Myron Taylor Hall
Ithaca, NY 14853-4901
Phone: 607.255.5141
E-mail: lawadmit@lawschool.cornell.edu; Website: www.lawschool.cornell.edu
When Cornell University's founding president, Andrew Dickson White, began to lay plans for a law department at Cornell University, he wrote that he wanted to educate "not swarms of hastily prepared pettifoggers, but a fair number of well-trained, large-minded, morally based lawyers in the best sense. . ." He hoped graduates of the school would become "a blessing to the country, at the bar, on the bench, and in various public bodies." More than a century since President White's vision, this ideal still holds true. A small, top-tier law school located in beautiful surroundings, Cornell draws on, and contributes to, the resources of a great university, consistently producing well-rounded lawyers and accomplished practitioners cut from a different cloth. Cornell is a national center of learning located in Ithaca, New York, the heart of the Finger Lakes region of New York State. The law school's small classes, broad curriculum, and distinguished faculty, combined with the advantages of being part of one of the world's leading research universities, make it ideal for those who value both depth and breadth in their legal studies. Students find Ithaca to be a safe and nonstressful, yet culturally rich, environment in which to pursue legal studies.
Sixty percent of Cornell's entering students have taken one or more years between completion of their undergraduate degree and enrollment in law school. Selective admission standards, combined with an emphasis on applicants' unique records and achievements, ensure that the student body is made up of people with wide-ranging interests, skills, concerns, and backgrounds.
The law school is located in the renovated and expanded Myron Taylor Hall, at the heart of the scenic 745-acre Cornell University campus. Hughes Hall, the law school dormitory, is adjacent to the main law school building and contains single rooms for about 45 students and a dining facility.
Cornell is one of the nation's leaders in the development and support of electronic legal research. It combines outstanding collections with professional expertise and access to worldwide electronic information sources for Anglo-American, as well as foreign and international law. Students have access to the full array of Internet services. The law school's multiple-node network, wireless network, and computer terminals are available to students for word processing, legal research, statistical analysis, and database management. Students also have access to the many satellite computer clusters and mainframe facilities located on the university campus.
Cornell's faculty are known not only as prolific scholars but also as great teachers. Tenured and tenure-track faculty teach and produce scholarship in their area of law; clinical faculty run client-focused and simulation courses centered around legal aid and several specialty clinics; and a large number of visitors, associated faculty from other university divisions, and adjunct faculty teach at the school each year. Many of the latter group are legal scholars and professors from other countries who teach in the law school's significant international program.
Cornell offers a national law curriculum leading to the JD degree. First-year students take a group of required courses and an intensive lawyering course stressing a variety of legal research, writing, and advocacy techniques. After the first year, students may choose from a wide range of elective courses, including many seminars and problem courses.
The Cornell Legal Aid Clinic, offering legal services to individuals financially unable to employ an attorney, provides students with the chance to engage in the supervised practice of law under the direction of experienced attorneys. Clinical faculty also conduct a variety of other specialized clinics and skills courses within the regular curriculum. Students can select from a bevy of clinical courses, such as the Advanced Human Rights Clinic; Advanced Labor Law; Attorneys for Children; Capital Punishment Clinic 1 and 2; Criminal Defense Trial Clinic; Cross-national Human Rights Clinic; e-Government Clinic 1 and 2; Immigration Appellate Law and Advocacy Clinic; Innocence Clinic; International Human Rights Clinic; Labor Law Clinic; Land Use, Development, and Natural Resource Protection Clinic; Prosecution Trial Clinic; Securities Law Clinics 1, 2, and 3; US Attorney's Office Clinics 1 and 2; and Water Law in Theory and Practice 1.
Being part of a world-renowned university, and the interdisciplinary environment it provides, is of great benefit. Cornell Law School and Cornell University offer many opportunities for combined-degree programs, including both three- and four-year programs for the JD/MBA (business degree from the Johnson School of Graduate Management); JD/MPA (public affairs degree from the Cornell Institute of Public Affairs); JD/MILR (labor relations degree from the School of Industrial and Labor Relations); JD/MRP (regional planning degree from the College of Architecture, Art, and Planning); and a JD/MA or PhD in a variety of fields (master's or PhD degree from the graduate school). Law students can also take as many as 12 credits outside of the law school for law school credit.
