Thomas Jefferson Law School – On Probation For Good Reason

Last week the California State bar released some more detailed information about the July 2017 bar exam.

We already knew that Thomas Jefferson had the lowest first-time pass rate of any ABA-Accredited law school in California, at 30%.  (Whittier, now closed, was second lowest at 38%, with LaVerne the only other ABA school below 50%, at 41%.) But the latest data provides some more interesting nuggets of information about Thomas Jefferson's performance.

First, no less than five state-accredited (non-ABA accredited) law schools had higher first-time pass rates than Thomas Jefferson:

(School, first-time passing percentage, #of takers/#of passers)

• San Joaquin College of Law  59%  20/34
• Lincoln Law School 47%  17/36 
• California Northern School of Law 45%  5/11 
• Glendale University College of Law 41% 7/17
• Empire College School of Law 31% 4/13

In fact, San Joaquin College of Law had nearly as many first-time passers (20) as Thomas Jefferson (29).

The statistics also reveal that Thomas Jefferson's pass rate for repeat takers was also 30% (39/131).  Thomas Jefferson's bar pass rate has been so bad recently (Feb 2017 – 24%; July 16 – 31%) that the school had substantially more repeat takers (131) than first-time takers (96).  (The only other ABA-Accredited Schools in California with more repeat takers than first-time takers are Golden Gate (76:70) and LaVerne (35:34).)

These abysmal bar pass rates actually mask the truly horrific success rates at TJSL.  Consider that, based on TJSL's 509 reports, 192 full-time 1Ls started in 2014, while 149 part-time students started at TJSL in 2013.   In the normal course of events, one would have expected most of these 341 students to have taken the July 2017 bar.  But with an attrition rate well over 40% for these students, there were fewer than 100 first time takers, and only 29 first-time passers.  Even assuming a handful of these 341 students might have taken and passed the February exam, when the first-time pass rate was 24%, the overall success rate (defined as graduating on time and passing the bar on the first try) for this cohort is likely below 10%.  Let's not even talk about how many TJSL students are finding jobs. 

Clearly, the ABA had very good reason for placing Thomas Jefferson School of Law on probation. With the caliber of  students currently enrolled at the law school, there is little hope for substantial improvement in TJSL's performance, especially since the top- performing students are likely to transfer out this summer to nearby schools like Cal Western.   TJSL has an uphill battle, to say the least, to stay open.