The Bavarian Ministry of Justice now wants to keep Passau as the examination location for the second state examination in law. Originally it had planned to delete the location in autumn 2024. This would have made it possible to study law in Passau – but not to take the final exam there. The Ministry of Justice justified the deletion with personnel and organizational bottlenecks in the e-exam; this electronic version of the exam is to be introduced in autumn 2024.
In talks with the service provider responsible for this, however, it has been shown that the introduction of the e-exam is possible at all eight previous examination locations, Minister of Justice Georg Eisenreich (CSU) is quoted as saying in a statement from his house. In addition to Passau, the Bayreuth location can also be retained. This was also on the cross-off list.
Protests against the plans had formed in Passau in particular, across campus and party boundaries and also from CSU ranks. Representatives of the student council warned against travel stress for Passau test candidates: it would have been a good 120 kilometers by car to the next location in Regensburg. And a petition – signed by the mayor and district administrator, among others – criticized the fact that the deletion “contradicts” the political promise to “particularly promote the border areas and rural areas in Bavaria instead of the centralized preference for conurbations”.
The Ministry of Justice’s announcement that it was revising its own plans was accordingly welcomed. “A good day for Passau, a good day for Bayreuth and an important decision for Bavaria as a place of justice and training,” said the lawyers’ working group of the Lower Bavarian CSU district association. From his point of view, too, “it would have been unreasonable for Passau trainee lawyers to travel hundreds of kilometers to write five-hour exams in the Upper Palatinate over nine days”.