The Legal Education Eligibility Test (LEET), the first gateway to law school admissions in Korea, will distribute identical test booklets to all test-takers starting this year. The move aims to resolve recurring fairness disputes that have arisen from operating two versions of the test with different question orders.
According to the Law School Council on Tuesday, the 2027 LEET, scheduled for the 19th of next month, will be administered with a single test booklet for both the verbal comprehension and reasoning sections. It marks the first time since the test's introduction in the 2009 academic year that all examinees will solve the same questions in the same order.
Until now, LEET has distributed two types of test booklets — odd-numbered and even-numbered — based on the last digit of the examinee's registration number. While the questions themselves were identical, the order of questions and reading passages differed. At test centers, adjacent test-takers were assigned different booklet types. The arrangement was designed to prevent answer sharing and cheating. Multiple booklet types have long been used as a means of ensuring test integrity.
However, as LEET serves as a key evaluation component in most law school admissions, test-takers have been highly sensitive to differences in question arrangement. Given the test's nature of requiring examinees to solve many questions within a limited time, the order in which passages and questions appear can affect time allocation and problem-solving strategies.
In particular, some test-takers perceived the even-numbered booklet as harder to follow and more difficult than the odd-numbered version. As claims that one type was more difficult resurfaced after every test, calls grew to address the disputes over advantages and disadvantages tied to booklet types, even at the cost of weaker anti-cheating measures.
The test preparation community has largely welcomed the introduction of a single test booklet. Kim, 24, who is preparing for LEET at a university in Seoul, said, "Every year after the test, there were repeated complaints that one type was more difficult, but now those debates should diminish. I think I'll be able to accept the test results purely as a reflection of my own ability."
Another test-taker, Park, 26, said, "On the day of the test, you can't help but become sensitive to even small variables, but now I don't have to worry about the booklet type. From a test-taker's perspective, one unnecessary source of anxiety has been removed."
The Law School Council explained that the reform reflects the operational trends of similar aptitude tests. "Similar tests, including the Public Service Aptitude Test (PSAT), are also operated with a single test booklet," a council official said. "We improved the system so that test-takers can focus on the exam without worrying about advantages or disadvantages tied to booklet types."
