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Revealed: The Bar Courses with the highest pass rates

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By Legal Cheek on

9

Bar Standards Board’s latest data release well worth a look for aspiring barristers

The Bar Standards Board (BSB) has published a detailed breakdown of pass rates according to Bar Course provider and students’ prior undergraduate degree results.

The data gives aspiring barristers a sense of where they are most likely to pass their vocational training at the first attempt according to what degree classification they got.

Bar Course pass rates
Percentage of students that passed all 10 modules at the first attempt by provider and
degree classification as of December 2023

The other standout finding from the wider report was the growth in Bar Course student numbers. 2,378 students were enrolled on courses between July 2023 and June 2024, a 6% increase on the previous year and a 12% rise from July 2020 to June 2021, when 2,120 students enrolled on the course. It’s worth noting that a sizeable proportion of these students are international and intend to return home to practise. Pupillage numbers in in England & Wales rose 10% to 638 in the most recent figures published by the Bar Council.

Gearing up for pupillage applications in the new cycle? Check out Legal Cheek’s Chambers Most List, featuring profiles of 50 top sets.

9 Comments

Aich Haitch

I wanna be a Barista!

When do I get me wig?

Reply Report comment
(1)(7)

Concerned

These stats are worrying. Why on earth are those with a 2:2 allowed on the (very expensive) course when the course providers know full well they have almost no hope of passing? BPP (other sites) 8%(!) pass rate for those with a 2:2, but BPP is still happily signing them up to the course simply to take their money.

Course providers are marketing their courses to people who they know will not pass, simply to pocket the fees and generate profit. How many students have taken out crippling loans to pay the course fees despite the course provider knowing they have no hope of passing, let alone securing pupillage. This is frankly unethical.

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(13)(2)

unconcern?

Because if the providers stopped allowing those with 2:2 to take the course, the accusation would be one of freezing out those from low socio economic / disadvantaged backgrounds…

The above stats show that some 2:2 students still manage to pass, and if so, good for them! If providers changed the rule, these students wouldn’t have been able to pursue a career at the Bar.

Onus is on students to research and work out whether they can hack it. As much as I sometimes think the providers could do better in some ways, you have to lay a big piece (mostly) of the responsibility on the students themselves.

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(8)(3)

Lydia123

I got a 2:2 and start pupillage in a couple of months. A 2:2 doesn’t necessarily reflect academic ability, I had a lot of extenuating circumstances at the time and was lucky to get that. Flew through the BPTC. Personal circumstances aren’t reflected in generic stats and don’t show individual circumstances.

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(8)(6)

Edmund

The pass rate in this table is the percentage of students that pass all the modules *at the first time of asking*. A huge percentage will pass eventually (my guess is more than 75%), once they’ve done resits.

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(3)(1)

NQ

I think the only explanation of ppl on the bar course with desmonds is foreign students. When i was doing the LPC, one of my (random) flatmates was going to work in (i think) Malaysia and aparently the LPC wasnt equivalent. So she did the BPC instead of the LPC even though she wanted to be a solicitor.

Cant imagine anyone with a desmond is actually trying to be a UK barrister unless DPP really needs some folk haha.

She also did it at BPP, so maybe Ulaw requires a 2:1? Anyways, your legal career nowadays is pretty much scuppered if you get a desmond in undergrad. Far too many students.

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(4)(1)

Laz

What is desmond? Explain

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(0)(0)

Deed U No

Fact: Some of the greatest achievers of in the world- are university/ college dropouts!

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(1)(0)

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