JD or not?

I will be finishing my BS from Excelisor and my MBA from California Coast University in the next 18-24 months ( I have a BS from Cal Coast) and I am considering entering law school. If I graduated from a law school that is not ABA approved and did not intend to take the bar exam, what type of jobs could I apply for? Would that limit my chances of employment? I might like to work in Risk Management. Any advise would be great. Thank you.

 

Oh man, you are really asking for it with this question. But I shall resist.

 

The world could always use another good lawyer.

 

If you need a law degree to augment your career in business then it might be helpful, but if you are going to practice at some stage make sure you attend a Uni with a chance of doing that. Northwestern Cal University School of Law might be a cheap option as long as you follow the strict Cal bar reqirements. If you live out of State then you might run ito recognition problems.

 

I see you live out of State....possible problems!!

 

I agree with Gert!

 

let me rephrase the question - If I earned a law degree and did not sit for the bar, would I have wasted my time with law school. I would like to work in Risk Management in the healthcare field and I am looking for something that would give me the edge over others.
I fully understand the accreditation issues but I do not understand ABA approval and not ABA approval.

 

First, forgive me for interjecting this when you did not ask for comment on Cal Coast. Any reason you did not go for the Andrew Jackson University (DETC accredited) MBA which costs about the same and probably has better utility?

As for the JD issue. This is certainly not my field but.......
I am assuming you are talking DL. If you are not going to practice I would consider the University of London LLB. Available through DL, very inexpensive, UofL has a great reputation. This may avoid any potential professional embarassment in the future when someone discovers a non ABA approved law degree. In any case the JD is a glorified LLB (Canada & Britian award the LLB)My understanding is for law in the US ABA means "accredited" in a way that exceeds APA with regard to Psych programs. You could be working in Risk Management and come across attorneys who disover non ABA JD and think you are professionally a joke. So my thinking would be this could hurt you professionally. If you are going to do the non ABA route I would sit for the Bar (California) because that at least gives some external certification to your learning. In other words if you can pass the same Bar attorneys in California did then your education cannot have been that substandard. I think that might look better professionally.

On the other hand this is not my field & I am making assumptions.

Good luck Randall!

North

 

That's something only you can answer. I have a friend who went to law school with a woman who went on to become a Deputy Superintendent in the Boston Police Department, then the Public Safety Commissioner for Massachusetts. They went to an ABA law school, but the woman had no intention from day one of even taking the bar exam. She wanted the skills obtained in a legal education, and had no desire to ever practice law. As far as I know, she's happy with her decision.


Bruce

 

North,
Thank you for your response. You have some very valid points. As far as my MBA from Cal Coast...it was just my choice . I don't want to open a new discussion about RA vs. State Approval.

 

Hey Randall

I have to go with North a University of London LLB and even a University of South Africa LL.B is the equivalent of a RA degree. The University of London also offers a BSc in Law with Management which gives you a good grounding in both fields.
The only real possible problem with this is that these are international degrees and many employees may want U.S. degrees only.

 

regionally accredited DL JD ?

is there a

regionally accredited

(100 %) Distance Learning

Juris Doctor

program somewhere out there?

I have not found one so far...

;(

 

FWIW: If I were going to earn an online J.D., I would probably go with the DETC-accredited Kaplan College/Concord School of Law program. They even have a special "Executive J.D." track for laypersons. I can't recall if graduates of Kaplan/Concord are eligible to take the Bar exam, but it couldn't hurt to call and ask.

The University of London program is also excellent, but my vague recollection is that at least two-thirds of the program deal specifically with British law, and the other one-third tends to deal with international issues that you may not find useful or interesting (maritime law, for example).

Good luck.



Cheers,

 

Re: regionally accredited DL JD ?

Not as far as I know; but it would make sense, wouldn't it?



Cheers,

 

Imagine

If there were a DL RA JD offering University, I bet the majority of residential law schools in America would be bankrupt within a few years.

The main thing that concerns me is the lack of regional accreditation of the California (or wherever) DL law schools. Many employers that I know of are big on that especially in business so if you are doing to enter a certain job or industry it is best to check around with experts, staff or associations within it.

The problems with national accreditation (DETC etc...) is that you do not know where it will be accepted or not unlike RA. It is a risk and could be an expensive one at that.

 

Re: Imagine

Nahhhh; it'd have to be ABA-accredited to put the brick-and-mortar schools out of business, since a merely RA JD doesn't always qualify someone to pass the Bar.

The reason California law schools are so big is that California is the one state--or, if not the one state, one of the few states--where an unaccredited, state-approved JD clears you to take the Bar.



Cheers,

 

I will not repeat the many posts I have made on this subject. I continue to point out, however, that the soul and purpose of the JD is to qualify the student for the practice of law. A non-Bar JD therefore makes no sense to me. It is either an exersize in futility or, to be meaningful, must be so disimilar to the Bar JD as to be a JD in name only.
An ABA JD can be completed in evening classes in many parts of the country. It preserves the option of practicing law. This matters because the three year process of legal education has deep and profound effects on the student. You might well decide that you DO want to be a lawyer after all.
Go find a copy of Scott Turlow's book "One L" and read it before you decide what to do.

