SQE1 pass rate drops to just 44%

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By Legal Cheek on

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Lowest success rate so far

Student sitting SQE
Less than half of students passed the most recent sitting of part one of the Solicitors Qualifying Exam (SQE).

The latest statistical report from the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) shows that, of the 5,006 candidates who attempted both parts SQE1 in July 2024, only 44% passed. This is the lowest success rate to date and represents a notable drop from the 56% pass rate for the January sitting.

The SQE was formally introduced in September 2021 as the new route to solicitor qualification. SQE1 focuses on functioning legal knowledge (FLK) whilst SQE2 focuses on legal skills.

The SQE Hub: Your ultimate resource for all things SQE

The report, published yesterday, shows the pass rate was slightly higher among those sitting the exam for the first time, at 48%. The pass rates for the two papers that make up SQE1 — FLK1 and FLK2 — were 55% and 50%, respectively, for all candidates.

Earlier this year, Kaplan, the company responsible for administering the SQE, issued an apology after 175 students were mistakenly informed that they had failed parts of their assessments.

Want to know more about the SQE? Be sure to check it out our SQE Hub for more information on the law schools offering support one the new pathway as well as more information about the assessment itself.

54 Comments

ARidd

Anecdotally, from those I’ve spoken to – many who failed January 24 or lost their TCs were attempting to sit this one without the backing of course providers like BPP,ULAW etc and were purely using smaller company textbooks (ReviseSQE and the like) /online sessions. Perhaps a contributing factor? Without putting out a past paper or at least some more sample questions its going to be incredibly hard for course providers and resource creators to ensure their products are up to standard.

Affordability/logistics I’ve also found was a big stress point, for myself I needed to book exams, book hotels and book transport to the London test centres- which is feasible on a firm grant but an absolute pain if you needed time off from work or don’t have a city firm’s financial firepower to support you

Gabriel Harr

The pass rate was 48% for first timers. Still a very significant drop.

Christian C

5,500 candidates sat the exams this year as opposed to 3,800 in the SRA’s last report.

This could show that more people are ‘trying’ law and sitting the exams, resulting in a much lower pass rate.

Non-Russell Final Year

Are there not local test centres yet?

PJS

My local test centre is Preston, I still got sent to London

Passed SQE1

It’s difficult for students to effectively study properly when the SRA don’t release sufficient past papers for students and course providers. If the exam questions are changing or the marking is becoming harsher then the SRA need to release more guidance and examples to students so those sitting exams can prepare for them properly. Especially those who aren’t lucky enough to secure funding from their employers and have the extra stress of all the costs involved in retaking.

Taty

Surely the SRA/Kaplan are taking the p… and milking the SQE for every penny

PB

The 44% pass rate for the July SQE1 exam is certainly alarming, particularly when compared to the more consistent figures of previous sittings (53%, 53%, 52%, 53%, 56%). It could even be among the lowest pass rates in QLTS history, where the overall rate was a more palatable 57%. To suggest that this significant drop is due to candidates not studying hard enough is, frankly, a convenient but highly improbable excuse. The reality is that the questions appear to have been more challenging than in January or prior sittings, and let’s not forget the new rating system introduced since January 2024, which may well be a factor here.

The SRA can proclaim until the early hours that there’s no bias compared to earlier sittings, but let’s be honest—who’s buying that? Perhaps it’s time they took a moment of reflection: are they genuinely aiming to foster a fair and balanced qualification process, or is this just another cog in a well-oiled money-making machine, pushing candidates to retake the exam at least twice?

Archibald O'Pomposity

” is this just another cog in a well-oiled money-making machine, pushing candidates to retake the exam at least twice?”

No, this is NOT a case of the most cynical possible explanation. The issue is that candidates are not up to the standard required to pass the examination. Thankfully, we finally have a qualifying test that discriminates on MERIT. Being a lawyer requires considerable knowledge and analytical skills, upon which the lives of real people depend. Those who are not competent enough to pass a slightly challenging set of tests must NOT be allowed to practise.

KTS

Ok. Here are my 5 cents on this one since I was there this July.

