New D/L law school: St. Francis eUniversity

It's at

www.sfeu.net

It offers an M.P.A. and both Bar and non Bar J.D. programs. Midway through the J.D program, the student earns a "Bachelor of Legal Letters" (B.L.L.), a degree title that is new to me but sounds too much like the first professional degree LL.B.

It's fairly cheap at $120 s.h. but since it is operating on temporary BPPVE authority, I can't say what the student gets for his money.

 

Re: Re: New D/L law school: St. Francis eUniversity

The site certainly needs a good proofing. Under Mission and Objectives, they write: " The mission and purpose of St. St. Francis eUniversity . . ."

"eUniversity" is pretty lame, but they could hardly use another title:

Saint Francis University (Pennsylvania)
University of St. Francis (Illinois)
University of Saint Francis (Indiana)

are already taken.

Their "Library, Reference and Research Center" includes such sterling references as CNN, Encarta, FunkandWagnalls.com, and RefDesk.com. Their legal reference sites are all open source. Not a proprietary database in the bunch. Where are West or LexisNexis?

I also could not find a non-virtual address, telephone number, or any other means of contacting a live human voice.

Seems pretty slipshod to me.

marilynd

 

Unfortunately, the website doesn't seem to provide their physical address. (I'd hate to enroll in a school without knowing where it is.) The BPPVE puts them on a streetcorner in Carmel Ca.

http://app1.dca.ca.gov/bppve/school-search/view-school.asp?schlcode=2701241

The faculty listing shows that the law school dean is the city attorney of both Carmel and Seaside.

http://www.sfeu.net/cgi-bin/page_format.cgi/?page=Professors

The president seems to be a retired guy who works as an adjunct at Golden Gate U., the Union Institute and Monterey Peninsula College (the local community college). There's a Monterey County judge signed up to teach.

 

For what it's worth, they're listed on the CalBar web site as an approved distance education provider of the bar-eligible JD:

• St. Francis eUniversity
  P.O. Box 6321
  Carmel-by-the-Sea, CA 93921-6321
  
  PHONE: (831) 373-1171
  
  WEB: www.sfeu.net

Man... they're just springin'-up all over the place, all of a sudden, aren't they.

 

Not "approved", please. They are "registered" but CalBar makes no representation as to the quality of the education they offer.

Yes, D/L law schools DO seem to be springing up but they also seem to die at about the same rate.

Wanna start one?

 

That's funny--I was just in Carmel this past saturday, even around the area of San Carlos and 8th Street--didn't see any new law school--just a bunch of antique shops, real estate agencies, law offices, and small cafes and restaurants. We usually go down to Carmel every week-end (I live in Seaside, right up HWY 1). I'll have to check out the specific site to see what's really there.

 

There's an intriguing little CalBar accredited resident school down there, Monterey College of Law.

Given the high and increasing cost of an ABA law degree in California, I have a bet with myself that places like Monterey will begin to attract higher and higher quality students which SHOULD result in improved Bar passage rates.

It'll be interesting to see.

 

It seems that the Monterey College of Law may also be expanding since they are moving to a new, larger location on the old Fort Ord property(Army installation that was closed about 10 yesrs ago, I believe).

This is becoming an interesting area for higher education--not only did the closing of Fort Ord give way for the new CSU-Monterey Bay campus, but also a larger facility for the Golden Gate University Monterey campus, and now the new Monterey College of Law campus. Of course, we still have the Naval Postgraduate School, along with the Defense Language Institute, in Monterey.

 

Oops. My bad. You're right. It's "registered," not "approved." I knew that, of course. As I'm sure you've noticed, I've actually misused "approved" when talking about DL JD programs (and knew I was doing it) probably about half the time around here. I should be more careful. At least I don't ever refer to them as "CalBar accredited"... though, as you know, CalBar does accredit JD programs... just not DL ones. But I digress (as usual).

Let's see... the last one that died was that one that sort of disappeared into the night and left a buncha' people high and dry, wasn't it? The owner had been disbarred (for good cause), as I recall... right? Which one was that one again? And when was it that it went defunct? And, lastly, how long before that was there one that failed... and, if you can remember, why? (Just curious.)

You bet! But I'm not nearly ready yet... nor, based on what you once told me about when you might want to retire to California, are you, either. But... and this is an important "but"... when that time comes, call me (if I haven't called you by then first), 'cause what I remember of the very specific way that you want to do it fits right in with my dream of how it should be done quite snugly! We are of nearly one mind, as I recall, about how CalBar-registered DL programs should operate... and, moreover, I believe the attractiveness (and effectiveness) of our combined approaches could all-but-corner that market. The only thing is, I'd want it to be accredited by a USDE- and/or CHEA-approved agency as quickly after start-up as possible. BPPVE-approval would be a snap, of course; and DETC would be nice. But, to be candid, my research of ACICS for a client a few months ago got me thinking that I kinda' liked it better... at least for the purposes I had in mind. And since the core of your particular approach is actually largely residential (I don't want to say any more than that here), ACICS may make more sense in any case. Of course RA would be the real goal... but first things first.

I also wouldn't mind being the irritating S.O.B. (since, clearly, I already know how to be that) who so beat-up the ABA about distance learning, and who had put together a program so unassailably good, that it (the ABA) decided to beta-test my (or our, as the case may be) CalBar-registered DL JD program for ABA approval down the road. In the meantime, convincing a few additional states to accept it would also be a fun (though slow and frustrating... and maybe impossible) task, I think.

But we're (well, really, I'm) getting embarrassingly ahead of ourselves (myself)!

A discussion for another day.

Closed military facilities can make terrific college campuses (among other things... although not always pretty ones). There's a beautiful, available, modern-looking, metal-and-glass, four-story former Navy office building on a now-closed military facility (that I'm not at liberty -- no pun intended -- to name here) that's not all that far from me, here in Napa, that the aforementioned client is thinking about locating the new school that it's considering launching. It remains to be seen if that's the building on which they'll settle. It wasn't actually my first recommendation to them... but it's a nice one, regardless... and affordable. Almost nothing at The Presidio, on the other hand, is affordable. Believe me, I've checked. It's outta' sight!

 

. . . especially the firing ranges.



marilynd

 

Actually, as klutzy as eUniversity is, St Francis ain't much better. I mean, lookit, if anybody was totally loopy when it came to canon law, it was the Birdman of Assisi, otherwise a swell fella and a heckuva nice guy.

 

That's not the same phone number that's on the BPPVE listing.

 

I'd guess that the 'St. Francis' might have something to do with 'San Francisco'.

And the invocation of a saintly figure known for empathy and compassion might be a comment about a profession that's best known for a-moral hired guns.

 

Are you sayijng that lawyers are, generally, amoral? Or that they lack empathy... and/or compassion?