations where the bar examination are given can be found
here. The Essay
and Performance Test (PT) sessions will be administered on Tuesday and the Multistate Bar Examination (MBE) session will be administered on Wednesday.
ESSAY EXAMINATION: The essay examination
consists of six essay questions that cover one or more of the following
subjects:
| Business Organizations (including
corporations, partnerships, limited liability companies and professional
corporations) |
Employment
Discrimination (limited to Title VII, ADA and ADEA) |
Professional
Responsibility |
| Civil
Procedure (Pennsylvania and federal) |
Evidence
(Pennsylvania and federal) |
Real
Property |
| Criminal
Law (including related Pennsylvania and federal constitutional issues
and DUI) |
Family Law |
Torts |
| Conflict of
Laws |
Federal
Constitutional Law |
U.C.C., Art. II - Sales |
| Contracts |
Federal Income Taxes (personal only and
limited to taxable and non-taxable income,
deductions, proprietorships and capital transactions) |
Wills, Trusts and Decedents=
Estates (including related fiduciary responsibilities) |
Applicants are expected to demonstrate their knowledge
of Pennsylvania law (where applicable) when answering the essay portion of
the bar examination. Please note that the value of an essay answer depends
not so much upon the correctness of the conclusion(s), as upon the
recognition of issues and the quality of the discussion that evidences an
ability to apply the law to the facts presented, and to reason in a logical
manner in arriving at a conclusion. Factors such as grammar, penmanship and
spelling are not considered in the grading of the essay answers.
PERFORMANCE TEST: By Order of the Supreme
Court of Pennsylvania, one PT question, developed by the Board of Law
Examiners, may be used in lieu of a Multistate Performance Test question as
a component of the essay portion of the bar examination. The PT is designed
to test an applicant’s ability to use fundamental lawyering skills in a
realistic situation. Each test evaluates an applicant’s ability to complete
a task, which a beginning lawyer should be able to accomplish.
MULTISTATE BAR EXAMINATION: The MBE
consists of 200 multiple choice questions that cover the following subjects:
| Constitutional Law |
Evidence |
Contracts |
| Real Property |
Criminal Law |
Torts |
PASSING STANDARDS
By Order of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, a successful applicant for
admission to the bar of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, in addition to the
other examination requirements approved by prior Orders of the Court that
are not superseded hereby, must attain a scaled score of 272 on the combined
scores of the PT, essay examination and MBE.
The six answers to the essay examination and the PT (valued at 1.5 times an
essay question) will be graded, totaled and scaled to the MBE. The combined
essay and PT scores will be weighted at 55%, and the MBE score will be
weighted at 45% of the total scaled score. The scaled scores of the PT/essay
examination and MBE will then be combined to determine whether a scaled
score of 272 or higher has been attained. Please visit our web site in early
April (for February) or October (for July) for the official date for release
of results.
Note: Applicants are required to sit for all sessions of the bar examination
(both the morning and afternoon sessions of the PT/Essay Examination and MBE),
and make a good faith effort to answer each question. Failure to do so will
result in disqualification.
|
