California Bar Wants To Offer Exam Score Boosts, Payments To Sample Test Guinea Pigs

The Recorder, California Bar Wants to Offer Exam Score Boosts, Payments to Sample Test Guinea Pigs:

Select California bar exam applicants who complete a sample test written by Kaplan could receive financial incentives and see their actual 2025 exam scores boosted under a plan the state bar submitted to the California Supreme Court this week.

In two filings with the high court on Monday, state bar leaders said they need to test drive sample multiple-choice questions drafted by testing giant Kaplan, which the bar recently retained to provide a 200-question exam starting with the February 2025 sitting. The bar’s testing expert would evaluate the exam and results for the bar.

As an incentive for field testing 49 sample multiple-choice questions in November, up to 4,300 participants could receive an as-yet-undetermined payment if the state bar secures grant funding, the bar’s filing with the court stated. The bar would also offer to raise the scores of certain sample-test participants who then take the actual multiple-choice exam in February or July 2025. ...

The California Supreme Court has not announced any timeline for considering the bar’s requests to replace the NCBE multiple-choice exam with Kaplan’s test and for offering score increases to field-testers. The high court has still not responded to the bar’s proposal, submitted late last year, to create an alternative pathway to licensure that would allow successful applicants to become lawyers through supervised work instead of passing the traditional bar exam.

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