Nosborne JD

 

As luck would have it, I am a senior healthcare risk management consultant, with 18 years experience in the field and can speak with some authority on entry qualifications for the position. I work for a medium-sized regional malpractice insurer in the Pacific Northwest as well as having my own private consulting practice. Prior to working for the insurer, I worked for a malpractice defense lawfirm and various hospitals in the area of malpractice defense and healthcare risk management. Prior to that, I did lab work in hospitals and worked as a paramedic to finance my college education.

My educational qualifications include a BSc/MSc in analytical chemistry; a AAS in paralegal studies; a EMT-P certificate; CPCU, ARM and CPHRM designations; and a MBA. You will note that relatively few of these qualifications have much to do with risk management.

I am unusual in this field in being both male and not being a former nurse. Healthcare risk management is changing, and more and more emphasis is being put on financial matters and quality improvement efforts. The 'old days' of a healthcare risk manager as being a nurse who also does infection control, credentialing and JCAHO surveys in a hospital are rapidly dying out. The contemporary risk manager is someone who negotiates insurance contracts, does quality improvement, and can educate providers about malpractice. So more and more educational emphasis is being put on financial, insurance and quality areas.

Speaking as someone who hires in this field, I am sorry to tell you that having a JD in and of itself will not distinguish you from the herd and will not necessarily make it easier for you to find a job. Noting particularly that you will not necessarily sit for the bar, having a JD from a non-ABA accredited school will be worse than useless.

Every week, I get unsolicited resumes from people who want to be risk managers. Many of these people are nurses who want to leave the bedside, and went to law school at night. They are under the mistaken belief that being a RN/JD automatically qualifies them as a malpractice expert. It does not. If they have no actual clinical or legal experience in the area of malpractice defense or risk management, then they are not qualified even as an entry-level position. I would much rather hire someone who did risk management in a hospital, a claims rep from a malpractice insurer, or someone who did malpractice defense. Having a JD may be of some benefit if the JD was used to gain experience in malpractice defense. But if being a former lawyer is the only qualification, then that person goes in my 'hold' pile. Healthcare risk management requires a skillset in clinical, financial, legal, business and insurance issues. Any person who has a skillset in only one of these areas is not an optimum employee candidate. People who have relevant experience in most or all of these areas are optimum employee candidates.

And right now, with the contraction and consolidation happening in the healthcare and insurance industries, there are lots of experienced people in the marketplace for healthcare risk management.

So the long and short of my reply is having just a JD, and particularly from a non-ABA accredited school, and with no relevant clinical or legal experience, will be of little if any benefit to you in your search for healthcare risk management employment.

If you wish further advice or comment in the healthcare risk management field, please feel free to email me and I will be happy to help.

Regards,

Michael Lloyd
Mill Creek, Washington USA

 

I can think of five good reasons to earn a JD/LLB without designs on taking the Bar:

1. To research and/or teach in the field of law.
2. To work as a law librarian, paralegal, or consultant.
3. To supplement one's resume if one works in a field where dealing with the law is not uncommon; accounting or criminal justice, for example.
4. To satisfy one's personal curiosity.
5. To write legal thrillers like Scott Turow.


Cheers,

 

Certainly the reasons suggested for getting a JD are valid but ALL of them would be better served by a combination of the JD and experience at the Bar, except maybe personal curiosity.

The thing is, a JD is not a research graduate degree. It is a first professional degree designed to equip the student for practice and obtaining one that is not the merest fraud is a long, agonizing process. The amount of "grunt" work is unbelievable to anyone who hasn't actually done it.

Trust me on this; there are many law students who have earned research and other professional degrees. Nevertheless, EVERYONE works like a slave in law school, no matter what his or her background may be. You have to; there simply is no other way to acquire the vast amounts of arcane, dry, unsystematic knowlege that a practicing lawyer MUST have. There is no dabbling, at least not in fundamental subjects. You may love criminal law but hate contracts. Nevertheless, you must master both. You may think that tort reform is an important subject (it is) but you won't study tort reform; you must instead acquire a thorough knowlege of tort law as it now is. Any so-called JD program that does NOT require the student to master all of the fundamental areas of law is not a JD program at all. It is something else; I don't know what.

In the process of studying for the degree, the student gradually acquires certain tools of advocacy, analysis and research in a narrow field, useful for only a limited set of purposes. That is why the degree is neither academically prestigious nor terribly useful outside the Bar. A lawyer's skills do not necessarily transfer well.

If a student is going to subject himself to this process, and expense, at least let him acquire a degree that will maybe reward the student with the chance to put this narrow set of skills to use.

I do not insist that the student should consider only ABA accredited programs. I recommend that he do so, but I realize that a Californian or an Alabaman or a New England Yankee may find that the unaccredited Bar programs in their states might serve them well enough. But the student should be SURE on that point before enrolling.

Nosborne JD
University of New Mexico 1986