Chat GPT-4 Understands Academic Attrition's Impact on Bar Passage But Does Anyone Else?

Abstract

Access Lex recently published an article titled, and purportedly answering the question, “Are Law Schools Cream-Skimming to Bolster Their Bar Exam Pass Rates?” The article, however, does not answer the question asked, but rather answers another question, “Whether the impact of attrition and transfer on bar passage can be accurately detected using broad national level regression analysis?” The answer to the first question is yes, some schools’ bar passage rates are impacted by transfer and/or academic attrition. And the answer to the latter question is no, regression cannot accurately detect the impact of academic attrition and transfer on bar passage. In asking one question but instead answering the other, the article conflates and obfuscates the important difference between causation and correlation. In this short essay, we use artificial intelligence to demonstrate why, even though academic attrition and transfer can impact an individual institution’s bar passage rates, these impacts are not fully discernable using broad, national level, regression analysis. Additionally, conclusions based on regression analysis distract us from addressing the systemic inequities perpetuated by the bar examination.