If you’re interested in going to law school, chances are that you know it can be an expensive proposition. Unless you live in one of a handful of states that permits the law to be ‘read,’ becoming a lawyer means getting an undergraduate degree and then three years of law school. This means that you’ll be spending upwards of seven years as a student, living off of your family, financial aid, or loans.
Luckily, there is a better way for those who want to go abroad.
Outside of the United States, law is typically taught as an undergraduate subject. This means that you study law right out of high school, much like you’d study political science or math. This means that lawyers in much of the rest of the world are able to practice at about the same age that you’d be applying to law school in the US.
Of course, there are exceptions. Canada typically expects you to have completed an undergraduate degree.
There are two major routes to study law overseas and come back to practice in the US. One of them is shorter, but can be messy. The other takes an extra year, but opens many more doors as to where you can practice, as well as regarding what firms may hire you.
The faster of the two routes is to get an LL.B in a Common Law country, then find a state that will let you take the Bar exam. Chances are you’ll have to obtain an LL.M, a masters degree in law, in American legal subjects. The good news is that New York and California permit this. The bad news is that plenty of other states don’t.
Notice too that I said a Common Law country. Without getting too much into legal history, if they speak English, chances are that they are Common Law. This includes England (but not Scotland), Ireland, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and India, as well as a few others.
If you get a law degree in another country, chances are that it will be in Civil Law. These law degrees have much less acceptance in the US.
However, Civil Law degrees are often offered by countries that are much cheaper than Common Law degrees.
Therefore, we only recommend the above in cases where you know you want to practice in a state that permits foreign law graduates to practice. If there is any doubt in your mind about this, then we recommend a second route.
A growing number of law schools allow for foreign law graduates to get a JD in two years instead of three. That means that you’ll be able to practice in any jurisdiction in the United States, as well as wherever your foreign law degree qualifies you. There are some highly ranked law schools doing this, like Northwestern, Wake Forest, and Vermont, with some others (like Penn) rumored to have an informal arrangement for law grads.
This is a game changer for a number of reasons.
First, it can save you at least a year, if not two, and plenty of money along the way. A year of law school, with living expenses, can cost upwards of $70,000. Combined with the potential to save money on your undergraduate degree, that means that you can save nearly $100,000 on your education.
Second, you’ll be able to answer many of the questions that law school admissions officers ask as a part of an application. You won’t have to wax on poetically about the law, you’ll have studied it, and have more perspective on it than practically any other applicant.
Finally, you’ll have a unique value proposition for every firm that you apply to. Increasingly, law is globalized, with even family lawyers needing to understand adoption or marriage laws overseas. You’ll be able to do that easily.
But, of course, there’s also the money. Here’s the breakdown.
We reckon that an LL.B at LSE, the third most expensive option we can think of, costs around $135,000. Combined with two years at an American law school, you’re looking at $275,000. That is by no means cheap, but it assumes no financial aid and the most expensive options we could think of outside of Oxford and Cambridge. If you’re looking to save money, we can cut that amount by half, to around $150,000 for both undergrad and your JD, by studying at a cheaper law school and going to a European university that costs around $75,000 for three years of undergraduate law school, living expenses, and travel.
Meanwhile, if you did the traditional approach to law school, you’d be looking at around $140,000 for undergrad (assuming you’re instate at UCLA), plus another $210,000 for three years of law school. That’s $350,000 for seven years.
Saving upwards of $200,000 while getting an amazing law education, that sounds like ‘case closed’ to us.