New England School of Law

The Portia School of Law

The Portia School of Law started informally in 1908 when Arthur W. MacLean (1880-1943), a graduate of the Boston University School of Law and a professor at Suffolk University Law School, agreed to tutor two young women who were studying for the Massachusetts bar examination. At the time, few options were available to women seeking a legal education in New England. Soon afterwards, MacLean rented space at 88 Tremont Street, began admitting students, and took on a second faculty member, A. Chesley York. MacLean's wife, Bertha, named the school after the character Portia in Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice. In the play, Portia disguises herself as a male lawyer and eloquently pleads her client's case in the famous "quality of mercy" speech. The Portia School of Law was the only law school in the country exclusively for women.

The school was incorporated in 1918. By this time it had 91 students. The following year, the Massachusetts legislature granted the school the power to confer the degree of Bachelor of Laws (LL.B), and the school was reincorporated as the Portia Law School. In 1920 the school awarded its first LL.B degrees to 39 women. The school was one of the few that offered part-time enrollment, enabling working-class women to pursue their studies while supporting themselves.

In 1920, the school outgrew its space on Tremont Street and moved to a townhouse at 45 Mt. Vernon Street on Beacon Hill. The Portia Law School was granted the authority to confer the degree of Master of Laws (LL.M.) in 1926; five graduates were awarded the LL.M. the following year.

The Portia Law School was integrated from its earliest days. Blanche E. Braxton, who graduated in 1921, became the first African-American woman admitted to the Massachusetts bar in 1923. Another Portia graduate, Dorothy Crockett, became the first African-American woman admitted to the Rhode Island bar in 1932. The former site of the Portia Law School at 45 Mount Vernon Street is a stop on the Boston Women's Heritage Trail.

Admission of male students

The school began admitting male students out of financial necessity in the 1920s. In 1930, the school's first two male graduates received the LL.M. degree. From 1940 to 1950, the men's program was referred to as the Calvin Coolidge Law School.

As the school entered the 1950s it saw its student body shift from a student body that had a majority female population to a predominately male student body. 1963 saw Portia Law School begin the process of applying for American Bar Association accreditation, and some of the steps the school took included restructuring its board of governors and launching the school's first law review. In 1969, the school changed its name to New England School of Law to coincide with its accreditation granted by the ABA.

As New England Law neared its 75th anniversary, new programs were started, the first was the creation of Law Day in 1970 and then the opening of its clinical law services office in 1971. The clinical law services program is performed by the law students to those who did not have the economic means to seek paid legal assistance. In 1980, New England moved into its current location; which is located in the Boston Common neighborhood. To honor the 75th anniversary of New England Law the 41st President, George H. W. Bush, was the keynote speaker for the celebration.

In the 1980s, the school started a program that arranged for students to study abroad and work with former Soviet Bloc nations to develop their own legal systems. New England Law also became a co-founder of the Consortium for Innovative Legal Education; which allows students to study abroad at countries throughout the world and learn about foreign law and put their current education to work through externships. In 1996, New England Law students worked with Office of the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Tribunals by providing legal research and analysis for war crimes in Rwanda and the former nation of Yugoslavia. New England Law received membership from the Association of American Law Schools in 1998. In 2002, New England Law expanded its campus by buying adjacent buildings around the schools current location. Also, in 2008, New England School of Law began a new campaign to rebrand itself as "New England Law | Boston", with the purpose to put an emphasis on its location.

Campus

The law school's main campus consists of five buildings: The main academic building is a five-story building on Stuart Street in the Boston Theater District, which includes classrooms, faculty offices, and the schools library. Clinic, administrative, and law review offices are in a nearby building in the Bay Village on Church Street. Offices for the school's admissions office, administrative departments, clinical law office, and student publications are located in a two-story building two blocks from the main academic building. New England Law also shares its bookstore facilities with Tufts University. Students also have access to the Tufts University Medical Library located down the street.

Academics

New England School of law offers full-time and part-time enrollment with an application deadline of March 15. In 2015, the school accepted 80% of all applicants who applied to the school. Enrolled students from that entering class had Law School Admission Test (LSAT) scores in the range of 144 to 151 (25th–75th percentile). New England Law offers full-time and part-time (both day and evening) divisions and the student-to-faculty ratio is 23:1. It is currently a medium-sized law school with approximately 1,100 students, with a majority of its students in the full-time program.

