Юридическое образование в США: история и современность.

Legal education in the United States generally refers to a graduate degree, the completion of which makes a graduate eligible to sit for an examination for a license to practice as a Lawyer. Around 60 percent of those who complete a law degree typically practice law, with the remainder primarily working in business (especially finance, insurance, real estate, and consulting) or government or policy roles, where their degrees also confer advantages. (Other types of legal education, such as that of paralegals, of Limited Practice Officers (in Washington), and of the citizenry in general, and of the education of lawyers after admission to the bar (continuing legal education) are not covered in this article.)

The foundations of the first universities in Europe were the glossators of the 11th century, which were schools of law. The first European university, that of Bologna, was founded as a school of law by four famous legal scholars in the 12th century who were students of the glossator school in that city. The first academic title of doctor applied to scholars of law. The University of Bologna served as the model for other law schools of the medieval age. Although it was common for students of law to visit and study at schools in other countries, such was not the case with England because of the English rejection of Roman Law. Although Oxford did teach canonical law, its importance was always superior to civil law in that institution. The original method of education at the Inns of Court was a mix of moot court like practice and lecture, and observation of court proceedings. The training of solicitors by apprenticeship was formally established by an act of parliament in 1729. The apprenticeship programs often employed the trainee with menial tasks, and while they were well trained in the day to day operations of a law office, they were generally unprepared practitioners or legal reasoners. The first university law programs in the United States, such as that of the University of Maryland established in 1812, included much theoretical and philosophical study, including works such as the Bible, Cicero, Seneca, Aristotle, Adam Smith, Montesquieu and Grotius. In the words of Dorsey Ellis, "Langdell viewed law as a science and the law library as the laboratory, with the cases providing the basis for learning those 'principles or doctrines' of which 'law, considered as a science, consists.'" Nonetheless, into the year 1900 most states did not require a university education (although an apprenticeship was often required) and most practitioners had not attended any law school or college. which has become an essential part of legal education in the U. S. and in the J. D. program of study.

Legal education is typically received through a law school program. The professional degree granted by U. S. law schools is the Juris Doctor (J. D.). Prospective lawyers who have been awarded the J. D. (or other appropriate credential), must fulfill additional, state specific requirements in order to gain admission to the bar in the United States. The Juris Doctor (J. D.), like the Doctor of Medicine (M. D.), is a professional doctorate. The American Bar Association issued a Council Statement that the JD is equivalent to the PhD for educational employment purposes. The Doctor of Juridical Science (S. J. D.) ("Scientiae Juridicae Doctor" in Latin), and Doctor of Comparative Law (D. C. L.), are research and academic based doctorate level degrees. In the U. S., the Legum Doctor is only awarded as an honorary degree. As of July 2012, Yale Law School offers a Ph. D. in Law designed for students who have already earned a J. D. and who wish to pursue extended legal scholarship. Academic degrees for non lawyers are available at the baccalaureate and master's level. A common baccalaureate level degree is a Bachelor of Science in Legal Studies (B. S.). Academic master's degrees in legal studies are available, such as the Master of Studies (M. S.), and the Master of Professional Studies (M. P. S.). Foreign lawyers seeking to practice in the U. S., who do not have a Juris Doctor (J. D.), often seek to obtain a Juris Master (J. M.), Master of Laws (LL. M.), Master of Comparative Law (M. C. L.), or a Master of Jurisprudence (M. J. ).

Please see Admission to the bar in the United States. Depending upon their state, attorneys must also satisfy Continuing Legal Education (CLE) credit requirements.

American law firms are often very credential oriented. Apart from the minimum requirements of a J. D. and admission to the state bar, there are certain credentials recognized within the profession to distinguish lawyers from one another; those credentials are almost always mentioned in lawyer profiles and biographies, which are used to communicate to both fellow attorneys and prospective clients. Chief among them are such honors as being a member of their law school's law review, moot court, or mock trial programs. Judicial clerkships after graduation or law clerk positions at prestigious law firms while in school are also distinguishing marks. This credential based system is sown in law school, where high grades are frequently rewarded with law review membership and much sought after summer clerkships (called "summer associateships" in some areas) with large private law firms. These programs are designed to give a firm's summer associates an idea of what the everyday practice of law is like at that particular firm by allowing them to work with the firm's partners and associates on real projects involving real clients. In larger cities, such as New York or Chicago, summer associates at large firms can make as much as $3,000 per week. Competition to receive a summer offer from a firm is intense, and credentials (a student's GPA and class rank, law review or moot court membership, publications, etc.) play a decisive role in determining who is selected. Most offers are received after a three step interview process. First, during the early fall of their 2L (second year), students at each law school first submit their resumes to a central paper file or online database (such as CRIS or LexisNexis Martindale Hubbell), from which interviewers selected candidates they wish to interview, based almost entirely on their 1L GPA and class rank. Second, selected students are notified, usually via email, and then schedule a screening interview, either at the law school or at a local hotel; this interview is usually conducted by one or more attorneys from that firm and is part of most schools' On Campus Interview ("OCI") program, in which firms send recruiters to schools across the country. Finally, students selected from the screening interviews are invited for a final "callback" interview, commonly held at the firm's offices. If the selected student attends school in a place far from the city in which the firm is located, it is not unusual for the firm to fly the student in and pay for accommodations while they are in town. After the callback, a selected candidate will receive a phone call (usually within 48 hours) informing them that they have been extended an offer. After the summer, early into their 3L (third) years, the vast majority of summer associates receive formal offers to join the firm after graduating school and sitting for the bar exam.

U. S. News & World Report publishes the most well known annual ranking of American programs, where Yale Law School has held the #1 spot every year since the inception of the ranking reports. A number of alternative rankings exist, such as the Leiter Reports Law School Rankings. These rankings divide law schools into "tiers" based on the overall quality of each program. A number of factors and statistics are compiled to produce these rankings each year, including academic reputation, the quality of the faculty (usually measured by the quality of its publications), the quality of the student body (usually measured by average Law School Admission Test, or LSAT, score and undergraduate grade point average), the number of volumes in the library, the earnings potential of graduates, bar passage rates, and job placement rates. Most of these measurements are acquired by voluntary self reporting from each law program; others are compiled through a formal process of polling judges, legal professionals, recent graduates, law professors, and school administrators. The issuance of press releases that dismiss the rankings has become a yearly ritual for many law programs, but all but a handful cooperate in gathering and reporting statistics to the various ranking publications.

There are approximately 200 ABA approved law schools in the United States. There is no universally accepted ranking system, but many have attempted to divide law schools into "tiers" consisting of quartiles (50 law schools each) or perhaps eighths (25 law schools each), or have separated out the top 10 or top 20 law schools by U. S. News rank or median LSAT score. After the JD, a large study of law graduates who passed the bar examination (but were not necessarily practicing law), found that graduates of the top 10 law schools by median LSAT score of incoming classes typically earned incomes exceeding $170,000 within 12 years after graduation. Graduates of the next 10 law schools earned around $158,000, and graduates of schools ranked 21 50 typically earned more than $130,000. Another peer reviewed study found that Law graduates at the 75th percentile of earnings ability typically earned around $80,000 more every year than they would have earned with only a bachelor's degree. Based on anecdotal evidence, some have claimed that high level of stress, a "culture of hours" and ethical issues common in the legal profession lead to a lower level of job satisfaction relative to many other careers. See, for example, "Money and Ethics: The Young Lawyer's Conundrum", by Patrick J. Schiltz, January 2000 Washington State Bar News