Bar topnotchers' list shows improved education across the country

MANILA, Philippines — The change in the Bar Exams topnotchers list is an indicator of improved quality of education across the country, a panel that supervises Philippines law schools said.

Emerson Aquende, chairman of the Legal Education Board, said that the board sees graduates of schools from outside Metro Manila making it to the Top 10 list is a signal that “quality of legal education across the country has significantly improved.”

Aquende added in an e-mail to Philstar.com that "talent, which used to be concentrated in the traditional powerhouse law colleges, is now more evenly distributed."

The 2016 Bar Exams had a passing rate of 59.09%, one of the highest in the history of the SC. It was also the first time that no law school from Metro Manila made it to the Top 10 list.

The 2017 Bar Exams, meanwhile, posted a passing rate of 25.5%. For the first time, the SC expanded the bar topnotchers list to include the 20 highest scores..

Only two schools in Metro Manila: University of Santo Tomas—with three of its graduates—and San Beda College of Law—with two—made it to the Top 10.

LEB: Passing rates a better indicator of quality

But Aquende stressed that focus should be on "the passing rates of the different law schools, as it is indicative of the quality of legal education dispensed."

 In the 2017 Bar Exams, only 1,724 bar takers out of the 6,748 became new lawyers at the end of the four Sundays of gruelling exams.

An official announcement on the passing rates of schools has yet to be posted.

Aquende called on the country’s new lawyers to “serve to be instruments of justice for fellow Filipinos.”

READ: 'It's all worth it', Bar 2017 passers say