Florida Opens Bar Exam to Non-ABA Accredited Law Schools (2)

The Florida Supreme Court on Thursday issued an opinion that could expand access to the state’s legal industry, ruling that students from schools that are not accredited by the American Bar Association may be allowed to sit for the bar.

The decision doesn’t block ABA-accredited schools from having their students participate. Instead, the court may issue its own approval for law schools blessed by other United States Department of Education-approved accreditors beyond the ABA.

The move comes a week after Texas announced its own split from the ABA and put law school accreditation in the hands of the state supreme court. Like that decision, Florida’s ruling doesn’t mean immediate changes for one of the most sought after legal markets in the country.

“The Court acknowledges that additional programmatic accreditors for legal education programs may be recognized in the future and expresses its support for that possibility; this amendment is intended to accommodate that outcome,” the majority said.

The decision reinforced authority that the Supreme Court of Florida has always had over law school accreditation in its state, Jenn Rosato Perea, managing director of the ABA Section of Legal Education and Admission to the Bar, said in a statement.

“The Council has dedicated itself to quality legal education for over 100 years” and it “will continue to improve its Standards and promote the benefits of a national accreditation system for students, employers, law schools and the states themselves,” she said.

New Standards Coming

An open question among law school deans is whether their institutions could be forced to jump through separate hopes for state accreditation as well as for the nationwide accreditation they need from the American Bar Association that will let their students sit for the bars in all states.

The Florida Supreme Court said that it was open to establishing criteria it could apply to students from higher-education institutions accredited by seven accrediting agencies approved by the federal government. None of these accrediting bodies have law school-specific standards.

The justices anticipate “contacting such accreditors to assess their interest in accrediting law schools under standards focused on the quality of legal education and successful student outcomes,” the court said. “These standards may include requirements for law schools relating to credit hours, curriculum, disclosures to prospective students, bar passage rates, employment outcomes, compliance with federal and state law, protections for academic freedom, or other requirements the Court determines appropriate.”

Justice Jorge Labarga, who dissented, said the court was moving away from the “incomparable expertise” the ABA developed as an accreditor over decades.

The “best course for our legal educational system, our legal system, our profession, and above all, for Floridians is to stay the course with the ABA as the sole law school accreditor,” he said.

Politics, Competition

Florida’s decision charts a middle path between California, which for years has had special accreditation for non-ABA schools, and Texas, which is seeking to move accreditation away from the ABA.

The change in Texas and those contemplated by other GOP-led states comes amid conservative criticism of ABA’s diversity and inclusion requirements. The Trump administration threatened to pull the group’s accrediting power nationwide last year, and this week Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) encouraged the state high court to take a stand against the organization even though it has suspended enforcement of its DEI rules.

Austen Parrish, dean of the University of California Irvine School of Law and an officer on the Association of American Law Schools Executive Committee, said the Florida Supreme Court’s decision shows a bench “trying to navigate the political issue.” Several of the factors for accreditation the court said it wants in its order—such as a high-quality education and nondiscrimination—are things the ABA requires.

“I’m starting to hear more talk that maybe a group of conservative states will band together and a new accreditor could pop up,” he said. “But the devil will be in the details.”

Multiple accreditors could mean greater costs and time commitments if Florida schools must meet different sets of requirements. But Florida law school officials told Bloomberg Law they were happy the ruling didn’t change their students’ ability to take the state’s bar with their current ABA accreditation.

Nicholas Allard, dean of the state’s newest accredited law school, Jacksonville University College of Law, said he welcomes competition among accreditors.

“Competition is good and the free market will determine how much applicants and employers value the education in the schools that have ABA accreditation,” he said. “At the end of the day what’s going to matter is the quality of the education.”

The case is In re: Amendments to Rules Regulating the Florida Bar and Rules of the Supreme Court Relating to Admissions to the Bar, Fla., No. SC2025-2064, 1/15/26.