The Berger International Legal Studies Program is one of the country's oldest and most distinguished programs in international legal education. The Clarke Program in East Asian Law and Culture brings an exciting interdisciplinary and humanistic focus to the study of law in East Asia. Cornell's comprehensive program features a unique JD specialization opportunity; a three-year JD/LLM degree in international and comparative law; a four-year JD/Master en Droit (French law degree) program; a three-year JD/MLLP (German law degree) program; a Paris summer institute with the Sorbonne Law School at the Université Paris 1 (Panthéon-Sorbonne); a comprehensive speaker series; Mori, Hamada, and Matsumoto (Tokyo law firm) Faculty Exchange; Conseil d'Etat Clerkship (French Supreme Court Clerkship); a founding member of the Turin Interuniversity Centre; a large number of visiting foreign professors and scholars; a weekly luncheon discussion series; international moot court competitions; law clinics; internships; and a leading journal of international and comparative law edited by students. Students have the option to spend one semester abroad at a partner law school (we have agreements with 22 partner schools in 16 different countries), or to design an individual "term away" at a foreign law facility with which Cornell is not partnered.
In addition, the Clarke Initiative for Law and Development in the Middle East sponsors seminars, colloquia, and lectures and supports student and faculty exchanges with institutions in the region.
Cornell Law School is the home for several unique programs and projects of interest to students. These programs and projects include the following: Avon Global Center for Women and Justice (improve access to justice in an effort to eliminate violence against women and girls); Death Penalty Project (clinics and symposia related to capital punishment); e-Rulemaking Initiative (technology and practice of e-rulemaking); Clarke Scholars Program (visiting scholars); ILR-Law School Program on Conflict Resolution (raising the standards of arbitration, mediation, and other methods of alternative dispute resolution); Institute for Social Sciences; Journal of Empirical Legal Studies (only legal journal dedicated exclusively to empirical legal scholarship); Lay Participation in Law International Research Collaborative (transnational collaborative team dedicated to research on lay participation in court systems); Legal Information Institute (world's leading investigator of new ways to perform electronic legal research); Clarke Business Law Institute (classes, more faculty, seminars, conferences, and other programming); BR Legal (represent start-up companies); and Empirical Studies Project (empirical study of court cases).
Student-edited law journals include the Cornell Law Review, the Cornell International Law Journal, and the Cornell Journal of Law and Public Policy. Student organizations and activities include American Constitution Society, Asian Pacific American Law Students Association, Black Law Students Association, Briggs Society of International Law, Business Law Society, Christian Legal Society, Cornell Advocates for Human Rights, Cornell Animal Legal Defense Fund, Cornell Sports and Entertainment Law Consortium, Cornell Law Student Association, Cornell Law United, Cornell Law Democrats, Cornell Law Republicans, Environmental Law Society, Federalist Society, J. Reuben Clark Law Society, Jewish Law Student Association, LAMBDA, Latino American Law Students Association, Law Students for Reproductive Justice, MS JD Board, Moot Court Board, National Lawyers Guild, Native American Law Students Association, Phi Alpha Delta, Phi Delta Phi, Public Interest Law Union, South Asian Law Students Association, Students for Marriage Equality, Transfer Network Association, and the Women's Law Coalition.
Cornell offers an institutional-based financial aid program. About 50 percent of students receive scholarship aid (awards averaging more than $15,000 per year), with a higher percentage receiving government-backed loans.
Our Public Interest Low Income Protection Plan, one of the most generous of such programs, assists those choosing qualifying public interest law jobs through the use of a moderated loan repayment plan and loan forgiveness.
Cornell's students continue to be among the most recruited in the country. Every fall, hundreds of employers from across the country recruit Cornell students on campus and at job fairs in Boston, Los Angeles, New York, and Washington, DC. A professionally staffed Career Services Office provides employment counseling to students and serves as a liaison to legal employers. In addition, Cornell has two full-time professional staff members (assistant dean and director for public service) dedicated to public interest job opportunities and counseling.
Admission to Cornell Law is very competitive. Members of the most recent entering class had an aggregate 3.63 undergraduate grade-point average and median LSAT scores that placed them in the 97th percentile nationwide (168). But Cornell Law does not evaluate candidates by the numbers alone. The admission committee carefully considers such nonquantifiable factors as extracurricular and community activities, life experience and work background, and recommendations. Cornell Law subscribes to the university's long-standing tradition of affirmative action, and members of traditionally underrepresented minority groups are encouraged to mention their status where they think it is relevant. The decision to offer admission ultimately rests on whether the committee is convinced that the applicant will be an energetic, productive, and successful member of the Cornell Law community and eventually, the legal profession.