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I'd like to take the bar exam in state A as well as state B. The firm I'll be working at is in state A, but I'd like to keep my options open down the road for working in state B. Of course, state A and state B give their bar exams on the same days. So if during the summer after graduation I take the bar for state A, when will I have time to study for and take the bar for state B? I'll be busy working for my firm. How do people do this?

Nothing substantive to say. Just interested in this as well.

Royal wrote:I'd like to take the bar exam in state A as well as state B. The firm I'll be working at is in state A, but I'd like to keep my options open down the road for working in state B. Of course, state A and state B give their bar exams on the same days. So if during the summer after graduation I take the bar for state A, when will I have time to study for and take the bar for state B? I'll be busy working for my firm. How do people do this?

You wait until you move to a firm in state B, probably in the spring, you work until Christmas, and then you take a month off to study and then take in February.

Outside of a few exceptions, like NY/NJ, PA/NJ, NC/SC, this is the only way it's done.

Also why not just let nebulous future firm pay for it? You risk burning out and failing the bar that matters for a pie in the sky wish for the future. You also get to answer some uncomfortable questions from people at the State A firm asking "so why are you taking State B? we dont have an office there."

schedule them both the same day but different time zones (one Maine, one Hawaii) and fly a private jet to rush from first to last to get done on same calender day.



Or you could pace them out and not end up with two failed grades plus jetlag.

Either way.

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Depends where you practice. We require our associates to talk the Missouri bar and the Illinois bar since many of our clients do business in both states. The Missouri first then the Illinois second and assuming the multi-state score is high enough, only 1 day of the Illinois bar. We allow 2 weeks off for the Missouri and up to a week for the Illinois. I assume a lot of firms in major cities near state borders do something similar.

wiseowl wrote:

Royal wrote:I'd like to take the bar exam in state A as well as state B. The firm I'll be working at is in state A, but I'd like to keep my options open down the road for working in state B. Of course, state A and state B give their bar exams on the same days. So if during the summer after graduation I take the bar for state A, when will I have time to study for and take the bar for state B? I'll be busy working for my firm. How do people do this?

You wait until you move to a firm in state B, probably in the spring, you work until Christmas, and then you take a month off to study and then take in February.

Outside of a few exceptions, like NY/NJ, PA/NJ, NC/SC, this is the only way it's done.

Also why not just let nebulous future firm pay for it? You risk burning out and failing the bar that matters for a pie in the sky wish for the future. You also get to answer some uncomfortable questions from people at the State A firm asking "so why are you taking State B? we dont have an office there."

Thanks for the reply. I thought not being barred in state B might prove to be a hindrance to getting a job there in the first place -- a chicken or the egg situation. Firms generally hire laterals who aren't admitted on the understanding that they'll take time off and get admitted?

JusticeJackson wrote:At the firm I was at as a summer, they encouraged new associates to take the home-state bar right away (July after graduation), and another bar the next February. People would barely study for the second one, and just go off what they studied for the first time, and all passed.

This is my plan, but home state second.