The University of Maryland Francis King Carey School of Law (formerly University of Maryland School of Law) is the
law school of the
University of Maryland, Baltimore
The University of Maryland, Baltimore (UMB) is a public university in Baltimore, Maryland. Founded in 1807, it comprises some of the oldest professional schools of dentistry, law, medicine, pharmacy, social work and nursing in the United States ...
and is located in
Baltimore City, Maryland, U.S. Its location places Maryland Law in the
Baltimore-Washington legal and business community. Founded in 1816, it is one of the oldest law schools in the United States.
Maryland Law was ranked 47th by the
U.S. News & World Report in its 2023 law school rankings.
The law school is fully accredited by the
American Bar Association
The American Bar Association (ABA) is a voluntary bar association of lawyers and law students, which is not specific to any jurisdiction in the United States. Founded in 1878, the ABA's most important stated activities are the setting of aca ...
(ABA). It is a member of the
Association of American Law Schools
The Association of American Law Schools (AALS), formed in 1900, is a non-profit organization of 176 law schools in the United States. An additional 19 schools pay a fee to receive services but are not members. AALS incorporated as a 501(c)(3) n ...
and has a chapter of the
Order of the Coif
The Order of the Coif is an honor society for United States law school graduates. The name is a reference to the ancient English order of advocates, the serjeants-at-law, whose courtroom attire included a coif—a white lawn or silk skullcap, whi ...
honor society.
History
Maryland Law was founded in 1816 as the Maryland Law Institute. David Hoffman is credited with founding the institute and in 1817 he published his legal course
Hoffman's Course of Legal Study. The school began regular instruction beginning in 1824, and it is the
second-oldest law school in the United States, behind only
William & Mary Law School
The William & Mary Law School, known historically as the Marshall-Wythe School of Law, is the professional graduate law school of the College of William & Mary.
Located in Williamsburg, Virginia, the school is the oldest extant law school in th ...
. After the law school denied admission to black applicant
Donald Gaines Murray
Donald Gaines Murray (May 24, 1914 – April 7, 1986 in Baltimore, Maryland) was an American attorney, the first African-American to enter the University of Maryland School of Law since 1890 as a result of winning the landmark civil rights case ' ...
on account of his race, in 1936 the
Maryland Court of Appeals ruled that the law school must admit him.
In 2002, the law school moved into a facility in downtown Baltimore near the
Inner Harbor
The Inner Harbor is a historic seaport, tourist attraction, and landmark of the city of Baltimore, Maryland. It was described by the Urban Land Institute in 2009 as "the model for post-industrial waterfront redevelopment around the world". Th ...
and
Oriole Park at Camden Yards
The Oriole Park at Camden Yards is a baseball stadium located in Baltimore, Maryland. It is the home field of Major League Baseball's Baltimore Orioles, and the first of the "retro" major league ballparks constructed during the 1990s and early ...
. In 2011, the law school received a donation from the W.P. Carey Foundation, the largest gift in the school's history. In response, the law school changed its name to the University of Maryland Francis King Carey School of Law.
Student body
![UniversityofMarylandLawSchool 08 11](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f9/UniversityofMarylandLawSchool_08_11.jpg)
Maryland Law has approximately 650 students enrolled in its
Juris Doctor (J.D.) program.
The racial makeup of students in the J.D. program is approximately , with about 30% identifying as a minority race (and the remainder are unknown or did not specify).
Around 72% of J.D. students are under 25 years old. There are more than 40 student organizations, four specialized legal centers,
and five
law journals
A law review or law journal is a scholarly journal or publication that focuses on legal issues. A law review is a type of legal periodical. Law reviews are a source of research, imbedded with analyzed and referenced legal topics; they also pr ...
.
In 2019, Maryland Law enrolled 205 students into its first-year J.D. class, including 179 full-time students and 26 part-time students. The median LSAT score was 160, and the median undergraduate GPA was 3.66. The law school accepted approximately 36% of its applicants.
Rankings
The law school was ranked 36th by the
U.S. News & World Report in 2008 and 50th of its law school rankings.
The 2022 edition also ranked Maryland Law 8th in part-time programs, 7th in health care law, 16th in environmental law, 15th in dispute resolution, and 9th in clinical training.
Bar passage and employment outcomes
According to Maryland Law's official data reported to the
American Bar Association
The American Bar Association (ABA) is a voluntary bar association of lawyers and law students, which is not specific to any jurisdiction in the United States. Founded in 1878, the ABA's most important stated activities are the setting of aca ...
, approximately 77% of Maryland Law graduates who took the bar exam for the first time in 2019 passed. In addition, 94% of 2019 J.D. graduates were employed in some capacity ten months after graduation.
These 2019 graduates became employed in a variety of contexts, including approximately 35% in judicial clerkships (4% federal clerkships and 31% state and local clerkships), 23% in government, 20% in private practice, 11% in business and industry, 5% in public interest, and 4% in education. For 2018 J.D. graduates who entered private practice within ten months of graduation, the median starting salary was $80,000.
