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The Bar Exam: If At First You Don’t Succeed…

Monday, July 16, 2007 11:45 AM - By David Lat

Paulina Brady bar exam well endowed Abovethelaw Above the Law blog.jpgTry, try, try, try, try, try, try, try, try, try, try, try, and try again. And maybe the 14th time will be the charm!

For those of you freaking out over the bar exam next week, chillax. You will probably pass. If you don’t pass this time, surely you’ll pass the next time. Or the time after that.

You’ll be just fine — as long as your name isn’t “Paulina Bandy.” From the Orange County Register:

Paulina Bandy couldn’t fail the state bar exam again. Not after she failed 13 times before.

Some people complain that we’re elitist. So we apologize for asking: What the hell is UP with this woman?

(Is Paulina Bandy the child of a prominent politician? They seem to be jinxed when it comes to the bar exam.)

If you feel sorry for non-top-tier law school graduates who can’t land good jobs, just think — things could be worse. Much worse:

Paulina Bandy couldn’t fail the state bar exam again. Not after she had spent tens of thousands to attend law school. Not after she put her husband Jon Gomez through the ringer for so many years. Not after the debt she piled up forced her family to move into a 365-square-foot home.

Anywhere outside the island of Manhattan, that’s simply unacceptable.

More discussion, after the jump.

Let’s go back to the beginning:

Her journey began in 1994 at Western State University College of Law. She had been a marine biologist, teaching at Science Adventures in Huntington Beach and at the Ocean Institute in Dana Point.

She and Gomez, who married in 1992 after an 11-year courtship, lived in a three-bedroom home with a garage and yard in a Fullerton cul-de-sac. The couple traveled and shared a passion for sports. They loved to entertain guests at their home.

Life was good … until the day Bandy decided to go into law.

Famous last words — which could even be applied to top-tier law school graduates….

(Also, what’s up with that eleven-year courtship?)

The learning curve was steep for Bandy, who powered through night classes. But she made it through the first year, when most students are weeded out of law schools.

“Law school was so in-your-face smart,” she said. “It was very prestigious.”

“Very prestigious.” Not the first words we’d pick to refer to Western State University College of Law, but whatever.

She graduated in 1998 with a B average and a desire to teach business law. She didn’t want a high-pressure job, but an exciting internship with the Orange County District Attorney’s Office that summer stoked her interest.

With about $80,000 in unpaid school loans and a degree, Bandy prepared herself for the state bar exam. She felt confident.

Bandy did what every bar exam taker would do. She took bar review courses, consulted with experts, bought study aids and studied for hours a day. She had more work to do than the Ivy League graduates who were more prepared and apt to pass the exam.

“There was a secret out there to passing, and I wasn’t in on it,” she said.

Uh, Bar/Bri? Or maybe PMBR? That’s some good s**t.

(But according to the article, she did take “bar review courses.” So we don’t know what other “secret” she might be referring to.)

Gomez kicked off a tradition of bringing flowers to his wife after she finished her exam in February 1999. But Bandy found out later that she failed. She was disheartened but vowed to do better the next year.

Her father died that same year, but Bandy had to immediately hunker down and get ready for another exam.

Too depressing for a Monday. And it gets worse:

By 2003, five years after she took her first exam, Bandy hadn’t passed. On July 1 of that year, at age 39, Bandy gave birth to daughter Roxanne.

By then, Bandy had taken the test seven times and was spiraling into more debt. Her law school debt ballooned into $128,000, and Bandy had to defer the loan. The couple spent at least $1,000 on registration fees and hotel rooms each time she took the test.

Did it ever occur to Bandy that maybe this just wasn’t meant to be? Like training to become, say, a world-class weightlifter?

The fight continued for years. She tried twice in 2004, the year the family left Fullerton to move into a 365-square-foot home in the back yard of Bandy’s mother’s house in Orange. They sold the majority of their possessions - furniture, sporting equipment, wedding champagne glasses - at garage sales and squeezed what they could into their one-bedroom home.

One couch, a television set, a bed. No closet space, a tiny kitchen and a study area. No vacations, eating out or new clothes. Bandy took odd jobs to help pay for expenses such as Roxanne’s childcare and a $500 monthly rent.

We’re seeing some indie film potential in all of this pathos. The bar exam meets “The 40-Year-Old Virgin”? Or maybe “Little Miss Sunshine”?

The exam in February of this year was Bandy’s 14th. A few months before, her father-in-law yelled at her for being a “pretend lawyer” and ruining his son’s life. She also got into a bad accident in January and totaled her car.

On May 25, the day the results of the exam were to be posted online, Bandy came home to a message on the answering machine.

“I screamed,” Bandy said. “I’ll never forget it. I was doubled over like being punched in the stomach. In a good way.”

She had passed the exam, said the voice in the message. She sobbed uncontrollably. Her mother and husband were in the front yard, shocked.

Can you blame them? We’d be shocked too.

Because of her own experiences, she has an urge to help other repeaters pass the exam. Passing her 14th test in February and being sworn into the bar association in December is proof to other repeaters that if Bandy can do it, so can they.

She’s decided to devote her time to helping them full time. She launched a Web site, www.cabarexamrepeatersresource.com, and got a business license to help others find a formula to find pass the bar exam.

Because Paulina Bandy truly is an authority on taking the bar exam. Just not successfully.

Bar exam was the test of time [The Orange County Register]
CA Bar Exam Repeaters’ Resource [official website]

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Posted in: BAR/BRI, Bad Ideas, Bar Exams, Law Schools, Lunacy, Paulina Bandy, Rank Stupidity, Ridiculousness

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