Illinois is Changing to the UBE: How will the Illinois Bar Exam Change?

Illinois is Changing to the UBE: How will the Illinois Bar Exam Change?

Beginning July 2019, Illinois will begin administering the Uniform Bar Exam (UBE) rather than the Illinois bar exam. The Illinois bar exam is already similar to the UBE. However, officially changing to the UBE will cause changes in both the administration and scoring of the Illinois bar exam.  Here, we tell you exactly how the Illinois bar exam will change. 

The Illinois bar exam format will change! 

Right now, the Illinois bar exam consists of three Illinois essay questions (IEE), one multistate performance test (MPT), six Multistate Essay Exam (MEE) questions, and 200 Multistate Bar Exam (MBE) questions. With Illinois changing to the UBE, it will instead have two MPTs, six MEE’s, and 200 MBE questions. In other words, an MPT will replace the three Illinois essay questions.

The new schedule for standard Illinois bar exam test takers will be as follows:

Tuesday                                  Wednesday

MPT (two tasks, 3 hours)        MBE AM (100 questions, 3 hours)

MEE (six essays, 3 hours)      MBE PM (100 questions, 3 hours)

The scoring of the Illinois bar exam will change!

With the current Illinois bar exam, the MBE is worth 50%, and the six MEE essays and three IEE essays are weighted equally. The MPT is worth 2.25x as much as an individual essay.

The Uniform Bar Exam weights the MBE at 50%, the MEE at 30%, and the MPT at 20%. Thus, the MPT portion will be worth more!

For test takers, this means you have to start taking the MPT seriously!

Many bar exam test takers procrastinate studying for the MPT portion of the exam. Once Illinois switches to the UBE, you should take extra care to pay close attention to the MPT early on in your bar prep. It will be worth 20% of your score. And, you may find it quite easy to boost your MPT score significantly with dedicated practice.

We help Illinois bar exam takers pass the Illinois bar exam every single administration. If you are interested in our help, please review the options we have below or contact us today!

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