Law Schools

Indiana Orders Remote Bar Exam In Fit Of Reasonableness

Finally, someone doing the right thing.

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While law school deans complain that New York’s social distancing policies might inconvenience their bar passage stats and Florida declares its intention to go ahead and hold the July exam pandemic be damned, Indiana has decided to embrace a thoroughly rational remote examination option. Mark your calendars, everyone: this is the week that we’re looking to a state that brought us Mike Pence as a role model.

In an order issued yesterday, Chief Justice Loretta H. Rush of the Indiana Supreme Court took stock of the ongoing crisis and decided the only prudent course of action would be to call off the in-person exam and do it all remotely:

As a result of the circumstances surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic, it is unclear whether the State Board of Law Examiners will be able to safely administer a two-day, in-person Indiana bar examination on July 28-29, 2020 as scheduled or at any later date in calendar year 2020.

The Supreme Court therefore ORDERS that the Indiana State Board of Law Examiners shall conduct a one-day bar examination administered remotely on Tuesday, July 28, 2020. The examination shall consist of the Indiana Essay Examination and a series of short answer questions on the topics tested on the Multistate Bar Examination.

One assumes “remotely” means online, but that’s not explicitly spelled out. As with the Massachusetts contingency plan — to potentially draft their own exam and administer it online — scores will only be good in Indiana crimping portability for examinees, and we should expect the NCBE to remind everyone that testing on the topics of the MBE is not the MBE and shouldn’t be accepted outside of the state.

Honestly, every state should be pressured to accept one-off exam scores from places like Indiana and potentially Massachusetts for 2020 administrations. The challenges this year are unique and it wouldn’t be a big deal for Illinois to just declare that anyone who got admitted to Indiana in 2020 is eligible to apply to the Illinois bar. We can just all admit that 2020 is a special case. This could take the NCBE and its hand-wringing over online exams out of the process and let everyone get on with the business of minting new attorneys.

But that would require the reasonableness of a place like Indiana and right now it’s not clear that other states are up to the task.

Earlier: Florida Promises Most Packed July Bar Exam Ever To Own The Libs
Law School Deans Rail Against Grave Injustice Of… Waiting A Few Months To Take The Bar Exam
With NCBE Quibbling Over Online Bar Exams, Massachusetts Says They’ll Just Write Their Own

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HeadshotJoe Patrice is a senior editor at Above the Law and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. Feel free to email any tips, questions, or comments. Follow him on Twitter if you’re interested in law, politics, and a healthy dose of college sports news. Joe also serves as a Managing Director at RPN Executive Search.

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