I took the Illinois virtual bar exam in February 2021. Illinois, like many other states, is planning to administer the test virtually for July 2021. I’d imagine many states will explore a long-term virtual option, given the comparative ease in administering the test. In this article, I’ll explain how the bar exam works (specifically, the UBE) and my experience in taking the virtual bar exam for the state of Illinois.
The Illinois Bar Exam Format
The state of Illinois uses the Uniform Bar Exam (or UBE for short). This is a semi-universal bar exam format that many other states also use.
Here are all of the UBE states:
The UBE will be largely the same in every state. Some states may require supplemental, state-specific material. Illinois does not, so all you need to do is pass the UBE (and character and fitness, of course).
I’ll explain how the UBE is structured and a breakdown of all of its accompanying subsections below.
The Uniform Bar Exam
The Uniform Bar Exam is broken down into 3 main sections. They are the Multistate Performance Test (MPT), the Multistate Essay Examination (MEE), and the Multistate Bar Examination (MBE). The first two of these sections are essay-based, while the latter is all multi-choice.
Here was my exact bar exam schedule:
Not every state will structure the test exactly the same way. That is, some states will have multiple MPT sections, or otherwise will weight sections differently. But the substance will remain consistent throughout UBE jurisdictions.
Some states also have supplemental examinations separate from the UBE. Illinois is not one of those states.
The UBE is no LSAT. Preparing for it is a different animal. Even if you did great on the LSAT, the bar exam is an entirely different challenge.
Let’s go over the three UBE sections now.
Multistate Performance Test (MPT)
The Multistate Performance Test is one of two essay sections on the UBE. The MPT is often deemed one of the “easy” sections in that you do not have to bring any substantive knowledge of the law to do well on it.
This is because the MPT aims to test your ability to (1) follow directions, (2) do basic legal analysis, (3) write clearly and succinctly while under a time constraint.
In the MPT, you are given a closed universe of facts and law, and you are asked to apply those facts to the given law to come to some legal conclusion for a client or boss, or write some persuasive essay via a brief or letter.
Most often, the MPT will be a memo, a brief, a persuasive letter, or something similar.
The MPT mimics a basic law school writing assignment. The point is less so to test your substantive knowledge of the law and more so to test your abilities as a legal writer. The legal analysis itself will usually be pretty straight forward, seeing as though you are given all of the materials you need to complete it. The hard part will be communicating that analysis clearly and quickly.
Typically, you will get a letter explaining your assignment (i.e., that you need to write a memo to your supervising attorney, or draft a letter to an opposing party). That letter will be followed by a series of other, fact-heavy documents, each explaining some potentially important detail about the case or client. Those materials will be followed with relevant statutes and case law, which you will use to complete your legal analysis.
Thankfully, the hardest part of legal analysis (finding all of the applicable law) is done for you. You can instead focus on crafting a well-organized essay.
Preparing for the MPT
If you did well in your law school writing courses, you should do well on the MPT. To me, it seemed to be the section most closely mirroring my experience with law school assignments (including the few briefs I wrote for moot court). The other sections of the UBE are far more reliant on your knowledge of the law, as I’ll get to shortly.
I only did a couple of practices for the MPT and felt plenty prepared for it by the time I got to the actual test. Frankly, there isn’t a whole lot you can do to prepare for it other than getting familiar with the format.
Illinois has two MPT sections, so I had to write about two MPT prompts across two 90-minute sections.
I can’t actually tell you about what the prompts were, but let’s just say there weren’t any surprises. I had to read the prompt carefully, noting seemingly important details as I went through it.
Pacing is the biggest priority here, as with the near entirety of the bar exam. You have to read a fair amount of materials and then shell out a coherent essay in an hour and a half. That’s not always easy, even if the problem is simple to understand.
But I’d say the hardest part about the virtual MPT was the interface itself.
Since you are referring to a bunch of documents as you write your essay, you need to be able to rifle through the materials pretty quickly. And if your computer or laptop screen is rather small, this can be pretty annoying. Oh, and I was unable to use CTRL+F to find key terms or section headings, which was especially frustrating.
This made it super important to focus on pacing, since I could not go as fast as I normally might have been able to with a more flexible workspace.
I’d imagine the in-person exam for this section would be slightly easier since you would not be confined to a single window on a laptop screen. I personally like to spread my materials across my workspace, but here my workspace was a single, small monitor. And for those of you with dual monitors, the Illinois exam did not allow for any more than one monitor during the test.