I scored above 350 points on FLK-1 and above 310 points on FLK-2. While it is all nice and fine it still is a difference of about 50 points. That is quite a lot.

And I guess, I know the reason why this is the case. The design of the actual questions on FLK-2 (in my case).

Briefly put, I would say that about 40 or may be even 60 questions on my FLK-2 were very, very hard. Like, really. And I did notice that this difficulty was totally artificial.

Let me refer to these test questions as ‘Extra Hard Questions’ or ‘EHQs’ for short.

So, this is how this artificial difficulty was achieved, in my opinion:

A wall of text – When you read the question itself the text of it takes almost the entire real estate of a 25–27-inch LCD display. And font-wise, it was something like Times New Roman 12-13, tops. So, it takes, physically, quite a lot of time to just read the scenario.

A scenario twist – These EHQs seem to have very, very convoluted or weird scenarios. Like, you read and read and read about one area of law, lots of facts and details and then, they just ask you something completely different in the final paragraph.

Very bloated answers – The answer choices for EHQs tend to be seriously verbose. So again, it takes a lot of time to just skim-read all the choices. And it all eats up one’s total time available.

Hair-split differences in answers – The differences in answer choices for EHQs are almost non-existent, they are really hidden in some minor details or nuances and under time pressure it is hard to make a right choice. Very often you must just guess, hoping you got it right. Or not.

So, this is my brief summary of the problem I spotted.

(117)(12)

Anon

Do you know if there is any way to change the font size? As a person with mediocre eye-sight, this makes me slightly worried.

KTS

I am afraid there’s no way to change the font size. If you really need the adjustments I believe you may notify Kaplan in advance. They ask about special arrangements needed for one’s medical and other needs/circumstance. But it is only a theory for me since I never used/never needed any of these options.

Name *L

this is what I’m really scared of. I struggle to process large blocks of text in artificially stressful conditions. Even if I probably know the principles and can get to the correct answer, given the time to carefully re-read it multiple times – as I would in real life. I’m terrified!

NQ

Em – the job is literally drafting and reviewing large blocks of text

SQE+1 intake

Exactly! The entire job is to process large blocks of text in pressurised high-stakes scenarios. As someone who took it, the SQE is pretty damn hard – but in my opinion that’s completely necessary. It’s a hard career that demands the best!

FVP

I sat the July SQE1. Although I did pass both sections, to be honest I did not feel confident about it until the day I received my scores. I felt that the FLK1 tested more on specific exceptions to rules rather than the rules themselves. And like another commenter here, I also felt that the FLK2 had some absurdly hard questions with answers that were different by only one word in some cases. The test felt harder substantively than the mocks through ULaw. Anyhow I am not surprised at the low pass rate. Best wishes to those who will need to retake it.

Reality of the SQE

SQE1 has a first time pass rate of about 50%, and SQE2 has a first time pass rate of 70% to 80% – with each round of exams costing thousands £££ to sit. On these statistics only around 35% of candidates first past time – if at all.

Every few months, 100s of aspiring solicitors dreams are crushed, training contracts lost, and they are forced to pivot into other career paths. However, you will only see the success stories shared online.

Outliers

This is interesting but shouldn’t really be alarming anyone.

Those who have training contracts mostly sit the SQE1 in January rather than July due to the timing of when the training contract starts. Those who sit in July are sitting in low season or are otherwise not part of the mainstream group (in terms of timing). It would be more interesting to see results from each January compared. If those were to change, that would be more of a concern.

(116)(75)

Sophie

I would disagree with your comment. It is alarming.

Many training contract offer holders are in both intakes – the ones in July are no less important than those in January. There’s options as to when to start the PGDL/SQE and this does not always match with TC start dates (for example, someone might finish the SQE 6 months before starting their TC). So I find that your comment is based on assumptions rather than evidence.

In any case, whether a candidate is a training contract offer-holder or not, every candidate is important, especially when the aim of the SQE was to improve accessibility to the solicitor profession. Only ‘caring’ about training contract offer-holder results goes against this very sentiment. It is alarming that less than half the country’s aspiring solicitors did not pass this new exam, for which there is very little transparency on marking and examinable content.

