Bar and Medical Exam Delays Keep Graduates in Limbo

John Molera thought the anxiety of taking the bar exam was over after he finished his test in late July. Then, a few hours later, he got an email from a classmate: One of the roughly 30 people sitting in the room with him for the past two days — where Mr. Molera recalled many people lifting masks for snacks and water breaks — had the coronavirus.

Mr. Molera, 25, is among roughly 70,000 recent law school graduates who take the bar each year, along with thousands of others who sit for licensing exams in social work, engineering, surgery and other fields, typically alongside hundreds of other students squeezed into crowded rooms at universities or testing centers.

Many of those exams were postponed and testing sites shut down in the spring as the coronavirus spread across the country, forcing recent graduates to delay the start of their careers.

Some tests moved online — often with scheduling problems and even computer glitches. Other states continued to offer them in person, raising concern about the possible spread of the virus at testing centers like the one where Mr. Molera took his exam at the University of Denver.

The chaos and confusion are helping fuel efforts in some states to eliminate the bar and other licensing exams, which are seen by some critics as unnecessary and antiquated, while administrators defend them as a needed protection for the public.

The test to get a law license is administered by each state’s bar association under the authority of its highest court, typically in February and July. This year, 23 states went ahead with in-person exams in July, while at least 20 postponed them until the fall — with some offering a new remote option in October.

Medical students have confronted similar uncertainty because of delays in their licensing exams, which are needed before they can become residents at hospitals. The United States Medical Licensing Examination temporarily suspended its exams in late March after the private company administering them, Prometric, shut down in-person testing sites.

Some medical students said they learned of the postponements from Prometric less than 48 hours before their tests. The licensing organization later said it was “disappointed” with Prometric’s failure to communicate with students.

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