Josh Gutierrez - California Bar Coach

Josh’s experience with bar preparation began in 2003 during the summer before he started law school when he got a job at BARBRI’s Boston office answering phones, filing and generally helping out wherever he could.  That fall, Josh started his first-year at Northeastern University School of Law and continued his relationship with BARBRI as both a student representative and as part-time office staff.  While Northeastern’s cooperative education program gave Josh the opportunity to explore several diverse legal experiences, his relationship with BARBRI continued throughout his three years at Northeastern. 

After graduating from Northeastern in May of 2006, Josh completed the BARBRI bar review course and passed the Massachusetts bar exam on his first attempt.  Josh then clerked for two years for the Hon. Alexander H. Sands III of the Massachusetts Land Court, where he gained valuable writing and critical thinking experience.  After his clerkship came to its natural end in 2008, Josh moved with his family to Los Angeles, where he joined BARBRI once again as a Director of Legal Education and academic staff attorney.  At that same time, Josh once again completed the BARBRI bar review course and passed the California bar exam on his first attempt. 

For the California bar exam, however, Josh’s experience with the BARBRI bar review course was much different.  He did not have the luxury of most fresh-faced law school graduates who could devote several uninterrupted months of study to their bar preparation.  Josh had to balance his responsibilities to BARBRI (then only part-time, thankfully) and his responsibilities as a husband and father (always full-time as anyone with a family can attest).  The difference in experiences between preparing for the Massachusetts bar exam just after law school and the California bar exam two years later while juggling work and family life gave Josh a unique perspective on bar preparation that has allowed Josh to help everyone from the first time applicant to the multiple repeat test taker.

With BARBRI, Josh gained invaluable experience writing study schedules for BARBRI’s California and Hawaii bar review courses.  He also coordinated BARBRI’s tutoring and grading programs, helping to create and update content for both programs as well as train new tutors and graders.  The part of the job that Josh enjoyed most, however, was helping individual students overcome whatever obstacles were impeding their success on the California bar exam.  Whether the student was having trouble understanding a substantive law issue or needed help refining his or her general study approach, Josh enjoyed spending as much time as necessary to discover the root of the problem and either work to solve issue or help the student navigate around it.  It was with this passion for providing individual, personalized support that Josh decided to leave BARBRI to create California Bar Coach.