New England Law has three specializations in environmental law, international law, and tax law and offers an LL.M. in advanced legal studies. New England Law also offers a program where a student may spend a period of time up to two academic semesters at a law school associated with the Consortium for Innovative Legal Education, Inc. (CILE). The schools taking part in the program include California Western School of Law, South Texas College of Law, and William Mitchell College of Law.

Accreditation and rankings

New England Law is American Bar Association (ABA) accredited and is a member of the Association of American Law Schools. It is also a founding member of the Consortium for Innovative Legal Education. New England Law is ranked as the 45th best law school in the country for those who want to be public defenders. According to U.S. News and World Report, New England Law ranks in the "Fourth Tier" of law schools in the United States.

Cost and student debt

The total cost of attendance (indicating the cost of tuition, fees, and living expenses) at NESL for the 2014–2015 academic year is $66,058 for full-time students and $52,752 for evening and part-time students. The Law School Transparency estimated debt-financed cost of attendance for three years is $242,231.

The cost of the full-time program at NESL is $42,490. The cost of the part-time program is $31,868. These figures does not include other necessary living and educational expenses.

According to U.S. News & World Report, the average indebtedness of 2013 graduates who incurred law school debt was $132,246 (not including undergraduate debt), and 89% of 2013 graduates took on debt.

Employment outcomes

According to NESL's official 2013 ABA-required disclosures, 40.6% of the Class of 2013 obtained full-time, long-term, JD-required employment nine months after graduation. NESL's Law School Transparency under-employment score is 30.4%, 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.

Centers

The Center for Law and Social Responsibility, CLSR, works mostly pro bono and public service activities. It is run and supported by students, faculty and alumni. The CLSR serves as a socially responsible organization that works with numerous projects that are representative of its members, as well as issues that public service lawyers are currently working with. The CLSR also works to support classroom projects, scholarship, and other activities that convey current social problems.

The Center for International Law and Policy, CILP, is utilized by both students and faculty for research, analysis and produce resource material on numerous topics. Some of the topics include CIA renditions in Europe, intergovernmental peacekeeper accountability and hate speech. Students also have the chance to practice international law in overseas externships. Most students work assist in prosecutions related to war crimes, because of the schools relationships with international criminal courts and tribunals. CILP also hosts the annual international law conference, by creating more awareness in global legal work, for issues such as Chinese reunification and Taiwanese independence, competition laws, responses to rogue regimes, the Rwandan genocide, and the development of new countries out of the former Yugoslavia.

New England Law's Center for Business Law offers academic credit in conjunction with legal externship positions through one of the CBL's three institutes, which individually focus on corporate governance and ethics, intellectual property, and tax law. Typical placements include Liberty Mutual, RNK Telecommunication, Natural Microsystems, Inc., the Boston Stock Exchange, and the National Association of Securities Dealers.

Clinics

New England Law offers more than a dozen clinics each semester in a wide range of areas including public interest, tax law, administrative law, criminal law, family law, health law, immigration law, land use law, and mediation. Students are eligible to participate in clinics in the first semester of their second year of law school.

Notable alumni

New England Law has some notable alumni: including Brian Darling, Director of United States Senate relations for the Heritage Foundation, Mark John Richard Simpson, Director of the United States Secret Service, Joseph R. Driscoll, Norfolk representative to the Massachusetts House of Representatives, Martha Ware, Lori St John an activist against the death penalty, Leonard P. Zakim, religious and civil rights leader in Boston, Andrew Vachss children's lawyer and author of the Burke series of novels, Joseph Petty, mayor of Worcester, Massachusetts and Ronald Washburn, Legal Contributor for ESPN, NBC, and Fox, as well as a distinguished Professor of Legal Studies at Bryant University.

Faculty

The school has 44 full-time professors from various fields of law. Some previous faculty members have notable status, including Michael Scharf. In response to declining enrollment, the school announced in October 2013 that it would reduce its full-time faculty from 44 positions to 30. [2].

The current dean, John O'Brien, received media attention after a Boston Globe article in January 2013 reported that he receives an annual salary of $867,000, in addition to receiving "forgivable loans" from the school. Citing a need to cut costs, the law school announced later in 2013 that O'Brien's salary would be cut 25% the next year.