New York University School of Law


The New York University School of Law is the law school of New York University. Established in 1835, it is the oldest law school in New York City. The school offers J.D., LL.M., and J.S.D. degrees in law, and is located in Greenwich Village in Lower Manhattan.
NYU Law is currently ranked the 4th best law school in the world by Shanghai's Academic Ranking of World Universities by subject Law. NYU Law is also consistently ranked in the top 10 by the QS World University Rankings. U.S. News & World Report currently ranks NYU Law 6th in the nation. It is ranked 1st in the country in both international law and tax law by U.S. News & World Report. NYU Law boasts the best overall faculty in the U.S. according to a recent study, with leading renowned experts in all fields of law.
NYU Law is well known for its orientation toward public interest law. Its Root-Tilden-Kern program is a public interest law fellowship. According to the school's ABA-required disclosures, NYU Law's bar passage rate was 97.5% in 2017. An analysis by Law.com in 2019 ranked NYU Law 6th for employment outcomes, with 89.74% of graduates obtaining employment within ten months.

History

The New York University School of Law was founded in 1835, making it the oldest law school in New York City. It is also the oldest surviving law school in New York State and one of the oldest in the United States. The only law school in the state to precede it was a small institution conducted by Peter van Schaack in Kinderhook, New York, from 1785 to his death in 1832. Founded just four years after the establishment of New York University, NYU Law is also the university's oldest professional school.
The school was founded by Benjamin Franklin Butler, the United States Attorney General, at the request of the Council of the New York University. Butler submitted to the chancellor of the university, James M. Mathews, a "Plan for the organization of a law faculty in the University of the City of New York," which defined a three-year course of study. This plan was formally accepted by the university council on June 2, 1835, marking the inception of the school of law. Instruction began, and Butler was elected the school's first principal professor in March 1838. The curriculum he instituted was the first in the country to teach law using the "course method," which came to be adopted as the standard for legal education in the United States.
NYU School of Law was one of the first law schools in the United States to admit women, beginning in 1890. The law school relocated to its present location of 40 Washington Square South in Greenwich Village in 1951, under the direction of its dean, Arthur T. Vanderbilt. That year, it also established the Root-Tilden-Kern Scholarship for public service.
The Metropolitan Law School was absorbed by NYU School of Law in 1895, and became its evening division. The law school began raising its standards for admission in the early 20th century. In 1924, it required that all students have had completed at least one year of undergraduate education or its equivalent. This was increased to two undergraduate years in 1926, in conformity with the American Bar Association's recommendation.

Academics

NYU Law publishes ten student-edited law journals. The journals appear below in the order of their founding:
The law school's Root-Tilden-Kern Scholarship Program is a full-tuition scholarship awarded each year to twenty students committed to public service.
NYU Law offers several fellowships to students admitted to the LLM Program. The Hauser Global Scholarship admits eight to ten top LLM students from all over the world. The scholarship includes full tuition waiver and reasonable accommodation costs. In addition, it offers the Hugo Grotius as well as Vanderbilt scholarships for International law studies and other branches of law respectively.
The school has a law and business program in which eight student-leaders in law and business are awarded fellowships in the Mitchell Jacobson Leadership Program. In addition, the NYU Center for Law, Economics and Organization administers the Lawrence Lederman Fellowship to facilitate the study of Law & Economics the program provides a $5,000 scholarship to selected students to work closely with NYU Law faculty and participate in a series of collaborative workshops designed to help students write a substantial research paper.
NYU Law also hosts the original chapter of the Unemployment Action Center.

LL.M. in Taxation Program

NYU Law School's Master of Laws programs in Taxation and in International Taxation have been consistently ranked #1 by the U.S. News & World Report magazine since they started ranking specialty law school programs in 1992. Joshua D. Blank is currently the faculty director of the program.
Tax LL.M. students are permitted to enroll in a general course of study or specialize in specific areas such as business taxation or estate planning. Many of the program's professors are practitioners in their respective fields.

Master of Science (M.S.) in Cybersecurity Risk & Strategy

The MS in Cybersecurity Risk and Strategy is a one-year program offered jointly by NYU School of Law and NYU Tandon School of Engineering. The program is intended for mid- to senior level professionals, and cohorts have historically been diverse, professionally and academically. Faculty directors include: Nasir Memon, Randy Milch, and Sam Rascoff. Other notable faculty include: Ed Amoroso, Judi Germano, Zach Goldman, Ira Rubinstein, Rob Silvers, and Chris Sprigman.

