Bicolana tops 2019 bar examinations

April 29, 2020

The throng at Taft Avenue and fast food restaurants teeming with examinees waiting for the bar exam results on a large screen at the Supreme Court may have been reduced by the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) but cheers reverberated in social media for passers of the 2019 bar examinations.

After an en banc session of the Supreme Court, the High Tribunal said Mae Diane Azores of the University of Santo Tomas-Legazpi City topped the 2019 bar examinations with  91.0490,  highest among the 2,103 passers.

Azores, in a TV interview, said: '' I have never studied like that in my life. I will wake up at 4 am, started to exercise, then study, 10-12 hours.”

Second was Princess Fatima Parahiman, a graduate of the University of the East, with a rating of 89.5230. Myra Baranda, also of UST-Legazpi, landed third with 88.8250.

UST-Legazpi is the new name of Aquinas University.

Fourth was Dawna Fya Bandiola  of San Beda College Alabang with 88.3360 and fifth was Jocelyn Fabello of Palawan State University with 88.2630.

Kenneth Glenn Manuel of the University of Santo Tomas was sixth with 88.173 while Rhowee Buergo of Jose Rizal University had 87.8710  for seventh.

Anton Luis Avila of Saint Louis University took eighth with  87.5820, followed by Jun Dexter Rojas of the Polytechnic University of the Philippines with 87.5765.

In tenth place was Bebelan Madera of the University of St. La Salle with  87.3795.

Senior Associate Justice Estela Perlas-Bernabe, chairperson of the Court’s Bar Committee, said 2,103 bar takers who passed the 2019 Bar Examinations represented 27.36 percent of the 7,685 examinees who completed the test last November.

The passing rate is higher than the 2018 bar exam,  where 1,800, or 22.07 percent of the 8,155 candidates passed. DMS