Law School Facts

(Last updated Dec. 16, 2014)

For 150 years, the University of Michigan Law School has offered its students one of the world's finest legal educations in a setting of stunning physical beauty. Among Michigan Law's 21,800 alumni are leaders in law, business, and public service in countries across the globe.

So what explains the Michigan difference? While students certainly gain access to a collegial community of scholars who work at the top of their fields, they also come into contact with each other—a diverse body of talented students whose cooperative spirit helps bring out the best in faculty and students alike.

Browsing the rich variety of events and news offers a glimpse into a dynamic intellectual world.

• Mark D. West is the 17th and current dean of the Law School.



• The Law Quadrangle is the finest living/learning environment in the world of legal education.



• Michigan Law has 82 full-time faculty members: 55 tenured and tenure-track and 27 clinical and legal practice. It has 57 part-time faculty members.
  
  
• The Princeton Review consistently ranks Michigan Law in the top three for best career prospects.
  
  
• Michigan Law is an international center for interdisciplinary legal scholarship and teaching.



• For the graduating class of 2013, 91.4​ percent are employed or continuing their education.
  
  
• Michigan's Law Library has one of the world's most comprehensive collections of foreign, comparative, and international law materials.



• At Michigan, legal writing is taught by nine full-time legal practice professors, not adjuncts or students.
  
  
• Michigan Law Library's comprehensive collection and superb services support research on any topic in any jurisdiction.



• With 1,030,028 volumes, the Law Library has one of the world's premier collections and is staffed by experts in legal librarianship.
  
  
• Michigan offers 14 different dual-degree programs, or students can design their own.



• Michigan Law clinics provide criminal and civil litigation, appellate, transactional, and mediation opportunities in such areas as child welfare, entrepreneurial businesses, human trafficking, housing, domestic violence, international commerce, environmental protection, poverty law, tax law, and more.



• Michigan's Debt Management Program is one of the most progressive in the country.



• Michigan has externships in South Africa and Geneva, and with human rights organizations worldwide.



• One or two Michigan Law graduates clerk with the U.S. Supreme Court every year; 18 have done so in the last 15 years, for seven different justices.



• Michigan students come from more than 265 undergraduate institutions and nearly 80 percent are students from other states.



• As of fall 2013, there are 1,055 JD students enrolled at the Law School.
  
  
• The Law School wireless network allows students Internet connections within Hutchins Hall, Legal Research, the Law Library, the Law Quadrangle, South Hall, and beyond.
  
  
• Michigan has eight student-edited journals and more than 50 student organizations.



• Michigan Law has 21,800 graduates worldwide.
  
  
• Ann Arbor is considered among the best places in the United States to live, work, raise children, and acquire an education.



• Restaurants, clubs, coffee shops, bookstores, shopping, and athletic facilities are within a few blocks of the Law Quadrangle.



• The variety of workshops, symposia, and student activities reflects the Law School's strong institutional interest in global affairs.



• More than half of our students take advantage of one of Michigan Law's many established clinical offerings.
  

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Timeline

1859 Law School enrolled its first students.

1859 James Valentine Campbell, Thomas MacIntyre Cooley, and Charles Irish Walker appointed law professors.

1859 First law department lecture given to students.

1863 First law building completed.

1868 First African American student admitted. Gabriel Franklin Hargo became the first African-American student to graduate from the Law School in 1870.

1870 First female student admitted. Sarah Killgore graduated in 1871, the first woman with a law degree in the nation to be admitted to the bar.

1877 Clarence Darrow studied law.

1883 First full-time professor appointed.

1890 First LLM degrees granted, two to students from Japan.

1895 Course of law study extended to three years.

1896 First summer session held.

1902 First issue of Michigan Law Review published.

1910 Henry Moore Bates appointed dean, serving until 1939.

1915 Law Department changed to Law School by Regental action.

1922-33 Law Quadrangle constructed.

1939 Cases and Materials on the Law of Future Interest, Lewis M. Simes, published.

1942-46 Judge Advocate General's (JAG) School in operation.

1946 Cases on Remedies: II, Restitution at Law and in Equity, John P. Dawsom and Edgar N. Durfee, published.

1953 International Law: Cases and Materials, William W. Bishop Jr., published.

1954 International legal studies program expanded by Ford Foundation grant.

1959 Institute of Continuing Legal Education established.

1962 Committee of Visitors established.

1969 Basic Criminal Procedure: Cases, Comments and Questions, Yale Kamisar, Jerold H. Israel (and Wayne R. LaFave), published.

1971 Clinical law program established.

1981 Smith Library addition opened.

1996 Legal Practice Program opened.

1998 Center for International and Comparative Law established.

2001 Transnational Law added as graduation requirement.

2003 Law School won Grutter v. Bollinger Affirmative Action Admissions Lawsuit.

2009 Law School Sesquicentennial.

2011 Robert B. Aikens Commons and Kirkland & Ellis Café opened.

2012 South Hall academic building opened and was dedicated.

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