Advice from the Successful Test-Takers
Tax Litigation Counsel Jeffrey Thompson Shares His Thoughts
The Tax Court Bar Exam is an incredibly difficult exam that many people underestimate.
Many of the individuals who are taking this exam have already passed difficult examinations including the SEE (special enrollment exam for EAs) and the CPA exam.
The various sections of those exams have average pass rates of 50-70% (which is comparable to the average pass rate of State Bar exams); however, the Tax Court Exam has an average pass rate closer to 10%.
Passing this exam requires a knowledge of taxation (often in areas that you don’t specialize in), understanding legal concepts (from ABA ethics and the rules of evidence to Tax Court practice and procedure), good time management and test-taking skills, and a little bit of luck.
One must remember that this is a test that is only offered once every two years. Passing grades do not carry over, so even if you passed 3 out of 4 sessions in one year,you’d have to pass all four in the next administration to be admitted into the bar. Even for seasoned professionals, this test can be incredibly overwhelming.
But despite the difficulty, people are able to pass the exam. So one must remember that it is possible to do so with the proper preparation. Here are some tips that will guide your study:
1. Review previous exams. The Tax Court website posts the past three years of exams on their website. Familiarize yourself with how the questions are asked, so you can be prepared to answer them.
2. Understand that this is a timed exam. Questions have uneven point allocation, so you must always be aware of how much time you’re taking to answer questions. Time is not your friend on this exam, and spending too much time on a low point question is a guaranteed way to fail.
3. Give yourself plenty of time to prepare. This is not an exam that you can cram for and even long-time tax professionals struggle with the substantive tax portions of the exam. You need time to absorb the material and make adjustments to your study plan.
4. Be disciplined in the months leading up to the exam. Some sacrifice is necessary to pass this exam and so it’s important to ensure that distractions (professional and personal) are minimized and/or planned for.
5. Get involved in the Tax Court. By starting early, you can plan to attend calendar calls (either in person or virtually) and read court opinions. These activities will help reinforce your learning and understanding.
6. Be patient with yourself. This is likely the most difficult exam that you will ever prepare for in your life and you’ll be tackling new topics constantly as part of your review process. It’s an incredibly frustrating process but make note of the progress you’re making along the way to remind yourself that you are improving.
7. Get support. Few people can say that they passed this test without any assistance. Good guidance will help you know what you need to study and ensure you don’t waste time in areas that are not likely to be tested.
Prepared by Jeffrey Thompson USTCP EA MBA M.A. Pro Bono Tax Litigation Counsel of the Tax Litigation Clinic at the Tax Law Institute and Acting Clinic Director of the Hawai'i Federal Tax Clinic on O'ahu.
Reprinted with the permission of Jeffrey Thompson USTCP E.A. MBA M.A.
Jeff Thompson passed the Tax Bar Exam on his first attempt in 2023. Here is his advice for you.
"You cannot ignore the sheet music and begin to play by your own tune ..."
- To follow is an internal memorandum prepared by Professor James Chapman and circulated among the Teaching Faculty at the Tax Law Institute. It is reprinted here and modified for the benefit of tax bar applicants who will sit for the 2027 Tax Bar Exam. Hopefully this writing might help some to re-focus their thinking as to how they are going about preparing for the test. Especially, how one prepares for the most problematic sections of the test that deal with Substantive Tax Law. Professor Louis B. Carpenter III, who passed the exam in 2016, requested that, once again, we offer the substance of Professor Chapman's original writing as insight for the hopeful.
The ABC's OF WRITING GOOD ANSWERS
- A suggested approach to answer questions about Substantive Tax Law on the 2027 Tax Bar Examination is to keep in mind that you are preparing to take an actual bar exam.
- To follow are Professor Chapman's words:
"Over the years, Professor Stuart and I have come to the conclusion that as the applicants prepare for the Tax Bar Examination that they have one key misunderstanding of the purpose of the exam. It seems that they approach the examination as though three of the four parts are oriented towards the legal profession, but that the fourth part, the taxation portion, is oriented towards tax preparation. I have been unsuccessful in the past in communicating to them that the Tax Bar Examination, all four parts, is oriented toward the legal profession. Everyone who has come through the program has either been an enrolled agent or a CPA, or both. Because they come to the program with an extensive background in tax preparation, and possibly audit representation, they think they have an understanding of what it takes to pass the examination and therefore focus all of their effort on the other three parts. It is my hope that the 2026-2027 Tax Bar Prep will be highly successful in helping them to understand that they need to answer the questions on the tax portion of the exam from a legal perspective, not from simply a tax preparation perspective.
Every examination cycle, there have been anywhere from 1 to 3 questions on the exam that come directly from opinions issued by the Tax Court. In 2021, 2023 and 2025 there were exactly such question that appeared. If the student has not read the cases that the questions draw upon then they will be totally unprepared to write an answer for that question. Since the timeframe between examinations is two years, typically the questions drawn from Tax Court opinions that are issued between July 1 of the year prior to the exam year through 30 September of the exam year. For the upcoming examination cycle this would be July 1, 2025, through September 30, 2027. Of the opinions, test applicants should be most concerned with cases of “first impression” issues. Between now and the end of September 2027 there may be quite a few.
Be sure to read those published opinions...there are going to be a few of questions on the examination about them...otherwise you're going to miss some points. It is my personal opinion that there are several reasons why the applicant should be encouraged to read, study, and understand Tax Court Opinions, aside from the fact that one or more test questions will be drawn from this material. As the only legal training that the majority of the applicants have comes from the lectures and material presented to them by TLI, the more they are exposed to the legal reasoning of the Tax Court judges the greater the probability that their thinking and reasoning process will be influenced by what they are reading, studying and attempting to master. For this reason, I also believe that encouraging the applicants to read the Memorandum opinions is beneficial; however, there are some who disagree with me. Encouraging the applicants to read and understand the legal reasoning behind the decisions should help to shape and mold their reasoning and thinking process to transition from thinking like a tax preparer to thinking like that of a tax litigator aka USTCP.
Finally, make sure you do understand the legal implications of the IRC code sections because the Substantive Tax Law questions of the 2027 Tax Bar Examination are going to be mostly about the tax laws and will test your ability to explain them succinctly.
The person grading the tax portion of the examination doesn’t want the applicant to prove that they know how to prepare taxes, but rather they are looking for the applicant to tell them that they understand the legal ramifications of a position taken on the tax return, and how they are prepared to defend that position from a legal and regulatory standpoint.
It is my intention to provide the student with an understanding of the physical demands of the examination. Having to answer questions, electronically, for a period of four hours presents a physical challenge that many people are not up to because remote programs don't always work the way they were intended to work. The 2023 test-takers found themselves not only challenged but frustrated with quirky computer programing that in many respects just didn't work. However, I understand that the 2025 test-takers did not experience the same sort of problems."
Prepared by James H. Chapman E.A, MPA, M.A, Associate Professor of Federal Tax Practice and Research at the Tax Law Institute and Chair of the Board of Directors at the Hawaii Federal Tax Clinic
Reprinted courtesy of James H. Chapman E.A. MPA M.A. Associate Professor of Federal Tax Practice and Research at the Tax Law Institute and Chair o.f the Board of Directors at the Hawaii Federal Tax Clinic deral Tax Clinic
Lorry Sorgman took the Tax Bar Examination five times before she passed and was admitted to practice
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