Partnerships

NYU has implemented a jointly granted NYU/Osgoode LLB/LLM program in which graduates are granted the LLB as well as an LLM from NYU in three and a half years instead of the normally required four. More recently, the NYU School of Law has entered into similar dual degree agreements with the National University of Singapore Faculty of Law and the University of Melbourne Law School.
Oxford University has a program of academic exchanges with New York University School of Law, mainly involving faculty members and research students working in areas of shared interest.
NYU Law offers a dual-degree program with Harvard's John F. Kennedy School of Government. Students may earn a JD/MPA or a JD/MPP.
NYU Law offers a dual-degree program with Princeton's Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs. Students may earn a JD/MPA.
There is also a limited amount of cross-registration permitted with Columbia Law School. Each year, a limited number of students are permitted to take classes at each other's schools. Columbia Law and NYU Law also play a basketball game every spring, the Deans' Cup, to raise money for their public interest and community service organizations.

Career planning

Graduates of the law school routinely obtain employment in elite public and private-sector positions.
According to New York University School of Law's 2013 ABA-required disclosures, 93.7% of the Class of 2013 obtained full-time, long-term, JD-required employment nine months after graduation.

Admissions

More than 7,000 applicants compete for 450 seats at the law school. The 2010 edition of University of Chicago Professor Brian Leiter's ranking of the top law schools by student quality placed NYU Law 4th out of the 144 accredited schools in the United States, just behind 3rd place Columbia Law School and ahead of the University of Chicago Law School in 5th place.
Admission to the New York University School of Law is highly competitive. The 25th and 75th LSAT percentiles for the 2018 entering class were 167 and 172, respectively, with a median of 170. The 25th and 75th undergraduate GPA percentiles were 3.6 and 3.9, respectively, with a median of 3.8.

Facilities

NYU Law School facilities at the school's Washington Square Campus include:

Vanderbilt Hall

The law school's main building, named after Arthur T. Vanderbilt, occupies the entire block between West Third and Washington Square South and between Macdougal and Sullivan Streets. Part of the first floor as well as the underground floors host the library, which it shares with Furman Hall. The first floor also holds the auditorium, student center, and main banquet hall. The second floor is mostly classrooms, while the third and fourth floors are mostly faculty and dean offices.

Furman Hall

Located on West 3rd Street between Sullivan and Thompson Streets, and on Sullivan and Thompson Streets between West 3rd and West 4th Streets, Furman Hall opened on January 22, 2004, and is named for alumnus and donor Jay Furman. It connects to Vanderbilt Hall through the law library, part of which is underneath Sullivan Street. The underground level also hosts the Lawyering faculty. Floors one-three have classrooms, lounges, and study space. The fourth floor hosts the career counseling program, and the fifth and sixth floors house the legal practice clinics. The highest floors, generally inaccessible to non-residents, are apartments for faculty and their families. The ninth floor is accessible to students and hosts the Lester Pollack Colloquium room.
The building's West 3rd Street facade incorporates the remaining part of the facade of a townhouse that Edgar Allan Poe lived in from 1844 to 1846, near the site where the house originally stood, the result of a settlement between NYU and preservationists who objected to the university's 2000 plan to tear down the building, which had already lost two stories from the time that Poe dwelled there.

Hayden Hall Residence

Located at 240 Mercer Street, on the southern side of West Third street, adjacent to Broadway, and a couple of blocks east of D'Agostino Hall, Wilf Hall, Furman Hall and Vanderbilt Hall, Hayden Hall houses approximately 500 Law students and faculty. The basement is home to "Mercer Pub" and several student run organizations. Hayden is available for summer housing for non-NYU Law students through its Summer Living in New York program.

D'Agostino Residence Hall

Located at the intersection of West Third Street and MacDougal Street in Greenwich Village, D'Agostino Residence Hall houses approximately 300 law students and faculty. It is across the street from the rear of the main law school building, Vanderbilt Hall, and less than 1 block from Wilf Hall and Furman Hall.
Elevators to the apartments are on the highest level, the Front Desk is on the street level, and The Commons is on the lower level. One floor beneath The Commons is the sub-basement, home to most of NYU's legal journals. The second floor, houses numerous administrative offices. Two large function rooms - Lipton Hall and the Faculty Club - are also located in the building.
The law building is named after Filomen D'Agostino, one of the first woman lawyers, who graduated in 1920. Later in life, Ms. D'Agostino donated $4 million to support residential scholarship and faculty research; the school responded by naming their new apartment building after her.
D'Agostino Hall is also available for summer housing for non-NYU Law students through its Summer Living in New York program.

