Loyola Law School, Los Angeles, California

<<Loyola Law has been accredited by the American Bar Association since 1937 and was awarded a chapter in the Order of the Coif in 1990. Among the various specialty institutions and programs students may utilize while pursuing their degrees are international programs in China, Costa Rica, and Italy, the Learning Rights Project, the Cancer Legal Resource Center, the Disability Mediation Center, the Center for Conflict Resolution, the Disability Rights Legal Center, the Center for Juvenile Law and Policy, the Civil Justice Program, the Law and Technology Program, and the Entertainment Law Practicum. J.D. students can pursue their studies abroad in Beijing, China; Bologna, Italy; and Ciudad Colon, Costa Rica, while those in the international LL.M. program can study abroad in Bologna, Italy.

The school has been the recipient of many high annual rankings, including a spot on U.S. News & World Report's "America's Best Graduate Schools 2008," where it placed 66th, on par with such schools as Pepperdine University, the University of Kansas, and the University of Missouri-Columbia. The Cooley/Brennan rankings have placed many of Loyola's legal programs even higher; Lawdragon has named Loyola among the 25 leading law schools at number 17.


U.S. News & World Report ranked Loyola's newly implemented taxation LL.M. program eighth in the nation and its trial advocacy program fifth in the nation. The Princeton Review also ranked Loyola third in the nation in terms of its professors' "interesting" and "accessibility" ratings, after Washington and Lee University and Boston University.

With both day and evening J.D. programs taken into account, Loyola has been recognized as having the largest and most diverse student body of any law school in California. Because of its diverse student body, the school has always prioritized playing key roles in the many communities from which its students originate. It holds the distinction of being the first law school in the state to require pro bono work for all students (the current minimum is 40 hours per student). In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, Loyola opened its doors to displaced law students of New Orleans who had no choice but to relocate after the storm devastated the Gulf region.

<<The school is also home to three respected law journals — Loyola of Los Angeles Law Review, Loyola of Los Angeles Entertainment Law Review, and Loyola of Los Angeles International & Comparative Law Review — which publish articles dealing with constitutional law, sports law, intellectual property rights, communications regulation, antitrust law, employment law, contract law, and corporate law, in addition to the emerging fields of computer and Internet law.

The school's total enrollment tallies to 1,360 students, evenly split between men and women, with minorities comprising 37% of the student body, the 12th-highest percentage in the nation. For the 2006-2007 entering class, LSAT scores ranged from 159 (25th percentile) to 160 (50th percentile) to 163 (75th percentile); GPAs ranged from 3.19 (25th percentile) to 3.42 (50th percentile) to 3.6 (75th percentile).

Tuition for full-time students in the 2006-2007 academic year was $33,719, and for part-time students tuition was $22,418. 85% of Loyola law students receive financial aid through loans and scholarships.

In terms of the school's post-graduation employment rate, more than 95% of graduates are able to start their legal careers within nine months of graduation. According to the 2008 U.S. News & World Report survey, 62.7% of Loyola law students were employed at the time of graduation, with median starting salaries reported at $70,000 for private sector attorneys and $54,750 for government attorneys.

Loyola Law School boasts of an impressive roster of highly accomplished alumni, including the following: high-profile defense attorney Mark Geragos (1982), defense attorney Robert Shapiro (1968), former governor of Hawaii Benjamin Cayetano (1971), former governor of Nevada Robert Joseph Miller (1971), civil rights lawyer and former head of the Los Angeles Board of Police Commissioners Melanie E. Lomax, current first lady of Massachusetts Diane Patrick (also a partner at the Boston law firm Ropes & Gray, LLP), and Laura Allison Wasser, a divorce attorney whose client roster includes Angelina Jolie, Stevie Wonder, Kiefer Sutherland, Spike Jonze, Nick Lachey, and Britney Spears.

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