Commencement

The Penn State Dickinson Law Supplemental Bar Course is designed to support students while they study for the bar examination. The course is administered in the summer in both Carlisle and University Park and runs simultaneously with commercial bar review courses. The course is designed to supplement, not replace, the need for graduates to enroll in a commercial bar review course. This course is for Penn State Dickinson Law graduates only and is FREE to all graduates preparing to sit for the July 2026 bar exam. Associate Dean Elkin in University Park and Professor Jackson in Carlisle will be in touch with students directly this spring with more information.

University Park Students: Graduates studying for the bar exam in University Park will be able to purchase parking for the summer. Current Spring UP parking permits are valid through May 16th, 2026. More details concerning summer parking will be emailed in the very near future. Please contact Marcus Englert mje160@psu.edu with any parking questions or concerns.

AdaptiBar is a bar preparation program that diagnoses your subject and timing performance in each area tested on the Multistate Bar Exam (MBE). The patented, adaptive algorithm automatically presents questions with an emphasis on your weakest subtopics, maximizing your study time. The program purchased by the school is for MBE preparation and is available to Carlisle and University Park graduates in the class of 2026. In the future, the Academic Success Office will only provide this program to graduates in the lowest ranked quartile of the class of 2027 and beyond. Learn more.

To receive an AdaptiBar license, graduates in 2026 will need to:

1. Commit to using AdaptiBar while studying for the bar exam; and
2. Submit the bar exam questionnaire, answering that you want an AdaptiBar license. The questionnaire will be sent via email to students at both locations in the spring semester.

Please only express interest if you are planning to sit for the July 2026 bar exam. The law school will only purchase AdaptiBar licenses for graduates once. If you sign up for AdaptiBar and fail to use the software, the school will not repurchase the program for a future bar exam.

Note that the hotel reimbursement program previously offered to Carlisle graduates has been discontinued due to it not being an effective use of resources that furthered bar exam success.

Students graduating in May are welcome to continue using the Law Libraries and its collections during the summer and beyond (subject to public access limitations). Alumni have additional privileges that extend beyond graduation. Specifically, those are:

Borrowing Privileges at the Law Library and other Penn State libraries

Recent graduates retain student borrowing privileges at all Penn State Libraries (including the Law Library) for several months after graduation. At some point in mid-to-late summer, the University updates its student records and converts recent graduates to “Resident-PA” status, at which point borrowing privileges are more limited but collections remain accessible. The University Libraries’ Alumni Library offers benefits targeted specifically to members of the Alumni Association such as complimentary access to selected library databases, Resource Centers for agriculture, business, health, news, and travel, as well as information about featured Penn State collections and events.

Lexis, Westlaw, and Bloomberg Law access

If you intend to use any one of these databases after graduation — Bloomberg Law, Lexis or Westlaw — you must change your email contact information for that database because your Penn State email account will likely expire before your access to this database does.

Bloomberg Law allows access to graduating students for six months after graduation. Access expires on November 30, 2026. You do not need to do anything to extend your access.

Lexis access will expire on December 31, 2026. During this time, there are no restrictions on how you use your Lexis ID, and you do not need to register for this additional access through the end of the year. Graduates working for a public interest organization may sign up for the Lexis ASPIRE Program, which permits job-related access to Lexis Advance for 12 months of free access to federal and state cases, codes, regulations, law reviews, Shepard’s and Matthew Bender treatises. The ASPIRE Program is for graduates who are engaged in verifiable 501(c)(3) public interest work. To apply, go to www.lexisnexis.com/grad-access. You must provide a letter from you employer to verify that it is a nonprofit organization.

Westlaw offers access to Thomson Reuters products, including Westlaw and Practical Law, for 18 months after graduation. Your “Grad Elite” access gives you 60-hours of usage on these products per month to gain understanding and build confidence in your research skills. While you cannot use it in situations where you are billing a client, you can use these tools to build your knowledge of the law and prepare for the bar exam. In addition, you get access to Knowledge Center Lessons on Westlaw for 18 months after graduation. To continue accessing Westlaw, graduates must register for “Grad Elite” access at https://lawschool.westlaw.com/authentication/gradelite or by logging into https://lawschool.thomsonreuters.com/.

Please see the following page for details on when your access to Penn State cloud resources changes: What Happens to My Penn State Account When I Leave? This page has a quick reference chart showing what changes occur to what resources and when. There are more details below under the section, “How Soon Do I Lose Access Once I'm No Longer a Student?” These changes occur once you’ve been marked as COMPLETED in LionPATH, which is typically in early June.

• Office365 Applications, including OneDrive storage — 14 days
• GSuite — 14 days
• Online Outlook email — 90 days
• What should I do before I lose access to Penn State resources? | Penn State Information Security
• Penn State Alumni Email Benefit

If you signed up for Adobe Creative Cloud, please see the following relevant Q/A from the Penn State Adobe FAQ page:

Q. What happens when I graduate?

A. You will be able to take all of your content with you by migrating your content from your school account to a new personal account. Please be advised that you will not be able to reverse this migration once it is initiated. Visit https://graduation.adobe.com to get started.

Q: What happens to my account when I leave the University?

A: First and foremost, make sure to back up all of your Adobe CC data files locally. Once your Penn State Access Account is deactivated, you will no longer be able to log in to the Adobe CC applications with your University email address. If you would like to continue using Adobe CC after your departure, Adobe has several options available for purchase.

Students currently assigned or in possession of a locker, you must clean out and remove all items from their lockers by May 15, 2026.

• Carlisle Students - Return keys to Academic & Student Services, 017B
• UP J.D. Students - Return keys to Academic & Student Services, 121 Katz
• UP LL.M Students - Return keys to Graduate and International Programs, 011 Katz

If you need a locker while taking the Supplemental Bar Program, have lost/misplaced your locker key, or have other questions, please email Marcus Englert (UP – mje160@psu.edu) or Gabby Yaremchak (CR – gey5033@psu.edu).

• Lawyers Concerned for Lawyers (LCL)-PA- Lawyers Concerned for Lawyers | PENNSYLVANIA (lclpa.org)
  • Free confidential assistance for law students, lawyers, judges and their family members dealing with emotional and mental health concerns.

• ABA Essential Mental Health, Physical Health, and Wellness Resources for Bar Prep
• University Park Students: PSU Campus Recreation option for Alumni Association Community Membership. Note: UP students will not have access to Campus Recreation, University Health Services, Counseling & Psychological Services (CAPS) after graduation.