After taking one (or two) MPTs, the MEE comes next.
Multistate Essay Examination (MEE)
The Multistate Essay Examination is another writing intensive section. However, unlike the MPT(s), the MEE sections are broken up into multiple short essay prompts.
You will have two, 90-minute MEE sections, each encompassing four essay prompts. This means you have 30 minutes per essay on average. As always, pacing is key.
Also unlike the MPT(s), the MEE questions require you to bring a broad range of substantive legal knowledge. MEE prompts may be on any of the following topics:
- Agency & Partnerships
- Civil Procedure
- Conflict of Laws
- Constitutional Law
- Contracts
- Corporations & LLCs
- Criminal Law & Procedure
- Evidence
- Family Law
- Real Property
- Secured Transactions
- Torts
- Trusts & Estates
- Wills
Some essays may touch on multiple substantive areas (civil procedure and conflict of laws often seem to be mixed into other problems), but usually just focus on one.
Given that there are only eight prompts, you will not see a problem on every area of law. But you still have to study as though you will, since you never know which ones the MEE will actually include.
However, past data suggests that these topics are most likely to appear:
In any event, you should already be studying particularly hard for the multiple choice (MBE) sections anyways, and they are very likely to appear on multiple MEE prompts. But don’t forget to review those subjects that aren’t on the MBE.
The MEE prompts are most analogous to a typical law school final. You are given a fairly substantial set of facts that likely touch on multiple legal issues. You then must recall the applicable law yourself and apply the facts to that law.
In some cases, the essay prompts will be quite broad (i.e., “Analyze the _____ issues in these facts” while others will be much more specific “Which lender has the highest priority in the foreclosure proceeding?”). In any event, you will have to identify the relevant facts, explain the relevant law, and then apply the facts to the law as you make your conclusion.
The MEE and MPT(s) together should make up about half of the test. The rest is left to the MBE.
Multistate Bar Examination (MBE)
The Multistate Bar Examination is the lone multiple-choice section on the UBE. But that doesn’t mean it’s small. It is 200 multiple choice questions across four, 90-minute sections.
Thankfully, you have to study far fewer subjects to prepare for the MBE when compared to the MEE, but these are all quite large topics:
- Civil Procedure
- Constitutional Law
- Contracts
- Criminal Law & Procedure
- Evidence
- Real Property
- Torts
Each of these subjects is guaranteed to show up on the MBE. Many of them will likely be on the MEE as well.
Preparing for the MBE
The best way to prep for the MBE is to rip through as many practice problems as you can, reviewing the correct answers carefully each time. I took Barbri’s course, and it was especially useful for that. Though there are other services that offer extra practice problems that I’ve heard good things about.
The point is: practice.
The MBE is arguably the hardest part of the UBE, just given the brisk pace that you have to maintain. On average, you have 1.8 minutes to complete each question.
As test exhaustion sets in, especially by the 4th session of the day, you may struggle to maintain that pace. Practicing consistently to build up your endurance will only help.
After two days of testing, that concludes the bar exam! But how is this monstrosity of a test scored?
Score Weighting
The bar exam is a curved exam. Each state will have its own guidelines for passing. Typically, anywhere from 70 to 90% of examinees will pass in each testing round, depending on the state.
Naturally, half of the points come from the writing sections (MPT & MEE) and the other half comes from the multiple choice section (MBE), at least for Illinois. Each half is scored and scaled separately, and then both halves are added together into your “Combined Scaled Score.”
In Illinois, you need a 266 combined scaled score to pass the bar exam. That’s out of a possible 400 points.
In Illinois, approximately 75% of bar examinees will pass. The state is rather cryptic in how they scale scores (you only receive your scaled score, not your “un-curved” score), but do realize that a significant portion of examinees will fail in every session.
In any event, all you can do is focus on giving your best effort. If you prepare and practice leading up to the exam, you will be in a strong position heading into both test days.
How Does the Illinois Bar Exam Differ from Other Jurisdictions?
Illinois has two MPT sections. Not every state does this. Instead, many just have one MPT section.
Some states have lower (or higher) passing requirements. Even though the test itself might be the same in one state, the passing score might be significantly different.
Non-UBE states might do things far differently. They might use some portion of the UBE, or have completely unique tests for their states.
Many states offer bar exam reciprocity, meaning that a licensed attorney in one state can practice in other states, generally speaking. Check the rules surrounding reciprocity for each state if that’s something you are interested in.
