Law school grads still must take bar exam during pandemic

Law school graduates still must take the bar exam in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic before becoming licensed attorneys, Illinois' highest court decided last week.

The Illinois Supreme Court officially denied a request by several graduates, state law school professors and faculty and others to grant this year's class a license to practice based on other benchmarks, including their juris doctor degree.

Students were already given a temporary license to work under attorneys with full permissions because, Chief Justice Anne Burke said in a statement, "the court understands the plight of recent law graduates and we want to provide an effective transition to them becoming practicing lawyers in these unprecedented times."

The annual bar exam was pushed from July 28 and 29 to Sept. 9 and 10. Now, according to the Illinois Board of Admissions to the Bar, state officials "will have no choice but to cancel" the test if certain criteria set by Gov. JB Pritzker to monitor the novel coronavirus' spread are met.

In a statement, those who filed a petition to eliminate the need for an exam said issuing that test "would be devastatingly inequitable to applicants, and any form of in-person exam would be unsafe."

Guidance issued by the bar admissions board specifies potential test takers must disclose health information prior to arriving at the test site, receive a temperature check and bring hand sanitizer, among other measures.

States including New Jersey, Nevada, Michigan, Indiana and California announced they would administer online exams. New York and Louisiana, among others, outright canceled the test.

If held in September, exam sites in Illinois are in Chicago, Rosemont, DeKalb, Champaign and Carbondale. About 2,000 people take the test each year.