SC departs from tradition, won’t announce topnotchers in bar exam

Before the pandemic, bar examinees await the release of passers from the Supreme Court. (INQUIRER.net FILE PHOTO / RYAN LEAGOGO)

MANILA, Philippines —Departing from tradition, the 2020-2021 bar examination will have no top 10 passers, the Supreme Court said in a Bar Matter released Friday.

Instead, an examinee who obtains an 85 percent or higher weighted score for the upcoming examination shall be recognized for exemplary performance.

The high court said the modification in the grading system is one of the reforms proposed by Associate Justice Marvic Leonen, the current chairman of the Bar Examination Committee “to enable a more reasonable approach to appraise and reporting on Bar Examination performance.”

In the past, simultaneous with the release of successful bar passers, the high court also announced the topnotcher but with the pandemic, Leonen said, they have to take into consideration the two batches that will be taking the bar exam this November.

“On one hand, those who had intended to take the Bar Examinations in 2020 either had more time to review, or endured more time for waiting. The 2021 graduates, on the other hand, had to endure the long ordeal of preparing to graduate during the pandemic, causing delays in the graduation dates. They have been put in a constrained environment, with only a brief window of time to prepare,” Leonen said in Bar Bulletin No. 25.

Leonen added that “testing two batches of examinees that prepared under different circumstances—not to mention the vast number of combined examinees, placing an enormous demand on the examiners—compels the adoption of unique mechanisms that aim to balance these inequalities.”

Aside from recognizing exemplary performances of examinees, the high court will also have a list of law schools ranked from the most to the least number of passers among first-time examinees and a separate list ranked from those with the most to the least number of examinees recognized for exemplary performance.

“It is hoped that by shifting the focus away from how to select individuals to excel and onto a school’s collective performance, this will encourage deep-seated and wide-ranging improvements in legal education,” Leonen said.

The 2020 bar examination was canceled due to the pandemic. But to make sure that the exam will push through this year, several reforms have been introduced including localized examination venues due to travel restrictions and the online filing of petitions to take the bar.

EDV