Almost two and a half weeks after the Israel Bar Association’s examinations were conducted for the first time in a new format, which included questions about substantive legal issues and not just procedures, the results remained similar to those of previous tests, or even worse. Only 34% of the examinees passed the exam. This is a very low result, probably the lowest ever.

Of the first examinees, who constituted 56% of all examinees, only 49% passed the examination. Of the second examinees (22% of the examinees), only 25% passed and among the examinees in the third group (21% of the examinees) only 5% passed.

As in previous rounds, among university graduates, who were only 17% of the examinees, 75% passed the exam. Tel Aviv University graduates (136 candidates) had a general passing rate of 81% followed by Hebrew University with 80%, Bar-Ilan University with 69%, and IDC with 68%.

The colleges are again trailing at the bottom of the list. Only 22% of Kiryat Ono students passed the test. This is the college that sent the highest number of examinees – 672 and the college with the largest number of chareidim. The average score for examinees in Kiryat Ono was only 55.3%.

Immediately following was Shaare Mishpat College is also attended by many chareidi students, with only 19% of 211 examinees. The bottom of the list is Netanya College (19%), immigrants (16%) and the Academic Center for Law and Business (14%).

The exam, which lasted from morning to early evening, was attended by 2,533 interns, and only about half of them attended for the first time. After the exam, the interns, as well as the preparation companies for the exams, claimed that the time allotted to the questions in the substantive part was unreasonable and even the best experts could not solve them in the required time.

The examinees also claimed that they relied on misrepresentations of a sample examination published by the Bar Association’s Board of Auditors a few months ago – which it did not reflect the difficulty of the current examination.

In the first part of the exam, the examinees were required to perform a writing assignment of 45 minutes, which constituted 15% of the grade. In the second part, the examinees examined the procedural law, and were asked to answer 45 questions on procedural matters. This part lasts an hour and a half, and constitutes 45% of the overall grade. The third part, which lasted two and a quarter hours, included an examination of substantive law. The examinees were required to answer 40 questions that constituted 40% of the grade. In this section, the examinees were given legislative pamphlets, and the questions dealt, inter alia, with contract law, corporate law, penal law, real estate law, and tax law.

The new format of the examination that was first tried in this round is part of the reform in the Bar Association Law, which determined that the examination of the qualification will include questions on subjects dealing with substantive law, in addition to the existing questions of procedural law. A special advisory team was appointed to determine the new format, with the participation of the National Institute for Testing and Evaluation. The objective of changing the structure of the examination was to improve the examination process, in order to ensure that the legal profession would be authorized to have the appropriate qualifications to serve as lawyers, since procedural law is less important than practical law.

In the April exams, which did not include any substantive questions, 44% of the examinees passed – although these results (which were the worst at the time) were still not final.

This is because the Supreme Court ruled, a week before the examination this month, that it receives four objections submitted, which could transfer many examinees. According to the examinees, in recent years the exams have become more difficult in order to prevent new interns from entering the flooded field and that the Bar Association is doing everything in its power to make it difficult for those coming to the professional gates towards directing them to go to other options.

(YWN – Israel Desk, Jerusalem)