We can't gloss over who these students are. A disproportionate share of student loan debt (and Bar prep costs) falls on students of color. According to a recent report by the ABA, 18.4% of BIPOC students have taken on over $200,000 in debt to finance their legal education, with an additional 47% incurring $100,000 or more. Bar study debt falls the heaviest on BIPOC, Latino/a/x, and Indigenous students, who often take on an additional $5-10k+ to pay for their bar prep.
What has the Bar done in response? To answer briefly: not nearly enough.
Consistently, state Bars have maintained artificially high cut scores, favoring those already advantaged and disadvantaging, well, everyone else.
A cut score is the score at which a state sets as its passing score. Making modest changes to states' cut score has no statistical relevance to a lawyer's ability to competently practice law. According to a case study in California, lowering the cut score to allow more attorneys admittance to the Bar would have no impact on the number of complaints filed against attorneys, charges filed, or other disciplinary proceedings. In other words, the cut score is largely arbitrary. And this arbitrary number disproportionately affects students of color.
In contrast, lowering the cut score would diversify the legal practice, with the biggest passage gains made by students of color:
