Concode Law School - Kaplan...

I am thinking of attending this school, any feedback?

Online Law School, Law Degree and Law Courses Online | Concord Law School

Thank you.

 

Shawn, you're a tough one to keep up with. First you requested info on a Physical Therapy Doctorate, then an MBA, then Chiropractic, now Law. I mean no disrespect, but what is it that you are actually looking for? What type of work do you do now? Maybe we could help you if you provide further info about what it is exactly that you would like to do.....

As far as your post topic, I know nothing about this school. Maybe someone will be along who can help you.

 

Remember this thread? Hopefully so as it's only a couple of months old and you started it.

http://www.degreeinfo.com/general-distance-learning-discussions/38777-law-program.html

 

You were also thinking about pre-medical coursework for the very very challenging project of medical school admission… but asked persistently if any chiropractic schools had especially low admissions standards. You've asked about B&M law schools as well. Even this probably wouldn't be in your backyard. Everything you ask about is a years-long very time intensive major-commitment thing; many are full-time, B&M, and could very well involve moving.

You seem to be looking for a relatively high-status professional career. IIRC, you have a bachelor's in business from a regionally accredited school and successful business experience. I wouldn't be surprised if there's a high-status professional career much closer to where you are or where you've been already, occupationally, than one of these disparate large jumps you're looking at here. "Don't go chasing waterfalls," etc. Could you build on the business background you have today more directly? It might in a move to a different industry, a different focused area of business administration, to the nonprofit or public sectors? To larger companies; to smaller ones? How about that MBA, or a related master's or certificate, maybe from a higher-status school than the school from which you earned your bachelor's? Is there a focused expertise you have or could build for which you could hang up your shingle as a consultant? With a graduate education could could teach part- or even full-time? There's said to be relative shortages of college-level instructors in accounting, finance, and mathematics and statistics in particular.

You know, don't you, that a sizeable majority of Concord Law students appear to initially fail the Baby Bar exam that allows them to move on to the second of four years of law school study to be eligible to sit the full bar?

Some will succeed after trying again, and, perhaps, again, racking up additional fees on a prospect that may succeed eventually, or not.

Then, after four years in the very best scenario, there's the full California bar. Smart and successful people to have failed the California bar at least initially and had to at least cool their heels not practicing law in California includ Jerry Brown, Pete Wilson (three times!), Hilary Clinton, Antonio Villaraigosa (four times and apparently then stopped trying), and Kathleen Sullivan (eventually Dean of Stanford Law School). Googling around I find Maxcy Dean Filer, who earned his law degree in 1966 and failed 47 TIMES before passing in 1991. By this time both of his sons were lawyers. I'm not immediately seeing this detail, but they could well have been born after he started sitting the bar exam. One of his sons is now a judge.

If you were committed to studying law, an ABA law school could qualify you academically to take the bar in any state in the union. As a first, low-commitment, you-could-start-today step, have you tried to prepare for the LSAT? There should be practical, targeted books in almost every public library and bookstore, and online.

 

I asked him these questions in the last thread, the chiropractic one, and last I checked I was ignored.

 

Nothing wrong with dreaming! I'ld love to be an Astronaut.
News – Our 500th Astronaut | Virgin Galactic

 

I would be an underwater archeologist.

 

Maybe he wants to open a private law practice to go after Physical Therapists and
Chiropractors for malpractice, lol.

J/K

 

Maybe he is just undecided. There is nothing wrong with having so many interests that you can not pick just one.

 

Well...

:redface: at least lawyer is easier to spell than chiropractic.

 

I agree with this.

 

I'm suspect of anyone who changes their plans more frequently than I do

 

Other than the few jokes, I think everyone agrees. The issue is that the fields he is interested in are multi-year adventures and are such a wide spectrum we are trying to get an idea of what his goals are. In the chiropractor thread he was asking about schools with easier admission and overall experience so it made us think that he was just looking for the quickest career of some sort, even though his selections are not short by any account.

 

To get back to the original question ...

Concord Law School is an unaccredited distance-learning law school in California. Concord actually has both national accreditation (DETC) and regional accreditation (as part of Kaplan University). However, it is considered "unaccredited" as a law school, because it is not approved by either the American Bar Association or the California Bar Association.

Concord is the largest and best-known of the California DL law schools. So it is probably a safe choice if you want to go that route. There may be other California DL schools that are smaller, less well known, and less expensive.