Costs
During the 2019-2020 academic year, tuition and fees for full-time J.D. students were $32,808 for Maryland residents and $48,426 for out-of-state students. For part-time J.D. students, tuition and fees were $21,538 for Maryland residents and $31,704 for out-of-state students. The estimated total cost of attendance for J.D. students, which includes tuition and fees, living expenses, transportation expenses, book expenses, and health insurance, was $61,745 for full-time students who are Maryland residents, $79,277 for full-time out-of-state students, $45,123 for part-time students who are Maryland residents, and $56,972 for part-time out-of-state students. In addition, 77% of students received a scholarship or grant from Maryland Law, including 78% of full-time students and 74% of part-time students.
Academics
Curriculum
Core
The core curriculum at Maryland Law for J.D. students includes courses in civil procedure, constitutional law, torts, property, contracts, and criminal law, as well as a two-semester sequence of courses focusing on legal skills of analysis, research, writing, and oral argument. After completing these initial courses, students are required to complete additional coursework in constitutional law, ethics, and legal research, and satisfy experiential and writing requirements. This core curriculum forms the basis for more specialized study through more than 150 elective courses, seminars, independent studies, simulations, clinics, and externships.
The LL.M. degree program is designed for students who have earned a prior law degree, either a J.D. degree from a law school in the United States or a law degree from a school in another country. Students must complete coursework in a specialty field and may choose to write a thesis. LL.M. students who did not earn a prior law degree in an American law school must take a course on introductory American law, but otherwise, no specific courses are required for LL.M. students.
Specialty programs
Maryland Law is home to several specialty programs that enable students to explore areas of interest through experiential learning and a specialized curriculum. The main specialty areas include:
* Alternative Dispute Resolution
* Business Law
* Clinical Law
* Cybersecurity and Crisis Management
* Environmental Law
* Health Care Law
* Intellectual Property Law
* International and Comparative Law
* Public Health Law
* Women, Leadership, and Equality
Students can focus in other areas as well, such as criminal law, dispute resolution, family law/child advocacy, general practice, jurisprudence/legal history, labor/employment law, administrative law, property/real estate/decedent's estates law, public interest law/community development, and tax law.
Clinical law program
Through the Cardin Requirement, named after Maryland Law alumnus U.S. Senator
Benjamin Cardin
Benjamin Louis Cardin (born October 5, 1943) is an American lawyer and politician serving as the senior United States senator from Maryland, a seat he has held since 2007. A member of the Democratic Party, he previously was the U.S. representat ...
, each full-time day student in the J.D. program must gain hands-on legal experience by representing actual clients who would otherwise lack access to justice. Most students fulfill the Cardin Requirement through the Clinical Law Program,
which provides free legal services to Maryland's poorest citizens each year.
More than 25 clinics focus on a broad range of practice areas, including civil and criminal litigation, advice and counseling, and transactional work. Civil practice areas include environmental law, health, housing and community development, juvenile law and children, AIDS, and immigration. Criminal student attorneys often represent defendants in misdemeanor cases in Maryland's district courts, as well as work in the School of Law's community justice efforts. In addition to in-house clinical work, students may gain experience in public and private nonprofit externships in the Baltimore-Washington region.
Initiatives
In addition to formal specialty programs, the law school sponsors a variety of academic and public service initiatives. These initiatives enhance the educational and scholarly mission of the law school and also serve the community.
* Agriculture Law Education Initiative
* Chacón Center for Immigrant Justice
* Leadership, Ethics and Democracy (LEAD) Initiative: In spring 2008, the Fetzer Institute made a three-year $1.6 million funding commitment to the School of Law to help it respond to these challenges and create a Leadership, Ethics and Democracy program (LEAD).
* Legislation, politics, and public policy: The University of Maryland School of Law offers students an educational experience in the areas of legislation, public policy and public interest practice.
* Linking law and the arts: The University of Maryland School of Law, in conjunction with local arts organizations and as part of the "Linking Law and Arts" series, uses theater and art to help address complex legal, social, and public policy issues. As part of their commitment to blending law and the arts, students and professors at Maryland Law produced a short film in 2010 about the handling of war tribunals at Guantanamo Bay titled "The Response" starring
Aasif Mandvi
Aasif Hakim Mandviwala (born March 5, 1966), known professionally as Aasif Mandvi (, ), is a British-American actor, comedian and author. He was a correspondent on ''The Daily Show'' from 2006 to 2017. Mandvi's other television work includes the ...
. UMD Carey Law is also one of fewer than 10 law schools in the United States to offer a course in Visual Legal Advocacy, teaching students how to and encouraging them to incorporate cinema into their advocacy work.
*The Moser Ethics in Action Initiative The successor to the LEAD Initiative.
*Erin Levitas Initiative for Sexual Assault Prevention
Dual-degree programs
The law school offers several dual-degree options:
Business
Maryland Law has a combined J.D./ through:
[
* Robert H. Smith School of Business at the ]University of Maryland College Park
The University of Maryland, College Park (University of Maryland, UMD, or simply Maryland) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in College Park, Maryland. Founded in 1856, UMD is the Flagship un ...
