On May 4, 2020, the DC Court of Appeals Committee on Admissions (DC Admissions) announced that they planned to administer the Uniform Bar Examination (“UBE”) on September 9-10, 2020, pandemic-related conditions and restrictions permitting. In their order, DC Admissions stated that registration for priority registrants for the September 9-10 UBE would open on May 18, 2020, and close on May 28, 2020 and that there will be no late registration period. In the evening of May 18, 2020, contrary to their previous order, DC Admissions posted the following announcement on dccourts.gov:

Due to the extremely high volume of applications, we may have exceeded our capacity for administration of the September 2020 DC Bar Exam, and, therefore, have paused applications, including applications that were initiated but not completed. The court will review submitted applications to ensure that all applicants qualify to sit for the exam. In addition, we will continue to review the available space in light of pandemic precautions. The court will likely reopen applications, and will give two days notice before reopening. We appreciate your patience; and we expect to have an update by the end of the week.

Despite indicating in their May 4th order that DC Admissions consulted with "the District of Columbia Department of Health, the Attorney General of the District of Columbia, the leadership of the District of Columbia Bar, the deans of the laws schools in the District of Columbia, this court’s Committee on Admissions, the National Conference of Bar Examiners, other bar admissions authorities, and the courts of other jurisdictions" they failed to anticipate that 2019/2020 graduates from other UBE jurisdictions who could not apply to their preferred jurisdiction due to new restrictions would flood DC with their applications seeking admission.

Graduates who were told by DC Admissions that they would have a ten-day period to complete their application were blindsided by this announcement. Further, graduates already dealing with the cancellation of their hard-earned graduations and rescinded job offers must now cope with potentially taking the bar in a jurisdiction they will not be practicing in or waiting until the February 2021 bar exam. Given the fragile state of the current job market, waiting till 2021 to take the bar will negatively affect their ability to get a job. DC Admissions should have anticipated that they would receive more applications and either advertised a “first come first serve” application period similar to NY solely for DC graduates or added two more September bar dates.

This petition asks that the DC Court of Appeals and the Committee on Admissions first to reopen the application and provide the ten day period they advertised. Second, restrict the priority registrants to 2019/2020 graduates from the six DC law schools or in effort to accommodate others, add two more dates to the September bar examination period.