Talk:Juris Doctor

Unnecessary text in the "Academia" section.

The text is this:

"Although the American Bar Association has issued a Council Statement[127] advising that the J.D. be considered as being equivalent to the Ph.D. for employment and educational purposes,[128] the United States Department of Education, the National Science Foundation, and the European Research Council do not include the J.D. or other professional doctorates among the degrees that are equivalent to research doctorates,[129][130][131] and there has been some confusion regarding the differences between the J.D. as a professional doctorate and research doctorates such as the Ph.D., with some sources noting that they are not equivalent.[132][133][134][135]"

The "some sources noting that they are not equivalent" is logically unnecessary; it's a non-issue. From what I can tell, no source actually says that the J.D. and the PhD are equivalent. The only thing that comes close is the ABA saying that the JD should be considered the same as the PhD for hiring purposes. This is not the same as saying that the degrees are equivalent, and it's already been stated in that very same paragraph that the JD is not a research doctorate.

The text says "there has been some confusion" - has there really? What sources maintain that the JD is exactly like the PhD? The only thing that has been claimed is that the JD should be equivalent to the PhD for hiring purposes - none of the sources that follow actually address this.

Saying "Although" implies that the sources that come after it contradict the ABA; but they don't. The ABA saying that JDs should be hired alongside PhDs in a teaching context has nothing to do with whether the European Research Council will award a JD holder grant money. It just doesn't make sense, logically. These are two separate issues.

(Not to mention the general weirdness behind comparing the "American" Bar Association to the "European" Research Council.)
Deep Purple Dreams (talk) 22:02, 7 February 2011 (UTC)

ERC

Reference to the European Research Council not accepting JD's as research degrees is irrelevant. First, the cited website doesn't mention JDs at all, merely refers back to the NSF (essentially saying, "we do what they do.") Consequently, since the NSF is already mentioned, the ERC is redundant. Second, the ERC, like the NSF, as others have noted, is primarily a science research entity. It goes without saying that funding for someone with only a law degree would be a bit out of place. (I would be surprised if the NSF gave any research grants to anyone with only a PhD is art history, too.) Third, JDs aren't used in Continental Europe -- or, for all intents and purposes, in the EU at all -- making the ERC reference utterly irrelevant. (If anything, the constant desire to reinsert the ERC reference, despite several editors' removing it, seems to involve some strange hang-up by a particular editor. Is this all about JD law professors getting paid more than the average PhD?) Epstein's Mother (talk) 05:10, 29 May 2011 (UTC)

You're entirely correct. It's no surprise that a scientific research entity would not accept a law degree for scientific research purposes. It doesn't have any reflection on the JD degree itself, so it has no place in the article. That would be like loading up the Doctor of Engineering article and noting that the Doctor of Engineering degree can't be used for practicing medicine. Deep Purple Dreams (talk) 08:14, 4 June 2011 (UTC)

Comparison to Italy

All undergraduate degrees in Italy, no matter the subject, are awarded as "dottore" giving the right of the graduate to call themselves "Dottore" (Doctor). Therefore, if you do what would be considered a B.A. in the U.S. in Italy you are still awarded a dottore degree. The comparison here is spurious and gives a sense of inaccuracy as it suggests that somehow in Italy undergraduate law degrees are special degrees awarding the dottore title, while the reality is ALL undergraduate degrees award this title! The Italian undergraduate degree in law is equivalent of the LLB/JD. 86.163.24.60 (talk) 02:15, 24 March 2012 (UTC)

English LLB

"The approach of the English degree can be seen in the required curriculum, in which there is no study of civil procedure, and relatively few courses in advanced law such as business entities, bankruptcy, evidence, family law, etc." ... What??? This statement is clearly wrong and you can figure this out by quickly examining any LLB in England and its curriculum! Plus, you completely exclude the LPC in England which is a required element of the English legal education that is specifically designed to cover off practical elements of the education. Even so, LLBs in England do cover these topics, for example Oxford University (http://www.law.ox.ac.uk/themes/all_courses.php) or the University of London (http://www.londoninternational.ac.uk/prospective_students/undergraduate/panel/law/scheme_a.shtml). LLBs in Scotland have mandatory subjects (http://www.lawscot.org.uk/becomingasolicitor/students/studying-the-llb/professional-subjects) which are: public law and the legal system, conveyancing, Scots private law, evidence, Scots criminal law, taxation, European community law, Scots commercial law (that includes practical elements of bankruptcy and business entities specifically!!!). As a Scottish lawyer working in the UK, I find this article wholly an inaccurate reflection and demeaning of th UK's education system. 86.163.24.60 (talk) 02:55, 24 March 2012 (UTC)

The text is a restatement of the citation. Yes, advanced practical courses are offered at those universities, but they are electives and are not part of the required curriculum. Zoticogrillo (talk) 01:17, 26 May 2012 (UTC)