Peaceful start for 2015 Bar exams

MANILA, Philippines - This year’s Bar examinations kicked off to a peaceful start yesterday. 

A total of 7,146 law graduates – the highest number in the past four years – trooped to the University of Sto. Tomas in Manila for the four-Sunday exams.

Supreme Court (SC) spokesman Theodore Te explained that the number of examinees may have increased after the court scrapped the “five-strike rule,” implemented since 2005, in which examinees who flunked five times are disqualified from further taking the Bar exams.

Te also attributed the increase in the figure to the increase of enrollees at new law schools, coupled with those who are taking the exams for a second or third time.

The SC official also explained that SC moved the Bar exams to November because of the academic calendar shift of most law schools.

Just like in the previous year, the examinees were again required to use transparent or see-through bags for purposes of convenience and security.

The guidelines issued by the SC office of the bar confidant provide that “all the examinees should place their books, bar materials, pens, food, water, and other personal items inside transparent or see-through bags, clear zip-lock bags, pouches, lunch boxes, clear water containers, and other similar containers.”

Additional security measures were put in place since the grenade explosion that marred the September 2010 Bar exams at De La Salle University in Manila.