Naysayers can’t hide truth about FAMU law

Anti-FAMU internet trolls, spammers, and naysayers love to predict doom and gloom without any factual basis.

Back when former Interim President [You-Know-Who] got FAMU in trouble with the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools and the Accreditation Council for Pharmacy Education, the naysayers said it was all over.

Today, thanks to the leadership of President James Ammons and his administrative team, FAMU is in good standing with SACS and ACPE.

The naysayers ignored a simple truth; those accreditation problems had nothing to do with FAMU’s academic quality. They had everything to do with an incompetent interim administration. When FAMUans finally succeeded in pushing [You-Know-Who] and five of her trustee cheerleaders to get lost, things got better.

[You-Know-Who] withheld critical resources and money from the pharmacy and law schools. Ammons has made it a priority to heal that damage.

Now that FAMU Pharmacy is back in top form, the naysayers are holding out hope that FAMU Law won’t make it. They’re falsely claiming that FAMU Law is nowhere close to meeting the American Bar Association’s minimum bar passage rate.

Here’s what the ABA actually says about the bar passage requirement:

Interpretation 301-6

A. A law school’s bar passage rate shall be sufficient, for purposes of Standard 301(a), if the school demonstrates that it meets any one of the following tests:

1) That for students who graduated from the law school within the five most recently completed calendar years:

(a) 75 percent or more of these graduates who sat for the bar passed a bar examination, or

(b) in at least three of these calendar years, 75 percent of the students graduating in those years and sitting for the bar have passed a bar examination.

2) That in three or more of the five most recently completed calendar years, the school’s annual first-time bar passage rate in the jurisdictions reported by the school is no more than 15 points below the average first-time bar passage rates for graduates of ABA-approved law schools taking the bar examination in these same jurisdictions.

FAMU’s naysayers usually focus on Test #2 and pretend like Test #1 (which takes overall bar passage rates into account) doesn't even exist.

According to FAMU’s March 2008 ABA report, the college’s overall bar passage rates have been the following: June 2005, 70.6%; February 2006, 71.4%; July 2006, 70.3%; February 2007, 70.9%; and July 2007, 81.3%.

Those numbers do not include the FAMU students who have re-taken and passed the bar exam since that report came out last year. FAMU Law still has a viable shot at meeting the standards set by Test #1.

The ABA is set to make a decision in August. Even if FAMU Law does not comply with the ABA’s bar passage requirement by then, denial of accreditation is not automatic. The ABA has the flexibility to provide an extension.

So yes – FAMU Law has some work to do. Many FAMU law students will be studying to re-take the bar exam. And, they’ll be joined by many other law students from UF, FSU, and the University of Miami.

Update:

In a Tallahassee Democrat news article published today, FAMU Law Dean LeRoy Pernell stated that the college's overall bar passage rate is about 80 percent.

RN Fact Check: FAMU’s bar passage rates

First-try bar passage rates drop across Florida

FAMU law defying critics