California Southern University Law School-Not Enrolling New Students

Discussion in 'General Distance Learning Discussions' started by Sacricolist, Feb 25, 2019.

Loading...
  1. Sacricolist

    Sacricolist Member

    https://www.calsouthern.edu/online-law-d.../jd-degree

    I hope this doesn’t mean the law school is closing. Even though they are non-ABA accredited, they are regionally accredited. But they also have abysmal Baby Bar and General Bar passage rates. I hope they are merely revamping the law school’s curriculum and start enrolling again. I like this school despite the limitations of the degree and the likelihood of not passing the bar.
     
  2. sideman

    sideman Well Known Member

    $33k for a non-ABA degree (but RA, for what that's worth in the legal world) vs. $107k for the first ABA online degree (Syracuse). Come on law schools, there has to be an affordable middle ground here.
     
  3. Jahaza

    Jahaza Active Member

    I think the Syracuse program is 87 credits at $1,770 per credit (the same as for on campus), so actually a total of $153,990.

    University of New Hampshire is also launching a hybrid JD. The tuition hasn't been announced yet as far as I know. If that charges the same tuition as their 3 year program (except spaced out over 3.5 years), the tuition for out-of-state students will be closer to $125,000.
     
  4. SteveFoerster

    SteveFoerster Resident Gadfly Staff Member

    There could be, were the ABA not doing its real job so well.
     
  5. heirophant

    heirophant Well-Known Member

    There seems to be quite a bit of turbulence around the California law schools and the bar exam. Here's the latest July 2018 results, broken down various ways:

    https://assets.documentcloud.org/documents/5671401/JULY2018-CBX-Statistics.pdf

    Total first-time takers July 2018 were 5,132 or which 2,816 passed, or 54.9%

    CA ABA -- 63.8%
    Out of state ABA -- 58.2%
    Calbar Accredited -- 16.3%
    Unaccredited -- 15.2% (this includes all the California DL and correspondence law schools)
    Foreign JD equiv + 1 year -- 18.8%
    US attorneys -- 58.3%
    Foreign attorneys -- 13.1%

    The state bar isn't happy. They have appointed committees to study the bar exam. Judges have been complaining. The huge difference in passage rates between ABA lawschools and others has undoubtedly been noted.

    The data in the link above breaks it down by law school as well (provided that the school had at least 11 people taking the exam, which excludes most of the DL and correspondence law schools discussed on Degreeinfo).

    California Southern's data isn't given, because it had fewer than 11 people take the exam. Which suggests that its law enrollment is small and/or it isn't graduating many of its students. Which would be something that WASC would presumably take an interest in.

    Some law schools' pass percentages:

    Stanford -- 91%
    Berkeley -- 86%
    UCLA -- 83%
    USC -- 80%
    Golden Gate U. -- 34%
    Whittier -- 26%
    Concord (an RA but Calbar unaccredited DL program) -- 29%
    NW Cal U. Law (a completely unaccredited correspondence program) -- 8%

    Combining the DL and correspondence categories (the state bar distinguishes between them) there were only 41 total exam takers, of whom only 7 passed -- 17% (and Concord undoubtedly pulled that upwards, despite only being comparable to the weaker ABA B&M programs).

    So despite all the talk that DL law schools receive on Degreeinfo, they collectively account for less than 1% of the first time California bar exam takers.
     
    Last edited: Feb 25, 2019
  6. sideman

    sideman Well Known Member

    I stand corrected. And let me correct the California Southern tuition to approximately $48k. Thanks.
     
  7. nosborne48

    nosborne48 Well-Known Member

    The California Bar Exam is notorious in the legal world. Just displaying a wall license from California will attract comments from other (impressed) lawyers admitted elsewhere in the country. No, I don't have one. Still, Taft Law (whence I earned my LL.M.) claims an overall pass rate of around 70% including re-takes. Now what this means is that, of all Taft J.D. grads who keep trying, eventually 70% or so will succeed. It DOESN'T mean that the school has a pass rate anywhere near that high on any given exam. My point is that a competent student can realistically expect to gain a California law license through correspondence study but it is by far the harder road.
     
  8. nosborne48

    nosborne48 Well-Known Member

    I had meant to say also that based on my own experience, straight correspondence is a more effective mode for law study than on-line lectures and chat rooms.
     
  9. jonlevy

    jonlevy Active Member

    As a graduate of Taft Law School and a licensed attorney, the main stumbling block is the First Year Law Exam or "Baby Bar" for non accredited law school students; the attrition rate rate is high maybe 75%. Pass that and you go 3 more years and can pass the California Bar. With a California license, you can also motion into the DC bar after 5 years. And while most US states will scorn your correspondence degree, England and Ireland will allow you take their qualified lawyer transfer tests.
     

Share This Page