With Report Cards Coming Soon, Kids Might Want Her on Retainer
In a move that bodes well for a legal career filled with successful appeals, a bar candidate who flunked the New York state exam got the decision overturned.</br></br>A few weeks ago, 29-year-old Rose Palermo learned that in July she had failed her third crack at the exam, missing a passing grade of 660 by a heartbreaking two points. "I was afraid I could lose my job," she says. But she saw a glimmer of hope after a discussion with Steven Shapiro, a fellow associate at the New York law firm Dreyer & Traub.</br></br>It seems that one of the 2 1/2-point multiple-choice questions addressed an arcane point of state labor law. Both Mr. Shapiro and Ms. Palermo gave the same answer. And as far as the State Board of Law Examiners was concerned, both got it wrong.</br></br>But the examiners were mistaken, according to the 31-year-old Mr. Shapiro (who passed the test nonetheless). A onetime unemployment-insurance consultant, he learned from his former employer that the law applying to the question in question had changed on July 7 -- about three weeks before the bar exam. Thus, Ms. Palermo and Mr. Shapiro were correct.</br></br>Ms. Palermo headed for Albany to petition the board of examiners, which late last month agreed to accept answers based on either version of the law. As a result, Ms. Palermo and 25 others passed the test. And 33 exam takers were bumped up into a range that allows them to appeal their failing grades by challenging the marks given to their essays.