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Information About

Boalt Hall




The School of Law, commonly referred to as '''Boalt Hall''', is one of 14 schools and colleges at the University Of California, Berkeley . The School features specialized curricular programs in Business, Law and Economics, Comparative Legal Studies, Environmental Law, International Legal Studies, Law and Technology, and Social Justice.

The School has approximately 850 J.D. students, 30 students in the LL.M. and J.S.D. programs, and 10 students in the Ph.D. program in Jurisprudence and Social Policy. Its admissions process is highly selective, as well as unorthodox. The school is known to value a high undergraduate GPA more than a high LSAT score (whereas the opposite can be said to be true at the top American law schools). According to U.S. News and World Report, which ranked the law school as the number 8th overall for its 2007 ranking, Boalt has the third-lowest acceptance rate among American law schools; 10% of applicants are admitted. Also unusual among top law schools is Boalt's grading system. Students are graded on a High Honors, Honors, Pass, and No Pass scale. 60 percent of the students in a given class receive a Pass, 30 percent receive the grade of Honors, and the highest 10 percent receive High Honors. In terms of weight, a Pass is worth 2.0, Honors a 3.0, and High Honors a 5.0.

The average age of admitted students is 24 years old, over a range of ages from 20 to 48 years old. Approximately 88% of students receive financial aid. As a state institution, Boalt had the lowest tuition of all the top 14 law schools in the country in 2005 ($24,000), though the sum continues to rise.


HISTORY

The Department of Jurisprudence was founded at Berkeley in 1894. In 1912, this department was elevated to the School of Jurisprudence, which was then renamed the School of Law in 1950.

The School was originally located in Boalt Memorial Hall of Law, built in 1911 with funds largely from Elizabeth Josselyn Boalt donated in memory of her late husband, John Henry Boalt . In 1951, the School moved to its current location in the new Boalt Hall, at the southeast corner of the central campus, and the old Boalt Hall was renamed Durant Hall .

In 2001, Dean of the Law School John Dwyer left amid a scandal concerning a 3L student, who claimed he had made inappropriate sexual advances on her during her 1L year.


CENTERS AT BOALT HALL

  • Berkeley Center for Law & Technology (est. 1995)

  • California Center for Environmental Law and Policy

  • Center for Clinical Education (est. 1998)

  • Center for Social Justice (est. 1999)

  • Center for the Study of Law and Society (est. 1961)

  • Chief Justice Earl Warren Institute on Race, Ethnicity and Diversity

  • Death Penalty Clinic (est. 2001)

  • Institute for Legal Research (formerly the Earl Warren Legal Institute) (est. 1963)

  • International Human Rights Law Clinic (est. 1998)

  • Kadish Center for Morality, Law and Public Affairs (est. 2000)

  • Robert D. Burch Center for Tax Policy and Public Finance (est. 1994)

  • Samuelson Law, Technology and Public Policy Clinic (est. 2000)



LAW JOURNALS AT BOALT HALL

  • ''Asian American Law Journal''

  • ''Berkeley Business Law Journal''

  • ''Berkeley Journal of African-American Law & Policy''

  • ''Berkeley Journal of Employment and Labor Law''

  • ''Berkeley Journal of Gender, Law & Justice''

  • ''Berkeley Journal of International Law''

  • ''Berkeley La Raza Law Journal''

  • ''Berkeley Technology Law Journal''

  • ''Boalt Journal of Criminal Law''

  • ''California Law Review''

  • ''Ecology Law Quarterly''



LIST OF NOTED ALUMNI



LIST OF NOTED FACULTY



EXTERNAL LINKS