The Supreme Court on Thursday announced that Bar examinations will be held on an earlier date next year, particularly on September 17, 20, and 24.
In a Bar Bulletin No. 1, the SC said the Bar exams will be conducted in September next year in order expedite “the admission of successful examinees to the legal profession.”
“The rationale is both practical and societal; an earlier conduct of examinations means an earlier release of examination results; successful Bar examinees can commence their practice of law as early as December 2023; and new lawyers may begin contributing to their families and to the society as members of the Bar in the same year they graduated from law school,” the SC said, in a bulletin signed by Associate Justice Ramon Paul Hernando.
The 2023 Bar exams will be divided into six core subjects, distributed over the three non-consecutive days of examination.
On the first day, subjects covered by the Bar exams include Political and Public International Law, and Commercial and Taxation Laws; on the second day, covered by the exams are subjects on Civil Law, and Labor Law and Social Legislation; while Criminal Law, and Remedial Law, Legal and Judicial Ethics with Practical Exercises are scheduled on the third day.
Examinees will take two subjects per examination day, segmented into morning and afternoon periods. The morning leg will run from 8 a.m. to 12 p.m. while the afternoon leg will be from 2 p.m. to 6 p.m.
The exams will also be composed of a maximum of 20 straightforward entry-level questions in essay-type form. The SC said the answers will not require computations, and will be graded from 0% to 100%, or 5% for each question.
It will also adopt a multiple-examiner policy of four examiners per subject.
