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I had the privilege of taking a short class with Martha Minnow in my first year in law school. I remember her telling me after class one day that “law school is either a year too long or a year too short.”

What she meant was that law school is a year too long if the purpose is to simply prepare us for the bar exam, and a year too short if the intent is to have students specialize in an area. Since she was once the Dean of Harvard Law School, I would suspect her opinion holds more clout than that of most others.

That conversation made me question the entire structure of our legal education system. After all, the first juris doctor was offered in 1902 and Harvard did not adopt the J.D. program until 1969.

The conversation then made me question the purpose of the bar exam. After all, if the purpose of law school is to train you to be an attorney, why must we be tested twice? If the purpose of the bar exam is to ensure quality attorneys, why not have stricter standards on law school exams?

In in “The Appeal,” there was an in-depth look at the history of the bar exam:

According to the article, the bar was initially set up for dubious and racist purposes. That is not to say that the continuation of the bar exam is racist, but merely to point out that its origins come from a place of hate and not, as we’ve been led to believe, to ensure quality attorneys.

“The Appeal” goes further:

Currently, have already granted diploma privilege, with new legislation being introduced in state legislatures across the country. The state of Hawaii should implement diploma privilege for future graduates of the William S. Richardson School of Law as well.

It is well documented that standardized testing disproportionately affects students who grow up in poverty, often leading to perpetuated .

The bar exam is no exception, as exam test scores for students in the evening part-time program are higher than their daytime counterparts, and yet their bar passage rate is substantially lower.

The test scores are released by the bursar’s office to the students, and several professors have commented that the EPT students had a higher average than the day students. Meanwhile, a professor presented data to my class showing that the day students had a bar passage rate of roughly 20 points higher than the EPT program students.

When examining the data, one can easily find that most EPT students are working full-time jobs in order to support a family and are forced to work while studying for the bar exam. I believe the EPT students are a microcosm of the inequality seen throughout the country when comparing students with means and those who come from disadvantaged backgrounds.

Those who are not fit to practice law will either fail out of law school or will be unable to attract clients. The market will dictate the standards in the same way they dictate hourly rates for attorneys. There is simply no logical reason to subject students to “double testing” in order to practice law.