New Master of Laws Degree

[Alpha]

I don't think these are rare anymore but this one seems geared toward people who do not have JD degrees.
Cincinnati Law launches Master of Legal Studies online degree | Mirage News

[ss20ts]

It's interesting that they mention these things: risk management and cyber security. You can already get a master's degree in them from numerous universities. I can see why this degree would be helpful in legal research. Employment law you might need to be careful because you're not a lawyer and legal issues can be tricky.

[sanantone]

It's not a master of laws degree; it's a master of legal studies. LLM programs rarely admit people who don't have a JD. Master of legal studies programs are an alternative for non-lawyers and are specifically intended for non-lawyers.

[Alpha]

Of course, you're right.  Somehow I used the wrong nomenclature and it makes sense that it's geared toward non-lawyers

[freeloader]

A lot of law schools have started these programs in recent years. I understand it from the schools’ perspectives, they are offering the same classes (or virtually the same) to a wider pool of students, so it probably is pretty easy money.

I don’t really understand who really benefits from these degrees. I know 2 people personally who have earned this type of degree. One was a historian who studied legal history. He wanted to get a different, more practical understanding of law than what he had gotten during his PhD studies. For academics who deal with law (some historians, political scientists, and economists, for instance), I can see the value. This is particularly true if they don’t want to spend the time or money to actually get a JD and don’t want to teach in a law school. This friend of mine got a sabbatical year for the master’s but could not have gotten 3 years off from his academic job for a JD. One of my wife’s co-workers was a federal agent (FBI, Secret Service kind of job) who left the government for a while. He got one of these masters because he wanted to get back into the federal agent job and thought this type of degree would help him and make it more likely that he would be able to move into management.  He did get picked back up as an agent, so perhaps it helped. I feel like these are both really specific, niche kind of situations that surely cannot warrant dozens of programs operating around the country.

So, who else would pursue one of these degrees?  Paralegals who think it will separate them from their peers?  People who are doing it PURELY for vanity—being able to say, “oh yes, when I was in law school at XYZ University…”?  

I looked into these degrees a few years ago. At the time, and I suspect still today, the ABA had a rule that you can only count classes toward an ABA-accredited law degree that are earned while pursuing a JD. So, no way to do one of these degrees for a year and then transfer into a JD and finish in 2 years. Perhaps you could transfer credits to an non-ABA school, but I wasn’t looking to do that.

[dfrecore]

I'm guessing it's someone who wants to move up in their career, and deals with the law - think accountants who already have a CPA, Finance managers, maybe even someone high up in HR. Lots of people need to know about the legal system for their profession, but don't necessarily need a JD.

But I'm also going to guess that it's not a large pool of applicants for this.

[ss20ts]

A lot of law schools have started these programs in recent years. I understand it from the schools’ perspectives, they are offering the same classes (or virtually the same) to a wider pool of students, so it probably is pretty easy money.

I don’t really understand who really benefits from these degrees. I know 2 people personally who have earned this type of degree. One was a historian who studied legal history. He wanted to get a different, more practical understanding of law than what he had gotten during his PhD studies. For academics who deal with law (some historians, political scientists, and economists, for instance), I can see the value. This is particularly true if they don’t want to spend the time or money to actually get a JD and don’t want to teach in a law school. This friend of mine got a sabbatical year for the master’s but could not have gotten 3 years off from his academic job for a JD. One of my wife’s co-workers was a federal agent (FBI, Secret Service kind of job) who left the government for a while. He got one of these masters because he wanted to get back into the federal agent job and thought this type of degree would help him and make it more likely that he would be able to move into management.  He did get picked back up as an agent, so perhaps it helped. I feel like these are both really specific, niche kind of situations that surely cannot warrant dozens of programs operating around the country.

So, who else would pursue one of these degrees?  Paralegals who think it will separate them from their peers?  People who are doing it PURELY for vanity—being able to say, “oh yes, when I was in law school at XYZ University…”?  

I looked into these degrees a few years ago. At the time, and I suspect still today, the ABA had a rule that you can only count classes toward an ABA-accredited law degree that are earned while pursuing a JD. So, no way to do one of these degrees for a year and then transfer into a JD and finish in 2 years. Perhaps you could transfer credits to an non-ABA school, but I wasn’t looking to do that.

My brother-in-law has one of these degrees. His job paid for it. He works for a federal union and deals with arbitration. He can't go back to the law school he attended and transfer the courses from his master's into their JD. At the time he completed his master's, he was ineligible to apply for the JD for a period of time at that law school. The school's reasoning was that they didn't want people to complete the same courses for less money and not have to complete all of the work. Apparently, the master's students had different assignments and tests than the JD students. Their tuition was also less.

[withrown]

I'm in one of these programs and most of the folks in my classes are paralegals or lawyers. It's weird since the lawyers are getting their LLM which is the exact same classes minus one intro to law class. The program is fun and interesting but, my goal is to get into government policy, and this allows me to check the law school box without spending the time and money on a JD.

Sidenote - My workplace is covering this degree, I'm not sure how keen I would be at paying 40k for a master of law degree that doesn't qualify me to be a paralegal.

[sanantone]

There are many non-attorney, federal government jobs that desire graduate degrees and credits related to law. These jobs are mostly in HR, compliance or civil enforcement, and legal administrative work. At the same time, you can also get the HR jobs with business and psychology degrees, and the legal and compliance jobs with CJ degrees or a degree related to the industry you'll be regulating i.e. construction management if you're overseeing construction contractors.

[bjcheung77]

I'm in one of these programs and most of the folks in my classes are paralegals or lawyers. It's weird since the lawyers are getting their LLM which is the exact same classes minus one intro to law class. The program is fun and interesting but, my goal is to get into government policy, and this allows me to check the law school box without spending the time and money on a JD.

Sidenote - My workplace is covering this degree, I'm not sure how keen I would be at paying 40k for a master of law degree that doesn't qualify me to be a paralegal.

That's interesting! I would think the same thing. Wouldn't you want a more "usable" degree in that case?
Is this the only degree work covers, if not, there are so many options to select from! Go shopping! <grin>