I think what would be more ‘interesting’ is to instead look at the possible grass-roots reason behind this – is it that course providers are not teaching well? Is it the SRA’s new marking system? Is it the lack of transparency? Is it the layout and format of the exam that is not conducive to top performance? etc etc.

(96)(113)

Outliers

Sophie, for an accusation that I’m jumping to assumptions, you’ve made about half a dozen of these yourself…

I’ll leave you to reflect carefully on your own comments.

(115)(55)

anon

The vast majority of firms have a March intake as well as September, so the march intake trainees take SQE1 in July and SQE2 in October.

Outlier

No, this is unlikely.

It is more likely that a minority of firms (such as the City or US firms) who have hundreds of staff are the ones with two intakes. The majority of firms by number, so the high street, small and others which outnumber the City firms, will usually only have one intake.

Unless by ‘’majority’ you mean firms that most readers of LC train at, in which case, you’re probably right.

7 years' PQE

Your comments about only being concerned about the “mainstream group” are, quite frankly, piss poor. I really hope you don’t have any involvement in the legal profession with judgement like that.

Sophie’s comments are much more sensible – I would read them and have a think about what the SQE’s intended aim was.

(64)(113)

Outliers

To 7 year PQE.

You obviously haven’t read my comment properly. Mainstream in terms of timing. I hope this attention to detail isn’t reflective of your PQE but rather just an oversight. Pisspoor isn’t a word I use – but here it’s apt.

(118)(47)

Int

you are insufferable!

SRA Stan

As always, people will blame the Kaplan and the SRA instead of the candidates. Passed in the first quintile and thought it was one of the easiest exams I have sat.

(25)(137)

Recruiter

One of the most arrogant posts I have ever seen on any forum. You may be good at passing exams but you clearly have zero emotional intelligence or self awareness Stan

Bob

They were clearly trolling… They were literally stanning SRA lol

SRA Stan

12 people clearly agree with me

KTS

In addition to what I have posted above about these ‘Extra Hard Questions’ and all.

The text of my fist post may look a bit artificial but that is because it is taken from my email to the sqe training provider to whom I tried to convey the message about the need to update their training materials to include the EHQs as I call them.

So, I would like to add that I did not meet such EHQs during my revision.

Neither my sqe training provider nor SRA website give anything similar to the EHQs I faced during the actual exam.

Trust me, I completed all the assignments (and extra) with my provider.
I also did all test Qs offered by SRA.
I also bought a couple of extra books just with more test Qs and finished most of them (For those interested the books are ‘FLK1/FLK2 Practice Assessment’ edited by Mark Thomas). But I never came across the Qs that were actually offered this July – not in style of their writing, not in style of the answer choices. There’s a post on reddit where someone said that they saw a similar type of hard questions when training with UOL but then, as far as I recall, that person also said that despite the scenarios being weird and hard the answer choices were more accessible. So, I don’t know what to make of it. Try to get as much prepared as possible. Do as many test Qs as you can. Expect the EHQs.

P.S. No, I have no tc. All adventure was totally self-funded, etc.

SRA Stan's alter ego

Wow, SRA Stan, first quintile? You must be a genius! Clearly, everyone else just needs to level up. Who knew all we needed was your superior insight to fix the whole exam system!

girl

I’m actually pissing myself. I take the SQE in january and i’m batshit scared. I’m also self funding as well. Therefore i’m paying money for materials that are not similar to the exam??? The SRA needs to fix up really and do something

Future Trainee

This is just a poor take.

I passed in the first quintile too and disagree with your comment and more importantly what you are trying to achieve by saying it.

Anon

The system is screwed, if they end up scrapping this, they better refund the fees people have paid to take these exams and course and then some! The fact that earlier this year, Kaplan got the marking wrong for a MCQ(!) exam speaks volumes.

Skin of my teeth

I sat this SQE1 exam as my first attempt. I passed overall but got 300 marks on FLK2, which is bang on the pass threshold. I know of peers in my cohort who were a mark or two below and I do feel like on another day, I may not have been so lucky.

I am have taken a student loan out for a prep course with BPP where the teaching standard is shocking. Lecturers just not turning up or getting questions wrong themselves. I took 2 weeks of annual leave from my full time legal role to ensure I had prepared sufficiently. For context, I also have a first class LLB degree.

