Western State College of Law

History

Western State College of Law was founded in 1966 in Orange County, California. In 1987, the school applied for accreditation with the American Bar Association (ABA). Although the school was unsuccessful in this attempt, it was at the time accredited by the Western Association of Schools and Colleges and by the California State Committee of Bar Examiners (CBE).

By 1990, Western State had expanded to three campuses in California including locations in Fullerton, Irvine and San Diego. At that time, the school was the largest law school in California. In 1995, Western State again began pursuing accreditation with the ABA for all three of its campuses. In the latter half of the 1990s, the school underwent several changes as part of the accreditation process. In 1995, the school's San Diego campus became the independently owned Thomas Jefferson School of Law and the following year, the school closed its Irvine location and consolidated students to its Fullerton campus. In 1998, the school received provisional accreditation from the ABA

In 2000, the college's owners sold Western State to Argosy Education Group, which owned the school for a year before it was purchased by Education Management Corporation. Western State was granted full accreditation with the ABA in 2005, and became the third for-profit law school to receive ABA approval. The same year, the school sold its property to California State University, Fullerton for roughly $18 million. In January 2016, the campus moved to Irvine, California.

In October 2017, it was announced that the college of law was sold, along with the rest of Argosy University, to the Dream Center Foundation, a subsidiary of the Dream Center, a nonprofit Pentecostal network of community centers. The transaction was funded in part by the Najafi Companies, a private equity firm. In 2019, a federal court approved Westcliff University's plan to purchase the school and revert it to for-profit status. The ABA allowed continued accreditation under the ownership of Westcliff University in December 2019.

Academics

Admissions

For the class entering in 2023, the school accepted 45.1% of applicants, with 33.1% of those accepted enrolling. The average enrollee had a 152 LSAT score and 3.16 undergraduate GPA.

Programs

Western State offers both full-time and part-time programs. The school offers two areas of focus through their Business Law Center and their Criminal Law Practice Center, which are aimed at preparing graduates for a career in business or criminal law through additional training, internships and networking with lawyers. The law school also offers certificates in Immigration Law, Family Law, and Real Estate.

, the school had 213 full-time students, 77 part-time students, and 19 full-time and 34 part-time members of the faculty.

Bar passage

The pass rate for Western State alumni taking the California bar exam for the first time in July 2023 was 60%, the lowest of 18 California ABA law schools. The Ultimate Bar Pass Rate, which the ABA defines as the pass rate for graduates who sat for a bar exam within two years of graduating, was 77% for the Class of 2020. Western State Bar Passage Data

Rankings

U.S. News & World Report ranks the school in the last group of 180–196 out of 196 schools, the bottom 8% at most. In 2020, among all law schools, Western State had the third-highest Diversity Index, as reported by U.S. News & World Report. In addition, in 2020, it received an A+ for Diversity in National Jurist's Best Law Schools.

Costs

The total cost of attendance (indicating the cost of tuition, fees, and living expenses) at the Western State College of Law for the 2018–19 academic year was $63,692 for a student living at home and $77,126 for a full-time student that is self-supporting.

Post-graduation employment

According to Western State's ABA-required disclosures, 88.3% of the Class of 2022 obtained some form of employment ten months after graduation. 25 members, being 58% of the class, obtained JD-required employment, and 7 members, being 16% of the class, obtained JD-advantage employment. Excluding solo practitioners, 55.3% of the class obtained full-time, long-term, JD-required employment with most employed in law firms of 1–10 lawyers.

Notable alumni

• Anthony Adams, a former member of the California State Assembly
• Leslie Alexander (businessman), former owner of the Houston Rockets
• Vito Barbieri, an Idaho state representative
• Roger Benitez, a senior judge of the United States District Court for the Southern District of California
• Bob Chandler, a former American football player
• Mark Chasan, founder of eMusic
• John L. Dodd, lawyer and 116th President General of the Sons of the American Revolution
• Bonnie Dumanis, former district attorney for San Diego County
• Nguyen Cao Ky Duyen, a Vietnamese-American personality and co-host of Thuy Nga's Paris by Night shows
• Michael Dvorak, former Indiana state representative and former St. Joseph County, Indiana prosecutor
• Mike Garrett, a former American football player and former athletic director at the University of Southern California
• George Gascón, the district attorney for Los Angeles County and the former district attorney for San Francisco
• Duncan Hunter, a former member of the United States House of Representatives and 2008 Presidential candidate
• Ross Johnson (deceased), a former long-time California state legislator
• Mangala Moonesinghe (deceased), a former member of the Parliament of Sri Lanka and former ambassador
• Ruth Parasol, the founder of PartyGaming
• Dick Walsh (deceased), a former Major League Baseball executive
• George O. Wood (deceased), former general superintendent of Assemblies of God

References

References

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