* Merrick School of Business at the University of Baltimore
The University of Baltimore (UBalt, UB) is a public university in Baltimore, Maryland. It is part of the University System of Maryland. UBalt's schools and colleges provide education in business, law, public affairs, and the applied arts and sc ...
* Carey Business School
The Johns Hopkins Carey Business School (also Carey Business School or simply Carey) is the graduate business school of Johns Hopkins University, a private research university in Baltimore, Maryland. It was established in 2007 and offers full-t ...
at Johns Hopkins University
Johns Hopkins University (Johns Hopkins, Hopkins, or JHU) is a private research university in Baltimore, Maryland. Founded in 1876, Johns Hopkins is the oldest research university in the United States and in the western hemisphere. It consi ...
Public policy
There are several dual-degree options in the field of public policy
Public policy is an institutionalized proposal or a decided set of elements like laws, regulations, guidelines, and actions to solve or address relevant and real-world problems, guided by a conception and often implemented by programs. Public p ...
:[
* J.D./ from the ]University of Maryland School of Public Policy
The Maryland School of Public Policy is one of 14 schools at the University of Maryland, College Park. The school is located inside the Capital Beltway and ranks 16th nationally for schools of public policy according to '' U.S. News & World Repor ...
[
* J.D./ through the ]University of Maryland Baltimore County
The University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC) is a public research university in Baltimore County, Maryland. It has a fall 2022 enrollment of 13,991 students, 61 undergraduate majors, over 92 graduate programs (38 master, 25 doctoral, ...
School of Public Policy
* J.D./M.C.P. (Master of Community Planning) through the University of Maryland Urban Studies and Planning Program
Health
* J.D./Master of Public Health from the University of Maryland School of Medicine
The University of Maryland School of Medicine (abbreviated UMSOM), located in Baltimore City, Maryland, U.S., is the medical school of the University of Maryland, Baltimore and is affiliated with the University of Maryland Medical Center and Medi ...
* J.D./Master of Science in Toxicology Risk Assessment and Environmental Law from the University of Maryland School of Medicine
* J.D./Master of Science in Nursing from the University of Maryland School of Nursing
The University of Maryland, Baltimore (UMB) is a public university in Baltimore, Maryland. Founded in 1807, it comprises some of the oldest professional schools of dentistry, law, medicine, pharmacy, social work and nursing in the United States ...
(J.D./M.S.)
* JD/Doctor of Pharmacy from the University of Maryland School of Pharmacy
A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United States, th ...
Law and society
* J.D./Master of Arts in Criminal Justice through the University of Maryland College Park
The University of Maryland, College Park (University of Maryland, UMD, or simply Maryland) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in College Park, Maryland. Founded in 1856, UMD is the Flagship un ...
* J.D./Master of Arts in Liberal Arts through St. John's College, Annapolis
St. John's College is a private liberal arts college with dual campuses in Annapolis, Maryland, and Santa Fe, New Mexico. St. John's is one of the oldest institutions of higher learning in the United States as the successor institution of Kin ...
* J.D./Master of Social Work through the University of Maryland School of Social Work (J.D./M.S.W.)
Campus
Maryland Law, including the Thurgood Marshall Law Library, occupies a complex that supports the school's programs integrating classroom and experiential learning. The facility opened in 2002 and contains three courtrooms, including the Ceremonial Moot Courtroom, where state and federal trial and appellate courts regularly sit in session to hear cases.
The Thurgood Marshall Law Library houses a collection of more than 495,000 volumes and equivalents accessible through the online catalog. A staff of 23, including 11 librarians, provides customized reference and consulting services to faculty and students. In addition to LexisNexis, Westlaw and Bloomberg Law, the library offers a legal and non-legal Web-based electronic databases.
The library is named after Justice Thurgood Marshall
Thurgood Marshall (July 2, 1908 – January 24, 1993) was an American civil rights lawyer and jurist who served as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1967 until 1991. He was the Supreme Court's first African-A ...
. Despite growing up in Baltimore, he was unable to attend Maryland Law because, in the 1930s, the school denied all African Americans admission. Marshall attended Howard University School of Law.
Publications
* Maryland Law Review
* Journal of Health Care Law & Policy
* Journal of Business & Technology Law
* Journal of Race, Religion, Gender and Class
* Journal of International Law
Notable alumni
References
External links
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:University Of Maryland School Of Law
School of Law
A law school (also known as a law centre or college of law) is an institution specializing in legal education, usually involved as part of a process for becoming a lawyer within a given jurisdiction.
Law degrees Argentina
In Argentina, l ...
Law schools in Maryland
Downtown Baltimore
law
Law is a set of rules that are created and are enforceable by social or governmental institutions to regulate behavior,Robertson, ''Crimes against humanity'', 90. with its precise definition a matter of longstanding debate. It has been vario ...
Educational institutions established in 1816
1816 establishments in Maryland