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<gallery widths="140px" heights="140px" perrow="5">
<gallery widths="140px" heights="140px" perrow="4">
Image:Jowenroberts.jpg|Justice [[Owen Josephus Roberts]], by [[Alfred Jonniaux]]
Image:Jowenroberts.jpg|Justice [[Owen Josephus Roberts]], by [[Alfred Jonniaux]]
Image:Safra Catz.JPG|[[Safra Catz]], president of [[Oracle Corporation]]
Image:Safra Catz.JPG|[[Safra Catz]], president of [[Oracle Corporation]]
Image:WilliamDraperLewis.jpg|Founder of the [[American Law Institute]]
Image:WilliamDraperLewis.jpg|[[William Draper Lewis]],Founder of the [[American Law Institute]]
Image:David l cohen.jpg|Executive Vice-President of [[Comcast Corporation]]
Image:David l cohen.jpg|[[David L. Cohen]], Executive Vice-President of [[Comcast Corporation]]
Image:JosephSClark.jpg|Mayor of [[Philadelphia]] and US Senator for [[Pennsylvania]]
Image:Mark Yudof.jpg|[[Mark Yudof]], President of the ''University of California]]
Image:JosephSClark.jpg|[[Joseph Clark]], Mayor of [[Philadelphia]] and US Senator for [[Pennsylvania]]
Image:George Wharton Pepper 745bfa7049 o.jpg|Founder of [[Pepper Hamilton]]
Image:George Wharton Pepper 745bfa7049 o.jpg|[[George Wharton Pepper]], Founder of [[Pepper Hamilton]]
Image:Sadalex2.jpg|[[Sadie Tanner Mossell Alexander]], the first woman to receive a Ph.D. in the US
</gallery>
</gallery>


Revision as of 18:42, 29 July 2011

University of Pennsylvania Law School
University of Pennsylvania Law School
Established1790
School typePrivate
Parent endowment$6.44 billion [1]
DeanMichael A. Fitts
LocationPhiladelphia, Pennsylvania, USA
[39.953885, -75.1922]
Enrollment787
Faculty103[2]
USNWR ranking7[2]
Bar pass rate94.44%[2]
Websitewww.law.upenn.edu
ABA profilePenn Law School Profile

The University of Pennsylvania Law School, located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, is the law school of the University of Pennsylvania. A member of the Ivy League, it is among the oldest active law schools in the nation and remains one of the most selective and prestigious law schools in the world. It is currently ranked 7th overall by U.S. News & World Report,[3] and 1st in terms of career prospects by the Princeton Review. [4] It offers the degrees of Juris Doctor (J.D.), Master of Laws (LL.M.), Master of Comparative Laws (LL.C.M.), and Doctor of the Science of Law (S.J.D.).

Admission to Penn Law is highly competitive: the class of 2013 had a median LSAT of 170 and a median GPA of 3.82.[5] Over 6,000 applications were received for approximately 250 spots.[5] Over a third of students identify as persons of color, and 12% of students enrolled with an advanced degree.[6]

The school prides itself on its collegiality[7] and the importance it places on diversity.[8] Penn Law emphasizes cross-disciplinary education, both within the law school and through courses, certificates, and joint/dual degree programs with the other graduate and professional schools on the Penn campus, such as the Wharton School.[9]

History

The University of Pennsylvania Law School officially traces its origins to a series of lectures delivered in 1790 by James Wilson, a signer of the United States Declaration of Independence and United States Constitution.[10]

Following this early beginning, Penn began offering a full-time program in law in 1850, under the leadership of George Sharswood, an innovator in legal education.[10] Under Sharswood's leadership, Penn Law created what has become the template for modern legal education: a combination of lectures in law with practical experience for students. In 1897, Penn Law once again reformed legal education by initiating a three-year curriculum and instituting stringent admissions requirements.

In 1900, the new Law School building (now Silverman Hall) opened in its present site on the Penn campus with its massive Georgian structure of brick and limestone with ornamental details throughout. It was at the time considered the largest structure devoted solely to legal education in the country.

