No. You may not claim in any way to be a licensed attorney of the State Bar of California. You must use the applicable title in connection with your activities performed under the MJP Program: 

• Registered In-House Counsel 

• Registered Legal Aid Attorney 

• Specially Registered Attorney (in lieu of Registered Military Spouse Attorney)

Processing may take up to 60 days from the date your Testing Accommodations Application is deemed complete by the State Bar. If you submit an application on or close to the final filing deadline, there may not be enough time after receiving a decision to submit a request for review. However, you can submit a request for review for a subsequent administration of the exam, if needed. Early filing is strongly encouraged.

Sample schedules for extended time are posted online. Detailed testing schedules for each administration of the CBX will be sent to applicants via a Testing Accommodations Notice once logistics are finalized. Please note that schedules for subsequent exam administrations are subject to change.

The PLP will sunset for first-time takers of the February 2025 CBX on December 31, 2027.

Once you are no longer supervised by your Supervising Lawyer, you must immediately: 

• Log in to the Applicant Portal. 

• Click on your most recent PLP case number. 

• Report the termination by posting the information, including the date and reason for termination, to your most recent PLP case. 

• Alternatively, you can also submit a general request through the Applicant Portal by clicking on the Help Center.

No. Pursuant to rule 9.40 of the California Rules of Court, the application must include the out-of-state attorney's residence and office address.

The program will terminate on May 31, 2023, for any participant who: 

• Has not completed the State Bar’s 10-hour New Attorney Training; or
• Has not received an 86 or higher on the MPRE; or
• Does not have an active positive moral character determination*; or
• Does not submit all documentation required by the State Bar; or
• Does not have an eligible supervisor committed to supervise the participant through the end of 2023.

*If you have received a negative determination, you will be immediately suspended from the PLP and cannot practice as a PLL. However, you will not be terminated from the program until time has passed to request a review or final appeal, or the review or appeal has concluded. If following the review or appeal you are issued a positive moral character determination, you can continue in the program through December 31, 2025, while you seek to pass the bar exam. If you had other outstanding requirements as of May 31, 2023 (for example, you hadn’t yet received an 86 or higher on the MPRE), you will be terminated from the program as of May 31, 2023, regardless of the status of your moral character determination.

No, but once your positive moral character determination expires, if you don’t have a completed application for extension on file, you will be suspended from the program. Applications for Extension of Moral Character Determination are simpler and can be filed up to six months before the expiration of your positive determination.

Hours must be tracked and submitted to the Office of Admissions on a weekly basis. Specifically, PLLs will be required to note the total number of hours worked, the total number of hours spent performing legal services (whether paid or unpaid), and a description of the supervised legal practice duties assigned that specific week. When the hours are submitted, the State Bar will contact the supervising lawyer to sign that week’s completed log. To access the time-tracking log:

• Log in to the Applicant Portal.
• At the top, click “Applications.”
• Then click “Timesheet.”
• Click “New” to create a new timesheet.
• Enter all information and click “Save.”

Once that timesheet record has been saved, the applicant will receive an email with a link to capture their electronic signature. After receipt of that electronic signature, an email will be sent to the supervising attorney to confirm the hours reported.

Once a PLL has logged a total of 300 hours of supervised legal practice, an email will be sent to the supervising lawyer requesting an evaluation of the PLL’s overall work performance. Once that evaluation has been completed, it will be reviewed by the eligibility team to determine whether the PLL has satisfactorily met the requirements of California Rule of Court 9.49.1 (i).

Yes, the rules allow for multiple supervisors. The supervisors may work within the same law firm or at a different law firm if you will be employed or volunteer at more than one organization. You must submit a declaration from each supervising lawyer with your application in the Applicant Portal. You may not work at any organization unless you have submitted a declaration from a supervising lawyer with that organization, and the State Bar has approved the supervisor as eligible.

You are required under rule 4.42 of the Rules of the State Bar of California to update your responses within 30 days, whenever information provided in the application has changed or there is new information relevant to the application, until you have taken the attorney’s oath. To update your application, please log in to the Applicant Portal and access your moral character case. Use the feed on your moral character case to post an update or upload a document.

Figure 1: Posting an update or document to a Moral Character Case

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Criminal history questions on law school applications vary widely. The State Bar is unable to provide advice concerning any particular application, including whether the application requires disclosure of arrests, convictions, or other criminal history information. An applicant should contact their law school for information about its application disclosure requirements, and under what circumstances updates to the law school application are required.

Yes. The moral character application requires disclosure of all debts that exceed $10,000 and are delinquent at the time the application is submitted.

Yes. The moral character application requires the disclosure of applications submitted to any jurisdiction for admission to practice law including, but not limited to, applications to be admitted by examination, on motion, or via diploma privilege; applications for reinstatement; and applications for determination of moral character. All submitted applications must be disclosed regardless of whether you were admitted, including applications that were withdrawn or otherwise did not result in a final determination.

Yes. Current and past employers are contacted during the moral character investigation.

Yes. Prior to submitting your moral character application, certain fields are editable by you. The editable fields are visible on each type of record. 

If you cannot edit the information on the application, you should upload a document (Word, PDF, etc.) with the correct information to any file upload section.

The notice of the adverse determination will provide you with the date on which you may submit a new Application for Determination of Moral Character. You are encouraged to engage in affirmative rehabilitative activities during the period you must wait to reapply.

Alternatively, you may choose to request administrative review by the Committee of Bar Examiners (CBE). If you request review by the CBE, the date on which you will be eligible to reapply may change, as it will be determined by the CBE in the event it issues an adverse determination.

The only licensees who are exempt from the annual reporting requirement are licensees who were on voluntary inactive status for the entirety of the reportable time period. All other licensees, including those who were active, suspended, or not entitled to practice law at any point in the reportable time period, are required to complete the CTAPP reporting requirements for that reportable time period.

When a licensee performs both legal and non-legal professional services for a client, the licensee is subject to the Rules of Professional Conduct with respect to all of those services. (See Cal. State Bar Formal Opn. Nos. 1982-69, 1995-141, and 1999-154.) 

Therefore, a key question is whether the licensee is performing legal services and, as a result, is subject to rule 1.15 and the other Rules of Professional Conduct. If not, and the licensee is merely a real estate broker who happens to be a lawyer, rule 1.15 may not apply. Similarly, if the licensee is a trustee but did not perform any legal services related to the creation of the trust and does not perform any legal services related to the trust, rule 1.15 may not apply. On the other hand, if the licensee is acting as both the real estate lawyer and broker, and the lawyer receives entrusted funds from, or for, the transaction, rule 1.15 would apply, and any accounts need to be reported and registered as part of the licensee’s CTAPP compliance. The same is true of lawyers providing other non-legal professional services, regardless of whether they, as a trustee, for example, report to the probate court.

If you have further questions on dual capacity, including whether you are responsible for complying with any of the requirements or prohibitions in rule 1.15, please contact the State Bar’s Ethics Hotline research service at 800-238-4427 (toll-free in California). The Ethics Hotline cannot provide legal advice, nor tell you how to comply with any of the CTAPP requirements, including whether to answer “yes” or “no” in any portion of the CTAPP reporting requirements.

The State Bar collects information on attorneys’ pro bono and reduced fee hours to better understand how these services are being provided across the profession. The data will be analyzed to identify trends, support efforts to expand access to legal services, and help address the justice gap. All reported data will be aggregated and not linked to individual attorneys.