Correspondence law school
For the purposes of this entry, online law school refers to those schools who offer a juris doctor degree completely online, with no requirement to enter a brick and mortar school or campus. There are many law schools who offer higher law degrees, such as the LLM, in an online setting, but they do not offer a juris doctor online.
List of California Correspondence/Online Law Schools
- Abraham Lincoln University School of Law
- American Heritage University School of Law
- Concord Law School
- Esquire College
- Newport University School of Law
- Northwestern California University School of Law
- California University School of Law
- Oak Brook College of Law and Government Policy
- Southern California University for Professional Studies
- St. Francis eUniversity
- University of Honolulu School of Law
- West Coast School of Law, Inc.
- West Haven University School of Law
- William Howard Taft University School of Law
Qualifications
Graduating from a correspondence/online law school in California will qualify the student to sit for the California General Bar Exam, to be admitted to the California Bar, and to practice law in California, if he or she successfully passes. However, prior to the General Bar Exam, the student must pass the First Year Law Student's Bar Exam, commonly referred to as "The Baby Bar", in order to proceed with the remaining three years of study.
If the student fails the "Baby Bar" after three tries, the student will not receive credit for any additional credits received beyond the first year of study.
Controversy
As of yet, the American Bar Association does not approve or endorse any online/correspondence law schools who offer a juris doctor completely online. There has been much debate within the ABA over online legal education and many educators and legal experts believe that a quality legal education cannot be obtained fully online. Of those, some cite that the Socratic Method of law school learning is a fundamental part of a quality legal education and is what prepares future attorneys to think like lawyers. The Socratic Method of in-class teaching is best known by law students because of the infamous fictional character, Professor Kingsfield at Harvard Law School, played by John Houseman in the film, "The Paper Chase".
There are others, however, who question even the validity or value of the Socratic Method of teaching law and, in fact, some law schools have abandoned the method for a less intimidating method of teaching students to extract the law and to think like a laywer.