Campus

Silverman Hall

The University of Pennsylvania campus covers over 269 acres (~1 km²) in a contiguous area of West Philadelphia's University City district. All of Penn's schools, including the Law School, and most of its research institutes are located on this campus. Recent improvements to the surrounding neighborhood include the opening of several restaurants, a large upscale grocery store, and a movie theater on the western edge of campus. Much of Penn's architecture was designed by the architecture firm of Cope & Stewardson, whose principal architects combined the Gothic architecture of the University of Oxford and the University of Cambridge with the local landscape to establish the Collegiate Gothic style.

The Law School consists of four interconnecting buildings around a central courtyard. At the east end of the courtyard is Silverman Hall built in 1900, housing the Levy Conference Center, classrooms, faculty offices, the Gittis Center for Clinical Legal Studies, and administrative and student offices. Directly opposite is Tannenbaum Hall, which opened in 1993, home to the Biddle Law Library (the 4th largest law library in the US),[11] several law journals, administrative offices, and comfortable student spaces. Gittis Hall sits on the north side and has new state-of-the-art classrooms (renovated in 2006) and new and expanded faculty offices. Opposite is the site of the planned Golkin Hall, a new building that will contain 40,000 square feet (3,700 m2) and will include a state-of-the-art court room, 350-seat auditorium, seminar rooms, faculty and administrative offices, a two-story entry hall, and a roof-top garden. Golkin Hall will be LEED certifiable and will replace the former Pepper Hall. The building project is estimated to cost approximately $33.5 million, and is expected to be completed in early 2012.

A small row of restaurants and shops faces the Law School on Sansom Street. North of Penn Law, on Chestnut Street, is a new deluxe apartment complex with retail outlets. Nearby are the Penn Bookstore, the Pottruck Center (a new 115,000-square-foot (10,700 m2) multi-purpose sports activity area), the Institute of Contemporary Art, a performing arts center, and area shops.

School Philosophy and Orientation

Throughout its modern history Penn Law has been well known for its collegiality and its strong focus on inter-disciplinary studies, a character that was shaped early on by the School's first Dean, William Draper Lewis.[12]

Its medium-size student body and the tight integration with the rest of Penn's schools (which are in close proximity to the Law School) have been instrumental in achieving those aims. More than 50% of the School's courses are interdisciplinary, while the School offers more than 20 joint and dual degree programs, including a JD/MBA (Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania), a JD/PhD in Communication (Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Pennsylvania), and a JD/MD (University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine). Various certificate programs that can be completed within the 3-year JD program are also available:

Certificate programs
  • Business and Public Policy, The Wharton School
  • Cross-Sector Innovation, School of Social Policy & Practice
  • East Asian Studies, Center for East Asian Studies
  • Environmental Policy, Environmental Studies Institute
  • Environmental Science, Environmental Studies Institute
  • Gender and Sexuality Studies, Women’s Studies/College of Arts and Sciences
  • International Business and Law (Themis Joint Certificate with ESADE Law School, Barcelona, Spain)
  • Middle East and Islamic Studies, Middle East Center

Nineteen percent of the Class of 2007 earned a Certificate.[13]

Penn Law also offers joint degrees with international affiliates such as Sciences Po (France), ESADE (Spain), and the University of Hong Kong Faculty of Law. Under the guidance of Penn's current Dean, professor Michael A. Fitts, the School has further expanded its international programs with the addition of the International Internship Program, the International Summer Human Rights Program, and the Global Research Seminar, all under the umbrella of the Penn Law Global Initiative.