What bothers me most is that I made efforts which would take me a great deal of time and expense to replicate. Fees of close to £2,000 which I could not afford to pay again. And after doing everything to prepare, I was still uncertain of whether it would be enough to pass.

There is not enough material out there to justify the complexity of the questions and multiple choice answers. SRA practice papers are so much easier than the real thing and course providers’ standards vary significantly. The exam questions are worded to catch you out rather than to reward knowledge.

I’m all for raising the standards – law is a difficult profession. But you have to give candidates a fighting chance with adequate resources and less financial exposure.

On to SQE 2…

SQE Drained

Are they sure that they marked the papers right again? Excuse me for being paranoid but I was part of the 175 who got told the wrong mark in January 2024.

Okay

I’m pleased to hear this.

It will mean that those seeking a legal career solely for financial gain will struggle if they don’t approach the law with seriousness and dedication to their studies.

Reality check

Isn’t this just proof that the next generation of would be lawyers are simply not good enough to cut the mustard?

Recruiter

The untold truth is that Law Schools are run by Private Equity and organisations that do not give a fig about anything other than making money. It is ridiculously easy to get a place at Law School. Kaplan et al will gladly take your money even though the truth is you may not have the aptitude to pass these exams. THEY ARE PROPERLY DIFFICULT and so they should be.

Of course people need to be given opportunity but too many students do not know what they are letting themselves in for. If self funded then in some cases they are being ripped off. The Law Schools publish impressive stats about employability but should in fact publish stats about the number of their students who actually go on to secure a training contract.

The same is true of Bar School.

Access for all is to be encouraged but so too is honesty that to pass these exams requires intellectual rigour and dedication. Too many students are being set up to fail and charged tens of thousands of pounds for the privilege. It is a scandal.

Stick to recruitment

Passing these exams doesn’t require intellectual rigour. I passed them and I can tell you the questions are more arbitrary and less meritocratic than you’ve romanticised in your head. Artificial difficult is not the same as a test that does well to separate strong ability/preparation and weaker candidates.

For starters, why are candidates required to memorise vast amounts of law and apply them without any type of resource to check against? When will you have to answer a question from a client where you are presented with 4 similarly worded answers and need to decide which one is the least wrong (SBAQ)? When in your career will you be required to prepare for a piece of advocacy where you are only given any facts of the case 40 minutes before your submission? When will you be required to give a client an assessment of their annual tax liability without being able to check the rules on this? When will you have to produce a handwritten attendance note under timed conditions straight after a meeting with a client?

Why are candidates examined to the standard of a “day one” NQ solicitor on several different topics of law, most of which will not be relevant to any NQ? Please feel free to disagree if you think the average associate will advise on wills, business law, criminal law, dispute resolution and property law in the same practice

Old timer

The whole examination process is artificial and now its largely reduced to multiple choice questions its become of dubious quality. Most litigation lawyers in practice simply need to be good at horse trading ie settling a case or in criminal advocacy possess good theatrical skills none of which is tested by examination. In reality you can be a very good lawyer without knowing that much about the law

KTS

This is why we have SQE-2 on top of SQE-1. SQE-2 does require theatrical skills and what not.

HenryTC

Students have to pay the full cost when resitting, there isn’t a discount available and many companies who are sponsoring candidates will not pay for the retake either so it becomes really expensive. Statistically why would those thinking of becoming solicitors decide to go down this route when there is less than 50% chance of passing?

Also, candidates are only permitted to sit the exam 3 times before being blocked for 6 years which really derails prospective careers.

Archibald O'Pomposity

Derails prospective careers? Derails the careers of the fumblingly incompetent, more like.

Sacked US trainee

Firms should be restricted from sacking trainees for failing the SQE. The SQE is one of the most difficult exams in the world and it’s totally unfair to kill one’s career on that basis.

I have been fired by my firm earlier this year for failing the exams. I worked 60+ billable since the start of my TC and I including during my study leave. I now have to work as a bellhop at a luxury hotel while figuring out what to do next.

