THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Tuesday, November 7, 1995 TAG: 9511070262
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY MARC DAVIS, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: VIRGINIA BEACH LENGTH: Medium: 78 lines
Barely half of all Regent University law graduates who took the Virginia bar exam this summer passed it.
Regent, which had the lowest pass rate last year among Virginia's six law schools for the July bar exam, dropped a little lower this year, with a pass rate of 54.5 percent.
The passage rate on the bar exam was one of two factors that the American Bar Association has said Regent must address to achieve its goal of earning full accreditation.
It was Regent's second decline in two years. The school's pass rate for the summer 1993 exam was 76.7 percent, then 61.3 percent for last summer's exam.
The state average, both this summer and last, was 71 percent.
The new numbers were published Monday in Virginia Lawyers Weekly, a statewide legal newspaper.
The University of Virginia led the state with a pass rate of 87.7 percent, followed by William and Mary (86 percent), the University of Richmond (77.3 percent), Washington and Lee (76.7 percent), George Mason (74.4 percent) and Regent.
But J. Nelson Happy, dean of Regent's law school, said the latest numbers are somewhat misleading because they don't include graduates who took bar exams outside Virginia.
At Regent, only 22 of the law school's 98 graduates this year took the Virginia bar exam in July, Happy said.
Happy also said that Regent's pass rate for all 1995 graduates who took bar exams for the first time nationwide improved - from 66 percent last year to 75 percent this year.
``I think it's a positive sign,'' Happy said. ``Certainly the overall improvement is impressive. It shows a good trend.''
The new bar exam numbers come at an important time for Regent.
The law school, which opened in 1986, is seeking full accreditation from the American Bar Association. Without it, graduates cannot take bar exams across the country.
Since 1989, Regent has had provisional accreditation, which means graduates can take bar exams, for now. But the school must show improvement in certain areas to win full accreditation.
In March, the ABA cited the school's low passage rate and faculty tenure as the stumbling blocks to full accreditation.
Tenure has been a major concern since 1993, when law dean Herbert Titus was fired. Law professors loyal to Titus protested the firing and feared they might be next. They complained to the ABA, but their complaint eventually was dismissed. Regent now has a new tenure policy.
The problem with bar-exam pass rates will take longer to fix, Happy said in June. ``You can't change that in a heartbeat,'' he said.
On Monday, Happy again said Regent aspires to better numbers. ``Certainly we'd like to see the bar passage rate like the University of Virginia's,'' Happy said, ``but at a new law school that's not possible.''
A state legal official also downplayed the exam numbers Monday.
``I don't think anybody would say you can judge a law school solely on its bar passage rate,'' said W. Scott Street III, secretary/treasurer of the Virginia Board of Bar Examiners. ``Some schools place their emphasis on other things. . .''
``There has always been a fluctuation in the schools and their (passing) percentages. One thing Virginia is fortunate in is we have six excellent law schools.''
Five American law schools have provisional ABA accreditation: Regent, Texas Wesleyan University, the District of Columbia School of Law, Roger Williams University in Rhode Island and Seattle University.
There is no maximum time that a school can spend in provisional accreditation before it reaches full accreditation.
An ABA evaluation team will visit Regent later this month. The bar association will decide in January or May whether to grant Regent full accreditation, Happy said. ILLUSTRATION: Color chart by John Earle, The Virginian-Pilot
Bar Exam Pass Rates 1994-95
by CNB