Notable faculty

Penn Law's faculty is selected to match the School's inter-disciplinary orientation. Seventy percent of the standing faculty hold advanced degrees beyond the JD, and more than a third hold secondary appointments in other departments at the University. The School is particularly well known for its corporate law group, with professors William Bratton, Jill Fisch, Edward Rock, David Skeel, and Michael Wachter being regularly included among the best corporate and securities law scholars in the country.[14] The School has also built a strong reputation for its law and economics group (professors Howard F. Chang, Tom Baker, David S. Abrams) and its criminal law group (professors Stephanos Bibas, David Rudovsky). Some of the notable Penn Law faculty members include:

Notable alumni

Main article: List of Penn Law School alumni

Penn Law alumni have been distinguished in several fields:

Law Professors, Judges, and Deans:



Entrepreneurs and Business Executives

Politicians

Media Professionals and Artists

Other

Toll Public Interest Center

Penn Law was the first national law school to establish a mandatory pro bono program and the first law school to win the American Bar Association’s Pro Bono Publico Award. The public interest center was founded in 1989 and was renamed the Toll Public Interest Center (TPIC) in 2006 in acknowledgement of a $10 million gift from Robert Toll (Executive Chairman of the Board of Toll Brothers) and Jane Toll. In 2011 the Tolls donated an additional $2.5 million.

Students complete 70 hours of pro bono service as a condition of graduation. More than a third of the Class of 2009 substantially exceeded the requirement. Students can create their own placements or select from 1,200 slots in close to 400 public interest organizations in Philadelphia and nationwide.

The Law School awards Toll Public Interest Scholarships to accomplished public interest matriculants and has a generous Public Interest Loan Repayment Program for graduates pursuing careers in public interest.

Students interested in public interest work receive funding for summer positions through money from the student-run Equal Justice Foundation or via funding from Penn Law. Additionally, the Law School funds students interested in working internationally through the International Human Rights Fellowship.

Students have a wide variety of opportunities to use their legal training in Penn Law’s client-centered clinics that focus around the distinct roles that lawyers play in various parts of our society. The Clinic provides the opportunity for students to explore the intersection of the legal system with a broad array of societal issues while developing skills common to any practice setting. Students may enroll in clinical courses in their second and third years of law school.

Civil Practice Clinic

Students serve clients in civil litigation in housing, consumer, family law, employment discrimination, and government benefits disputes.

Supreme Court Clinic

Students work on U.S. Supreme Court cases, including conducting research, writing briefs and participating in moot court rehearsals that are held prior to oral arguments at One First Street.

Entrepreneurship Legal Clinic

Students provide representation to an entrepreneurial client base, from emerging businesses and non profit organizations to larger organizations involved in community economic development activities.

Mediation Clinic

In this unique clinic, students are trained in dispute resolution skills and serve as front-line appointed mediators in civil litigation, criminal and family disputes, employment discrimination, and on-campus disciplinary matters.

Legislative Clinic

Students combine classroom study of legislative lawyering and public policy with firsthand experience in legislative and federal placements in Washington, D.C. and Harrisburg, PA.

Inter-Disciplinary Child Advocacy Clinic

Taught by a Penn Law clinical professor and a pediatrician, and a social work supervisor, Penn Law students team with medical, nursing, and social policy & practice students to represent children.

Transnational Clinic

Students work with clients across cultures, languages, borders and legal systems. Cases may include immigration-related matters, human rights claims and international transactions and development projects.

Detkin Intellectual Property and Technology Legal Clinic

Provides hands-on, practical experience along the technological, legal, and business pathways that comprise the commercialization of innovation. Working closely with Penn’s Center for Technology Transfer (CTT), law students gain insights and professional experience in the real world of IP and technology law and commercialization.

Criminal Defense Clinic

Students get first-hand experience trying cases in the Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas and the Philadelphia Municipal Court under the close supervision of a senior trial attorney from the Defender Association of Philadelphia.

Lawyering in the Public Interest

Students examine lawyering themes that arise in the representation of low-income and disadvantaged clients.

Externships

Penn Law externs can elect from a diverse and rich mix of experiences in a range of unique Philadelphia organizations.

Journals

Students at the Law School publish several legal journals.[15]

Institutes, programs, and centers

Penn Law’s institutes, programs and centers address many legal issues from a cross-disciplinary perspective. The Law School's partnerships extend across the University.

