Consistent Top-Tier Bar Results
Preparing for your bar exam success story begins the moment you walk through the doors of the Duquesne Kline School of Law. Our intensive and individualized approach offers the skills, knowledge, and support you need to pass the legal licensure exam in any jurisdiction. We take our commitment to your success seriously. We build communities of support and encouragement throughout the months you study for the bar exam, as well as provide you with practice opportunities, mentoring, and substantive guidance.
We are proud that our Duquesne Kline School of Law graduates who take part in specialized programming achieve superior bar passage results. Duquesne Kline School of Law is consistently in the top-tier for the Ultimate Bar Exam (UBE), with our most recent Ultimate Bar pass rate of 93.28%, exceeding the ABA reported aggregate for all 2023 law graduates in the United States.
Duquesne Kline School of Law’s 2023 Ultimate Bar Pass Rate, which follows our graduates’ successes two years after graduation, is also above the Pennsylvania state average. Duquesne Kline School of Law consistently ranks among the top law schools in Pennsylvania because our graduates consistently achieve a higher than 90% Ultimate Bar pass rate.
Sweeping State Average Success
Our bar preparation program leads to our Duquesne Kline School of Law graduates consistently placing in the upper level of Pennsylvania bar results and surpassing the Pennsylvania state average bar results by ten percent.
In fact, 92.86% of the graduates of our Duquesne Kline School of Law Class of 2025 passed the most recent administration (July 2025) of the Pennsylvania Uniform Bar Exam on the first attempt. When you pass this exam on the first attempt, you jumpstart your career in the law. Our 2025 first-time passage rate result ranked the Duquesne Kline School of Law together with three other top-performing Pennsylvania law schools—whose first-time passage rates were all clustered within tenths of a percentage point.
The success of our programming is demonstrated wherever our Duquesne Kline School of Law students sit for the bar exam. In our home state, the July 2025 first-time passage rate exceeded our historically high passage rate. The bar results from that administration placed Duquesne Kline School of Law more than ten percentage points higher than the Pennsylvania state overall first-time passage rate average of 82.47%.
Duquesne Kline School of Law graduates also sit for the bar across the country, and they achieve exceptional rates of success in these jurisdictions:
| California | Indiana | New York | Texas |
| Colorado | Maryland | North Carolina | Utah |
| Connecticut | Massachusetts | Ohio | Virginia |
| Florida | Minnesota | Oklahoma | Washington |
| Georgia | Nevada | Oregon | West Virginia |
| Illinois | New Jersey | Pennsylvania | Wisconsin |
Preparing for What's Next
Pennsylvania has adopted the NextGen UBE beginning in July 2028, and until then law graduates will take the legacy UBE in Pennsylvania. Scores from the legacy UBE examination will remain transferable to jurisdictions who have already begun administering the new NextGen UBE bar exam.
We are pushing forward. Duquesne Kline School of Law professors have been planning for Pennsylvania’s NextGenUBE debut for the past several years. Our professors are national experts on the new format of the NextGen UBE who are tapped to speak at conferences and other law schools across the country. These professors have also drafted problems released nationwide for all constituencies to employ when preparing their graduates for the new iteration of the lawyer licensing exam. Our Duquesne Kline School of Law graduates will be ready to experience success on the NextGen UBE across all jurisdictions, and especially in Pennsylvania.
Community Building
As a Duquesne Kline School of Law student, you will benefit from the teaching and experience of our engaged faculty who offer one-on-one support in addition to bar study courses and extracurricular programming sessions. Our alumni give back to the school by supporting these initiatives and our students.
Faculty make it a priority to host wellness gatherings as an opportunity for you to unwind and reduce the stress of bar study. These shared gatherings offer a reprieve during the demanding bar preparation season.
Achievements and Accolades
Our extensive bar preparation program and our graduates’ excellent bar outcomes have gained national recognition.
Our students celebrate other achievements and rankings, including high employment outcomes, a nationally recognized Legal Research & Writing Program, and experience in Duquesne Kline School of Law’s mission-driven clinics.
Bar Review Course Scholarships
Partial bar course scholarships are available annually. Learn more.