1,300 New Lawyers!

Source: INQUIRER.net

MANILA, Philippines – (UPDATE) Some 1,300 law graduates passed the 2008 bar examinations, Philippine Daily Inquirer and INQUIRER.net sources at the Supreme Court said Friday.

The figure is more than 20 percent of the 6,364 who took and finished the four-Sunday examinations in September last year.

INQUIRER.net sources who asked not to be identified because they were not authorized to talk to media said the passing rate was also lowered from 75 percent to 72 percent in the subjects that were taken but was not clear whether this was applicable to all or some of them.

In the 2007 bar examinations, 1,289 out of 5,626 examinees passed for a passing percentage of 22.91 percent.

The highest passing percentage since 2000 was the 31.61 percent posted in 2004.

Formal announcement of the results is expected at 4 p.m. on Friday shortly after the committee on the bar examinations finishes “decoding” the answer sheets and matches them with the names of the examinees.