  • Institute for Law and Economics Under the sponsorship of the Law School, the Wharton School, and the Department of Economics, ILE contributes to scholarship, policy, and practice on relevant issues of law and economics that affect our country’s businesses and financial institutions.
  • Institute for Law and Philosophy The Institute brings together scholars to discuss the application of legal theory to contemporary legal, moral, and political issues.
  • Center for Tax Law and Policy Using an eclectic methodological approach, the Center focuses on pressing issues of fiscal policy with close attention paid to the implications for economic growth and efficiency, socioeconomic inequality, and the cost effective administration of programs and rules.
  • Penn Program on Documentaries and the Law Addressing the critical use of law-genre documentaries, the role of lawyering in the creative process, and the film as legal advocacy, the Program creates instructional models for the legal profession and others in nonfiction filmmaking to better use and understand advocacy on film.
  • Penn Program on Regulation This Program emphasizes issues relevant to multiple domains of regulatory policy, such as issues of administrative law and procedure, economic analysis of regulation, and the political economy of regulation, and focuses on a variety of areas of social and economic regulation, such as e-rulemaking, employment, environmental, financial, health care, and transportation, among others.
  • Center for Technology, Innovation and Competition CTIC promotes basic research on technology-related issues to create foundational frameworks that will shape the way policymakers think about the issues the scholarly study of technology policy from a full range of perspectives, particularly those relating to competition policy and economic welfare.

References

  1. ^ As of March 31, 2011. "upenn.edu" (PDF).
  2. ^ a b c d Penn Law School Official ABA Data[dead link]
  3. ^ "Best Graduate Schools | Top Graduate Programs | US News Education". Usnews.com. Retrieved May 28, 2011.
  4. ^ "Press Release: Best Law and Business Schools". Princetonreview.com. October 12, 2010. Retrieved May 28, 2011.
  5. ^ a b http://officialguide.lsac.org/Release/SchoolsABAData/SchoolPage/SchoolPage_PDFs/ABA_LawSchoolData/ABA2926.pdf
  6. ^ "Penn Law – Class Statistics". Law.upenn.edu. Retrieved May 28, 2011.
  7. ^ "Penn Law – 2009 Student Satisfaction Survey". Law.upenn.edu. Retrieved May 28, 2011.
  8. ^ "Penn Law – Diversity". Law.upenn.edu. Retrieved May 28, 2011.
  9. ^ "Penn Law – Cross-Disciplinary or Interdisciplinary Education". Law.upenn.edu. Retrieved May 28, 2011.
  10. ^ a b "History of Penn Law". Law.upenn.edu. Retrieved May 28, 2011.
  11. ^ http://grad-schools.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/best-graduate-schools/top-law-schools/university-of-pennsylvania-03140
  12. ^ Margaret Center Klingelsmith, "History of the Department of Law of the University of Pennsylvania," The Proceedings at the Dediction of the New Building of the Department of Law, February 21st and 22nd, 1900, 16-18 (George Erasmus Nitzsche, comp. 1901).
  13. ^ "Penn Law – Certificates of Study". Law.upenn.edu. Retrieved May 28, 2011.
  14. ^ Corporate Practice Commentator's "Top 10" Corporate & Securities Articles for 2010, available at http://www.professorbainbridge.com/professorbainbridgecom/2011/05/corporate-practice-commentators-top-10-corporate-securities-articles-for-2010.html
  15. ^ "List of Student Activities". Law.upenn.edu. Retrieved May 28, 2011.
  16. ^ http://www.pennumbra.com
  17. ^ http://www.pennjcl.com
  18. ^ "Law Journals: Submissions and Ranking". Lawlib.wlu.edu. Retrieved May 28, 2011.
  19. ^ "The Journal of International Law". Pennjil.com. Retrieved May 28, 2011.
  20. ^ "The University of Pennsylvania Journal of Business Law". Law.upenn.edu. November 12, 2010. Retrieved May 28, 2011.
  21. ^ "The Journal of Law and Social Change". Law.upenn.edu. Retrieved May 28, 2011.
  22. ^ "East Asia Law Review – Journal of Law and Practice in East Asian Nations Including China, Japan, Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Macau, Tibet". Pennealr.com. Retrieved May 28, 2011.

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