Faulkner Law is launching a brand new Executive JD Schedule beginning in August 2020. Designed for working professionals, an Executive JD Schedule is perfect for those who cannot take three years off from work or family obligations to attend law school full time.
Faulkner Law Interim Dean Charles Campbell sat down to answer a few questions about the law school’s new Executive JD Schedule.
What is an Executive JD Schedule?
The Executive JD Schedule offers the same JD degree, with the same degree requirements, as our traditional JD program, but offers classes on a schedule tailored to fit the needs of working professionals and others who cannot attend law school full time. Rather than taking full loads of courses on campus during the workweek for three years, students on the Executive JD Schedule will take reduced loads of courses on weekends and online for four years.
What type of material is taught in an Executive JD Schedule?
The material taught in the Executive JD Schedule will be the same material taught in our traditional, full-time JD schedule. Both schedules will require 90 credit hours for graduation. The required courses will be the same. The other graduation requirements will be the same. The Executive JD Schedule offers the same JD degree, just on a different schedule utilizing innovative educational technology.
Is the Executive JD Schedule an online course or traditional?
Both (and neither). Students on the Executive JD Schedule can take up to 30 credit hours online, and can attend traditional on-campus classes as their personal schedules permit.Most courses will be offered in a blended online and on-campus format, combining the best of online and traditional learning.
Up to a third of the instruction in blended courses will occur online and asynchronously (meaning students can attend when best fits their personal weekly schedule). The remaining instruction in blended courses will occur on campus on nine weekends (Friday night and Saturday) during the semester.
How is our schedule unique from other similar programs?
The traditional part-time, evening JD program requires law students to be on campus for classes multiple evenings each week. This effectively limits attendance in such a program to students living in the same metropolitan area as the law school. Utilizing online and blended learning to reduce the amount of time spent on campus and scheduling on-campus classes on the weekends make our Executive JD Schedule a much more flexible and appealing option for more students in more places.
Our Executive JD Schedule is also more attractive than the totally online JD programs offered by a few institutions. Totally online programs are not approved by the American Bar Association (ABA), so graduates of those programs may not be able to sit for the bar examination in many states. Faulkner University’s Jones School of Law is fully approved by the ABA, and our graduates have the academic credentials to sit for the bar examination in any state.
What type of careers can students pursue with a JD degree earned on the Executive JD Schedule?
Because the Executive JD Schedule features the same JD degree as our full-time schedule, all of the same career opportunities will be available to graduates. Private practice, government service, nonprofit, and corporate in-house counsel careers will all be options. Of course, many students will find a JD degree helpful in their current careers, whether or not they intend to become a practicing attorney.
Why did Faulkner Law decide to offer this schedule?
From 1928 to 2000, Jones School of Law was a part-time, evening program. Many of our alumni from those years tell us that Jones was the only school that made studying law possible for them, because they had to keep working full-time while they went to school. So, part of our mission has always been to make legal education accessible to more people, especially working people. The advent of online and blended education now makes it possible for Jones to make legal education possible for many more students throughout Alabama and surrounding states.
How can someone take advantage of this new schedule?
We are accepting applications now for the Executive JD Schedule. Classes will begin in August 2020. The first steps in applying to law school are to register with the Law School Admission Council (LSAC) and to take the Law School Admission Test (LSAT), which is offered several times a year. You can visit our website or call (334) 386-7910 for details on applying.