All California DL law schools, including Concord, typically have the following characteristics:

- they are 4-year part-time programs

- they admit practically everyone -- including students who are poorly qualified and would probably not get into traditional ABA-approved law schools

- their students are required to take the First-Year Law Students Exam (or "Baby Bar") during their first year of study. Many never pass this exam.

- the vast majority of their students will never become attorneys. They will drop out, flunk out, fail to pass the Baby Bar, or fail to pass the General Bar.

- a small number of their students will succeed, and will pass the bar exam in California.

- however, their successful students may or may not be allowed to sit for the bar exam in other states, depending on local regulations.

 

Here's an example:

- During 2007, about 190 students started legal study at Concord. We can see this from the California Bar statistics: 118 Concord students took the "Baby Bar" for the first time in June 2007, and there were 72 more "first-timers" in October 2007.

- Since this is a 4-year program, students who started in 2007 should be eligible for the General Bar in 2011. The number of Concord students who passed the General Bar on their first try in 2011 was 23 (14 for the Feb 2011 Bar, plus 9 for the July 2011 Bar).

So Concord started with 190 law students in 2007, and produced 23 attorneys in 2011. These numbers suggest that a student who enrolls at Concord has maybe a 10-15% chance of becoming an attorney 4 years later.

Some Concord grads will fail the Bar on the first attempt, but will keep taking the Bar exam repeatedly, and will eventually pass. So a student who starts at Concord probably has somewhat better odds, maybe in the 20-25% range, of becoming an attorney eventually, but it might be 5 or 10 years after enrolling.

 

To reiterate with CalDog was saying, all DL Law Schools will be unaccredited. This doesn't mean you cannot graduate and practice law, it simply means you will be very restricted in where you can practice law. But if getting into a DL Law School is you aim, here are a few other unaccredited schools to consider because Concord is not the only game in town: (Everything listed below is just out of California alone)

Strictly DL Schools:

St. Francis School of Law
Abraham Lincoln University, School of Law
American Heritage University
California School of Law

Schools with Fixed Locations in California: (Non ABA & Non CalBar Accredited)

California Southern Law School
Inland Valley University
Irvine University College of Law
Larry H. Layton School of Law
McMillan Academy of Law
Pacific West College of Law
People's College of Law
University of Silicon Valley Law School
University of Northern California, Lorenzo Patiño School of Law
Univ. of San Luis Obispo School of Law
Western Sierra Law School

Source: http://admissions.calbar.ca.gov/Education/LegalEducation/LawSchools.aspx

 

Another thing to consider is looking at the amount of students who take the general bar exam compared to those who passed. This is broken down by each law school, and serves as interesting reading: (California Only)

Statistics

 

And maybe he wants to challenge that Western Michigan campus cop and the Indian professor in a race for the world record for most graduate degrees.

 

There are lots of unaccredited law schools in California to consider, both DL and B&M. But they all offer pretty much the same thing: easy admissions to a relatively inexpensive JD program with a small chance of becoming an attorney at the end. At some schools, the odds may be near zero. At others, like Concord, the odds may be better than zero, but they still won't be very high.

Concord is the biggest and best-known of the unaccredited law schools, so it is probably a safe choice. There are other reputable choices too, some of which might be cheaper.

The chances of success probably depend more on the individual than on the school. If you are smart, disciplined, and have an aptitude for legal issues, then you may be able to learn enough to pass the California Bar Exam at any decent unaccredited law school. If you lack any of these qualities, then you may never pass the Bar Exam -- in fact, you may never even reach the Bar Exam -- regardless of which school you enroll in.

One way to evaluate those chances would be to get an LSAT study guide. If you can get a good score on an LSAT practice exam, and find the questions interesting, then maybe you are a good candidate. If you can't get a decent score and don't understand the questions or the reasoning behind the answers, then maybe law school is not going to be a worthwhile investment.

 

It appears that California School of Law (annual tuition $7500), American Heritage University (annual tuition $4,000) and St. Francis School of Law ($6500-$7,000 annually) are relative newcomers to the DL law providers game. One not mentioned is Northwestern California University of Law (annual tuition $2850) in operation since 1982. The others may provide a better learning program (who knows, and if you do let me know) but generally DL law is what it is. You must be very self motivated to learn law by DL. You could take a year to get to the baby bar, pass it and then evaluate whether the study of law is for you. It's not for everybody. After a year you wouldn't have too much money wrapped up in it to just stop there. I like the idea of taking practice LSAT tests and you can also get baby bar study materials as well to see if this is for you. However until you throw yourself into it for a year or two or more, you have no idea of what you're getting yourself into.