Virtual Bar Exam: Day 1
For my virtual bar exam, I took it at my school, Chicago-Kent College of Law. The school let students reserve an office space to take the bar if they didn’t want to take it at home. I took advantage of this so as to limit distractions at home. If your school offers something similar, you should strongly consider it if your household or your neighbors have pets and other distractions lying in wait…
After a bit of a hectic experience trying to get into the parking garage I had reserved a spot in, I got to the school at 9:00 AM, right as the test was starting.
Here’s my full recap:
Otherwise, after taking one MPT, I got a 30-minute break. That break was followed with a second MPT, which was followed with my lunch break, which was an hour and a half.
The afternoon session kicked off with the first MEE section, followed by a half hour break, followed by the second MEE section. By 5:30 PM, I was all done with the first day of the bar exam.
The breaks were super nice for keeping my energy up during the exam. As I mentioned, pacing is critical, so exhaustion is a real threat. The half hour refresher between sections (and the hefty lunch break) was clutch.
And exhaustion can be hard to avoid in the virtual format in particular. In order to avoid cheating, I and the other test takers had to stare at their screens the entire time. My camera was on to make sure that my eyes were firmly on the screen. It’s quite tiring.
Puzzlingly, examinees were not allowed to drink water during the test, so I had to chug my water during breaks. Staying hydrated is about the only way that I can avoid headaches. That and blue light blocking glasses to cut down on eye strain from staring at a computer screen.
As an added boost, my wife graciously made me some food for both test days. I’ll leave you to check out the video posted above for more on that…
Virtual Bar Exam: Day 2
Day 2 looked very similar to day 1, schedule-wise.
The difference was that every test section was 50 multiple choice questions, not essays.
I picked a different parking garage than the first day, so I wasn’t scrambling (as much!) to get to the test on time. Once again, the test started at 9:00 AM, and I was off to the races in rifling through questions.
Here’s my recap of Day 2:
I definitely slowed down by the 3rd and 4th sections of the MBE. Thankfully, I finished all sections with at least some time to spare. But it was no walk in the park to keep up the pace for the whole day.
You just have to take the exam one section at a time.
The test’s structure, with the breaks sprinkled around each day, helps for maintaining that focus. Every 2 hours or so, you will have one section followed by a significant break. Focus on that one section as much as you can in the moment and enjoy your break after that. Then do it again.
Stretching and standing up between sections proved helpful for staying slightly more energized and focused.
When I finally finished the exam, I definitely felt some uneasiness. I couldn’t help but think “what if I did fine, but everyone else did great, and I’m at the bottom of the curve?“
I don’t think there’s any way to avoid at least some of that feeling. You just have to understand that the test is out of your hands now. It’s time to wait for results!
My Bar Exam Results
Waiting for results is almost as difficult as preparing for the test itself. I felt a steady uneasiness in not knowing for sure whether I passed the exam or not. Simply put, I sure didn’t want to have to devote a couple more months to studying again.
This time is a weird sort of purgatory: you can’t be too certain in making future plans.
If you pass, you can begin working as an attorney sometime shortly thereafter. Or take a vacation 😀
If you fail, you’ll have to do bar exam prep all over again.
These results are, quite obviously, mutually exclusive.
Having some distraction in the meantime will help. I was working as a part-time law clerk while I waited for my results, and I also poured time into my YouTube channel. It kept me busy and feeling productive rather than spending so much time wondering if I had passed. But, don’t get me wrong, I still did much more of that than I wanted to.
I got my results about a month and a half after taking the exam. Here’s my 100% authentic, real, legitimate bar exam results reaction:
Spoiler alert: I passed the bar exam!
Like I mentioned above, in Illinois, you need a 266 to pass. I scored a 300 on the exam, for whatever that might be worth. You generally do not receive a detailed score report; all you get is a scaled score for the writing half and the multiple choice half.
Conclusion – The Virtual Bar Exam
Bottom line: with some diligent preparation, you will pass the bar exam.
The bar exam is tough, no doubt. It will take many weeks of determined preparation to pass. But it is plenty doable.
The virtual bar exam may be awkward at times, but it’s nothing that will prevent you from doing well.
If you put in the work before the test, you should be rewarded on the other end. But there’s always a chance of having to retake the exam. If so, all you can do is take the bad news in stride and keep moving forward.
Whatever the case, I’m sure glad that’s over.
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