Dean Griswold Urges Harder Study During Students' Bar Preparations

Lay School graduates should prepare more carefully for their bar examinations, Erwin N. Griswold, Dean of the Law School, said recently in a memorandum to all law students.

"The results achieved by our students in bar examinations in June, 1950, were rather disappointing," the memorandum stated. Griswold added that special study is necessary before taking the exams, and that it is a mistake to take them "cold." The number of Law School graduates passing last June's exams was on the average 25 percent lower than the 80 percent national average of previous years.

Meanwhile, the Massachusetts House of Representatives tentatively approved an investigation of the high number of failures--581 out of 723--in the recent Massachusetts bar examinations. Thirty-seven out of 76 Law School graduates passed for a percentage of 48.7. The post-war average for the Law School has been 70 percent passing.

Griswold also pointed out that although "No graduate of this School should have serious trouble with bar examinations," it is imperative that each candidate find out the special nature of the exams in the state where he plans to practice. New York and California the pamphlet pointed out, put great emphasis on local procedure and common law, subjects which cannot be adequately covered in the Law School and which require special preparation after graduation.