17% hurdle 2012 Bar exams

The country has 949 new lawyers.

The number represents 17.76 percent of 5,343 law graduates who passed the 2012 Bar Examinations.

Supreme Court Public Informatiom chief Theodore Te said this was lowest passing rate in 12 years.

It was also the second lowest passing rate in the history of the Bar exam for lawyers according to the Supreme Court’s bar examination committee.

Supreme Court Associate Justice Martin Villarama, Bar exams chief told GMA 7 n ews they lowered the passing score from 75 to 70 percent. If they had not done so, only 361 examinees would have passed.

Ignatius Michael Ingles of the Ateneo De Manila University topped the exam with a score of 85.640. Ateneo graduates landed in six of the top ten slots.

There were no topnotchers from a Cebu law school this year.

Lawyer Joan Largo, dean of the University of San Carlos’ (USC) College of Law, expressed dismay over how last year’s bar examinations was conducted.

“The results do not reflect the competence of the bar examinees. The low passing rate in the 2012 bar examinations was really brought about by the unreasonable length of the exam,” she told Cebu Daily News.

Largo said bar examinees were asked to answer a set of 100-point multiple choice questions (MCQ) and another 100-point essay at the same time.

“It was physically and humanly impossible to answer the questions sensibly given the short period of time. It’s really hard. I give credit to all bar examinees,” she said.

Largo and other law school deans in the country are seeking a dialogue with the High Court about the conduct of the bar examinations.

“There should be a task force that looks into how the exam will be conducted,” she said.

(Full list of Bar passers in pages 10 and 11.)