Divided opinions over fairness to students
The Bar Course Aptitude Test (BCAT) is to be scrapped from 31 July because it ‘no longer… serves a useful purpose’, the Bar Standards Board (BSB) has confirmed.
However, the Bar Council reiterated its concerns that scrapping the BCAT will lead to increasing numbers of students paying to complete courses with little or no prospect of achieving a successful career at the Bar.
The Legal Services Board has approved the BSB’s application to end the Test, which costs students £150 and was introduced as a prerequisite for vocational training as a barrister in 2013 when high numbers of students were failing the Bar course. The Test was intended to filter students for aptitude. It is a computerised 55-minute test with 60 multiple choice questions, based on a Watson-Glaser psychometric test of critical thinking and understanding of arguments, identifying different perspectives, and distinguishing facts from opinions and assumptions.
BSB director general, Mark Neale, said: ‘Bar training providers must comply fully with the requirements of the Authorisation Framework when selecting their students, and that includes their obligations to maintain high standards and to promote accessibility.
‘We shall continue to monitor providers carefully to ensure that their own selection of students is fair and rigorous.’
However, Mark Fenhalls QC, Chair of the Bar Council, said: ‘The problem of too many students wasting money embarking on courses they will struggle to pass is on the rise again.
‘We fully support the aims of making sure the Bar is accessible to people from all backgrounds and so we are disappointed that the decision to scrap the BCAT has been made without putting robust alternative provisions in place.’
In its response to the September 2021 BSB consultation on the future of the BCAT, the Bar Council highlighted the ‘reasonably good correlation between BCAT mark and degree of success on the BPTC’.
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