KTS

I am really sorry to hear that. Do you plan to still press on and take another shot at the exams? I mean, that stint with a previous firm would still be a QWE, right?

Reginald

The SQE was in part created to increase diversity in the industry.

Yet, the prep course is no cheaper and if you have to work whilst studying you are at a huge disadvantage. (Molly-Mae, we don’t all have the same 24hrs in a day…)

It is only after students pass this somewhat insurmountable hurdle that they can access the benefits of the SQE. Although, to be frank, I doubt you could secure a decent NQ job with a patchwork TC.

The SQE isn’t fit for purpose. The LPC wasn’t perfect, but the SQE seems to set folks up better for pub quizzes than legal practice.

Archibald O'Pomposity

How useful are you in the pub quizzes, Reg?

Some thoughts...

Plus, these assessments are based on the standard of a ‘newly qualified solicitor’. Many students who are taking SQE 1 have limited experience of legal practice and are doing this assessment based on memorised information that they need to recall for a single best answer assessment format in order to progress into their training contract for two years. I appreciate some of those sitting do have prior experience of being in law firms, but raising the standard that high should have raised flags immediately for those who were devising this assessment. Even those who do trades qualifications don’t have to go through this format. Plumbers, for example, do end point assessments 2 / 3 years after they done work on-site.

Reality

From the comments on here, it sounds like the examination is doing a better job of sorting the wheat from the chaff which one would expect from a professional examination, especially in these days when degrees mean nothing.

Hard to claim 'reality' when most current lawyers wouldn't pass

It has separated those who are really good at memorising/ have lots of time to memorise versus those that are self-funding and having to work a job at the same time or are carers without the luxury of bank of mum and dad or training contract offering firm. I do not believe that memorisation in 13 different areas of law is the core skill of being a lawyer, the core skill is actually the application of the law to different situations and the skills tested in SQE 2. It appears that SQE1 is sort of an unnecessarily hard hurdle just to trip people up. I passed and let me tell you some of the answers in the exams differed by one word or the order of a sentence. An example I have written to illustrate the similarities of answers (ie. not taken from the exam) “She must first do X and do Y” or “She must do X and Y” – technically both were correct and both X and Y were part of the next step in that situation. The use of “first” is unnecessary because doing something “first” is in relation to doing another task second, yet there was no mention of another task. The answer is not “first do X and THEN do Y,” but rather “first do X and Y” vs “do X and Y.” I mean it’s entirely nonsensical that people’s entire legal careers are sitting on syntax like this.

What it has done is exacerbated the gap. Don’t get me wrong I’m all for making sure that those that progress into the legal profession deserve it, however, it would appear the exam threshold to pass is actually too high. You may disagree and that’s ok but a reminder that only in this last year has the sra forced the sqe onto a larger group of candidates, so setting the 300 pass mark is relatively arbitrary as they themselves don’t actually have enough data on it.

Archibald O'Pomposity

Correct, but try explaining that to the entitled snowflakes on this thread who believe that the exam is a mere rubber-stamp to enable them to practise law and make Mummy and Daddy proud.

Archibald O'Pomposity

The issue is that candidates are not up to the standard required to pass the examination. Thankfully, we finally have a qualifying test that discriminates on MERIT. Being a lawyer requires considerable knowledge and analytical skills, upon which the lives of real people depend. Those who are not competent enough to pass a slightly challenging set of tests must NOT be allowed to practise.

Jane

The LPC had about 50% pass rate https://www.legalcheek.com/2024/01/huge-disparity-in-lpc-provider-pass-rates-as-sqe-was-introduced/. I think the City Consortium Programme firms start people in September even if their TC starts in a mid year in which case you might expect these latest SQE1 results perhaps would be a bit worse than those taking SQE1 in January from those firms. Similarly everyone going seamlessly from the PGDL or LLB to the SQE course would be starting in September due to academic years before. However I wish we could just return to the LPC as it was better all round. I am not an SQE fan. I would like more data. The SRA says if you get a 1st you do best on SQE1, if 2/1 next best etc which makes sense but if some big firms have, say, 20% of trainees failing I would like data on who fails – did those people have very high A level grades, excellent degree etc – if so then something is going wrong.

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