Oct. 24, 10:58 p.m. – The Supreme Court has banned bar operations — activities like putting up streamers, holding sendoffs, and forming cheering squads — in the vicinity of the University during the bar exams this November.
The announcement was made by lawyer Ma. Cristina Layusa, bar confidant and deputy clerk of court, in a briefing for superintendents and supervisors of the bar examinations this afternoon, the Supreme Court said on its website.
The Supreme Court will be assisted by uniformed police and plainclothes agents of the National Bureau of Investigation “[t]o maintain peace and order during bar examinations,” the website said.
The website also said Associate Justice Roberto Abad, chairman of the 2011 committee on bar examinations, had ordered that streets surrounding the campus be kept open to traffic during the exams.
The exams will be held on all Sundays of November, and for the first time in UST. The 2011 bar exams is also the first time that multiple-choice tests will be included.
More than 6,000 bar applicants (23 percent higher than last year) will take the exams next month.
On Nov. 6, the exams will cover Political and International Law, Labor and Social Legislation, and Taxation. On Nov. 13, the exams will cover Civil Law and Mercantile Law; on Nov. 20, Remedial Law, Legal Ethics and Forms, and Criminal Law; and on Nov. 27, Trial Memorandum and Legal Opinion.
Multiple-choice examinations will account for 60 percent of the candidates’ final grade, while essay-type examinations will weigh 40 percent.
Last year, 47 people were injured after a bomb blast on the final day of the bar examinations at De La Salle University. Raissa Laurel, a law student from San Sebastian College-Recolletos, lost both legs, while Joanna Ledda, a law student from San Beda College, lost her left leg. Rommel Marvin C. Rio
