Boston College Law School
Boston College Law School (BC Law) is the law school of Boston College, a private Jesuit research university in Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts. It is situated on a 40-acre (160,000 m2) campus in Newton, Massachusetts, about 1.5 miles (2.4 km) from the university's main campus in Chestnut Hill.
Boston College Law School
Αἰέν ἀριστεύειν
"Ever to excel"
1929
$3.8 billion (2021)[1]
Odette Lienau
Newton, Massachusetts, U.S.
794 (2009)[2]
76 (full-time)
137 (part-time)[3]
28th (tie) (2024)[4]
91.77% (2022 first-time takers)[5]
The law school has approximately 800 students and 60 full-time faculty members.[6] BC Law has programs in human rights, social justice, and public interest law, as well as programs in business law and innovation,[7] law and public policy, and criminal and civil litigation.
According to the law school's 2023 American Bar Association (ABA)-required disclosures, 86.82% of the Class of 2022 obtained full-time, long-term, JD-required employment (i.e., as attorneys) ten months after graduation.[8]
History[edit]
Although provisions for a law school were included in Boston College's original charter, ratified by the General Court of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts in 1863, Boston College Law School was formally organized later in 1929. Previously, promising Boston College graduates interested in a legal education were encouraged to seek admission to Harvard Law School, as attested by the law school's inaugural faculty of whom 11 out of 17 members held degrees from both universities.[9][10] BC Law's founder, John B. Creeden SJ, formerly president of Georgetown University, served as its first regent and alumnus Dennis A. Dooley as its first dean.[11]
On September 26, 1929, BC Law opened its doors in the 11-story Lawyer's Building on Beacon Street opposite the Massachusetts State House in downtown Boston. From a pool of nearly 700 applicants, 102 day and evening division students had been selected. So rigorous were the school's academic standards that 50% of the first class eventually dropped out or flunked out.[12] However, just three years later, the school received American Bar Association accreditation, joining Harvard, Yale, and Boston University as the only law schools in New England to attain that distinction; accreditation by the Association of American Law Schools followed in 1937.[13]
Women were admitted to the school by 1940, when enrollment had surpassed 350 students.[14] In 1954, the school moved to St. Thomas More Hall on the edge of the main Chestnut Hill campus and to its present 40-acre (160,000 m2) Newton campus, the home of the former Newton College of the Sacred Heart, in 1975. Today, the law campus includes Stuart House, an administrative building; lecture halls; seminar spaces; a dining hall; conference space; and a law library that includes the Daniel R. Coquillette Rare Book Room.
Bar passage[edit]
In 2022, the overall bar examination passage rate for BC Law first-time examination takers was 91.77%. The Ultimate Bar Pass Rate, which the ABA defines as the passage rate for graduates who sat for bar examinations within two years of graduating, was 97.10% for the class of 2020.[5]
Employment[edit]
According to BC Law's 2023 American Bar Association (ABA)-required disclosures, 86.82% of the Class of 2022 obtained full-time, long-term, JD-required employment (i.e., as attorneys) ten months after graduation.[8] BC Law's Law School Transparency under-employment score is 6.98%, indicating the percentage of the Class of 2022 unemployed, pursuing an additional degree, or working in a non-professional, short-term, or part-time job nine months after graduation.[29]
For BC Law graduates, median private sector starting salary is $145,000, and the median public service starting salary is $51,000, based on self-reporting data.[30]