California Bar Calls $2 Million Exam Price Jump a ‘Big Mistake’

The new July 2025 bar exam might cost millions of dollars more than planned, causing alarm Tuesday among bar trustees as staff members said they’re still working to bring down the cost.

The deal the Board of Trustees authorized in September to administer a new, California-specific exam included $2.4 million to run the July 2025 test for four days. Bar staff believed that window could be compressed to the standard two days without significantly raising the cost, according to a report.

But the initial quote for a two-day July 2025 test staff received from ProctorU Inc., which does business as Meazure Learning, was an eye-popping $5.8 million. The state can’t extend that time frame to cut costs, bar staff say.

“I don’t think it was bad faith,” Special Counsel Bridget Gramme said. “I think it was a very big mistake.”

Meazure’s July estimate has since dropped to $4.4 million, and further negotiation is expected.

The state bar has for months been working out a deal so California can develop a state-specific test to save millions of dollars annually for its admissions fund, which is on the brink of insolvency. The California Supreme Court approved the switch this fall.

“I’m really disturbed that we’re having this conversation,” said trustee Sarah Good, calling for a post-mortem to understand what happened. “We approved this in September for a certain amount, and now we’re looking at a really material increase at a time when we’re trying to be fiscally responsible and cut costs and live within our means.”

State Bar executive director Leah Wilson said the responsibility lies “both with us at the staff level and with the vendor.”

“There are many moving parts all happening at the same time around this bar exam,” Wilson said. “We are transitioning to a new multiple choice vendor for the first time, I believe, in 30 or 30-plus years.”

Gramme said a competing vendor has offered a lower quote, but that state bar staff work smoothly with Meazure’s staff and it would be disruptive to test takers to switch.

A revised pricing proposal is expected next week.

Meanwhile, the board approved an additional $100,000 to fund the bar’s legal defense against claims that it shielded from mounting ethics complaints former plaintiffs’ attorney Tom Girardi, who has been criminally convicted of fraud.

Trustees also threw their weight behind the California legislature’s efforts to increase funding for legal services for vulnerable residents in anticipation of President-elect Donald Trump’s administration. Of that package, $10 million would go through the bar’s Legal Services Trust Fund Commission.

The commission “is fully prepared to quickly implement and distribute the additional ten million,” said Donna Hershkowitz, the bar’s chief mission officer and legislative director, “and obviously sees the need for that additional funding to provide support to legal services agencies that are funded by the state bar in California.”