The 2021 Ghana School of Law entrance exams saw 28 percent of the LLB candidates gain entrance to Ghana’s only institution for training lawyers.

790 out of 2,824 candidates passed the exam organized earlier this year.

The pass rate is in line with previous years, except for 2020, where 1,045 students out of 2,763 passed the entrance examination.

In 2019, only 128 candidates out of a total of 1,820 passed the exam.

In 2017, 500 students were admitted into the School, with 450 students admitted in 2016.

The poor pass rate has in the past sparked calls for a reform of legal education in Ghana.

Critics have said the General Legal Council deliberately restricts people from gaining access to legal education.

Admission to the Ghana School of Law for professional legal education requires that successful candidates obtain a minimum rank of 50%.

Introduce paralegal services for unsuccessful law school entrance exam students – Lecturer
Dr. Isidore Tufour of the GIMPA Law Faculty had earlier suggested the introduction of a paralegal training system to absorb thousands of unsuccessful applicants to the Ghana School of Law who wished to have legal training and not necessarily be lawyers.

According to the Head of Department of Public Law of the GIMPA Law Faculty, most professionals and persons of other backgrounds wish to have legal knowledge to enhance their work in their chosen fields and thus paralegalism, if introduced, will provide such persons with the requisite knowledge needed without necessarily going through the frustrations of becoming a lawyer.

According to Dr. Isidore, this will reduce the demand for entry into the law school.

Dr. Isidore added that this will make up for the low lawyer-to-citizen ratio of 30 million Ghanaians to 4882 practicing lawyers.