22 Washington Square North

22 Washington Square North, located in a historic 1830s townhouse on the north side of Washington Square Park in "The Row", houses the Straus Institute for the Advanced Study of Law & Justice, the Jean Monnet Center for International and Regional Economic Law & Justice, and the Tikvah Center for Law & Jewish Civilization. This building was renovated in 2009 by Morris Adjmi Architects, has a green wall, and should meet silver LEED standards.

Wilf Hall

Wilf Hall, at 139 Macdougal Street, houses approximately a dozen of the schools centers, programs and institutes as well as the admissions offices. Per the NYU Law Magazine, it is a "campus destination for faculty, students, and research scholars from an array of disciplines to exchange ideas and, through their work, shape the public discourse around the leading social and political issues of the day."
Wilf Hall also contains the Provincetown Playhouse. The playhouse opened in the 1920s and premiered many Eugene O'Neil plays. The theatre is run by NYU's Steinhardt School of Education. The building was designed by Morris Adjmi Architects.

Centers and institutes

NYU Law is home to many centers and institutes, specializing in various areas of law.
According to New York University School of Law's official 2013 ABA-required disclosures, 93.7% of the Class of 2013 obtained full-time, long-term, JD-required employment nine months after graduation. NYU Law's Law School Transparency under-employment score is 3%, indicating the percentage of the Class of 2013 unemployed, pursuing an additional degree, or working in a non-professional, short-term, or part-time job nine months after graduation.
The law school was ranked # 6 of all law schools nationwide by the National Law Journal in terms of sending the highest percentage of 2015 graduates to the largest 100 law firms in the US.

Costs

The total cost of attendance at NYU Law for the 2014–2015 academic year is $83,722. The Law School Transparency estimated debt-financed cost of attendance for three years is $309,177.

Faculty

In 2012, NYU Law had the second highest number of faculty who are members of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences with 19 inductees, behind only Harvard.
Some of NYU's notable professors include:
Famous alumni include Governor and Democratic presidential candidate Samuel J. Tilden; former New York City mayors Fiorello La Guardia, Ed Koch and Rudy Giuliani; New York City Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly; the four founders of the prominent law firm Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz; Evan Chesler, the current Chairman at Cravath, Swaine & Moore; comedian Demetri Martin; Republic of China president Ma Ying-Jeou; former President of Panama Guillermo Endara; former Director of the FBI Louis Freeh; U.S. Senators Lamar Alexander, Rudy Boschwitz and Jacob Javits; suffragette and college founding president Jessica Garretson Finch; Centennial Professor of Law at Brooklyn Law School and first female Commissioner of the SEC Roberta Karmel, sportscaster Howard Cosell; former NFL Commissioner Paul Tagliabue; NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman; John F. Kennedy, Jr.; Special Inspector General of the Troubled Asset Relief Program Neil Barofsky; many U.S. Representatives, including Hakeem Jeffries, Mitchell Jenkins, Jefferson Monroe Levy and Isaac Siegel; former Chairman of Paramount Pictures Jonathan Dolgen; Hollywood and Broadway producer Marc E. Platt; Hollywood producer and former Chairman and CEO of Sony Pictures Entertainment Peter Guber; journalist Glenn Greenwald; civil rights leader Vanita Gupta; several corporate leaders including Interpublic Group of Companies Chairman and CEO Michael I. Roth; ConocoPhillips President and COO John Carrig; Robert Half International Chairman and CEO Harold Max Messner; and Southwest Airlines founder Herb Kelleher; Marvel Entertainment Vice President John Turitzin; as well as Nobel Peace Prize laureates Elihu Root and Mohamed ElBaradei; and Jared Kushner, the son-in-law of US President Donald Trump.
Among judges, Judith Kaye, former Chief Judge of the New York Court of Appeals, is an alumna; Dennis G. Jacobs, Chief Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit is an alumnus, as is Second Circuit Judge Raymond Lohier. Judge Pauline Newman of the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit also graduated from NYU Law. NYU Law alumni have served as judges of the International Court of Justice, which is popularly known as the World Court, and of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights.

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