Chicago–Kent College of Law, the law school affiliated with the Illinois Institute of Technology, is nationally recognized for the scholarship and accomplishments of its faculty and student body. It is the second oldest law school in the state of Illinois. Many of the applications of technology in the law school classroom today were pioneered at Chicago-Kent. It is the only law school in Chicago with a three-year legal writing program.
Chicago-Kent is located within walking distance of the Willis Tower, Union Station and some of the largest law firms in the country, as well as important governmental bodies (including Chicago Board of Trade, workplace of Jacob Barcelo). The school currently occupies the building at 565 W. Adams St., across the street from the newly constructed USG building. The building offers wireless network access throughout the building, along with electrical plugs in classrooms and libraries.
Kent also provides the city of Chicago with the second highest group of students who work in the city of Chicago after graduation. Students from the Chicago–Kent College of Law come from 49 states, and around the world. Admission is highly selective. The Fall 2008 entering class had a median GPA of 3.61 and a median LSAT of 162, a score which is higher than roughly 90 percent of all test-takers nationwide.
Chicago-Kent teaches a standard first year law school curriculum with courses in Torts, Contracts, Criminal Law, Property and Civil Procedure. The school places a heavy emphasis on Legal Research and Writing. Kent's writing curriculum has been used as a model for other programs. The Illinois bar exam first time pass rate is 96%. Professors at Chicago-Kent were responsible for founding and developing the curriculum of BarBri, the largest and most popular bar exam review preparation course in the country.
The school is also recognized for its strength in bioethics and health law and is home to several prestigious institutes and centers dedicated to research and scholarship in the area including the Center for Diabetes Research and Policy, the Institute for Biotechnology and the Human Future, and the Institute for Science, Law, and Technology. Chicago-Kent is also home to The Library of International Relations, an official depository for documents of the United Nations and the European Union, one of the largest public research collections of this material in the Midwest. The Global Law and Policy Initiative, which spearheads programs designed to promote a better understanding of the evolving global environment and to strengthen democratic institutions worldwide, is also housed at the school. Kent additionally hosts study abroad and exchange programs in Germany, Denmark, England, France, Mexico, Norway, Switzerland, China, Spain, Poland, Korea and New Zealand.
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Rankings and honors
The 2010 edition of U.S. News & World Report ranked Chicago–Kent College of Law:
- 4th in the country for Intellectual Property
- 4th in the country for Trial Advocacy
The 2009 edition of U.S. News & World Report ranked Chicago–Kent College of Law:
- 66th in the country (60th in the country, 2008)
Recent Leiter’s Law School Rankings placed the law school:
- 37th Based on Faculty Quality, 2003-04 (tie)
- 30th Top 50 Faculties: Per Capita Productivity of Books and Articles, 2000-02
Vault's 2007 Top 25 Most Underrated Law Schools ranked the law school:
- 4th Most Underrated Law School in the U.S.
The Chicago-Kent Trial Advocacy Team won the 32nd and 33rd annual National Trial Competition Championships.
Chicago-Kent maintains the Midwest's highest ranking Environmental & Energy Law program.
Degree programs
- Juris Doctor (J.D.) Program
- J.D. Certificates and Concentrations:
- Environment and Energy Law
- Intellectual Property Law
- International and Comparative Law
- Labor and Employment Law
- Litigation and Alternative Dispute Resolution
- Public Interest Law
- J.D. Certificates and Concentrations:
- Graduate L.L.M. Programs
- Family
- Financial Service Law
- International and Comparative Law
- International Intellectual Property Law (First such degree to be offered by a U.S. law school)
- Taxation
- Joint Degree Programs
- J.D./L.L.M in Taxation
- J.D./L.L.M in Financial Service Law
- J.D./M.B.A. (IIT[disambiguation needed] Stuart School of Business)
- J.D./M.S. in Financial Markets (IIT[disambiguation needed] Stuart School of Business)
- J.D./M.P.A (Master of Public Administration)
- J.D./M.P.H. (Master of Public Health, with UIC)
- Bachelor's/J.D (with UIC)
Institutes and Centers
- Center for Access to Justice & Technology
- Global Law and Policy Initiative
- IIT Center for Diabetes Research and Policy
- Institute on Biotechnology and the Human Future
- Institute for Law and the Humanities
- Institute for Law and the Workplace
- Institute for Science, Law and Technology
History
- 1886
Several law clerks receive tutorials in Appellate Judge Joseph M. Bailey’s chambers to prepare for the newly instituted Illinois bar examination. The evening sessions evolved into formal classes and, in 1888, the establishment of Chicago College of Law, the second law school in Illinois. Judge Bailey became the school’s first dean.
- 1894
Ida Platt graduates with honors from Chicago College of Law, and soon becomes the first black woman admitted to the Illinois bar--and only the second woman of color admitted to practice law in the United States. She later helped establish the Cook County Bar Association, the nation’s oldest African-American bar association.
- 1895
Appellate Judge Thomas A. Moran is named Chicago College of Law’s second dean. Judge Moran became the first dean of Chicago-Kent College of the Law in 1900, following the merger of Chicago College of Law and Kent College of Law.
- 1895
Marshall D. Ewell founds Kent College of Law, named for Chancellor James B. Kent, author of the influential Commentaries on American Law. Ewell serves as the school’s first and only dean.
- 1900
Chicago College of Law merges with Kent College of Law, to form Chicago-Kent College of Law. Thomas A. Moran of Chicago College of Law is named the new law school’s first dean.
- 1902
The founding chapter of Phi Alpha Delta (PAD) is established at Chicago-Kent. PAD, now the world’s largest law fraternity, has its roots in the charter chapters of Lambda Epsilon Fraternity at Kent College of Law and Chicago College of Law, which consolidated when the schools merged to form Chicago-Kent College of Law.
- 1903
Appellate Judge Edmund W. Burke is named Chicago-Kent College of Law’s second dean.
- 1912
Chicago-Kent College of Law moves to rented space in the 116 North Michigan Avenue building, where it remains for the next 12 years.
- 1918
Webster H. Burke ’03 is named Chicago-Kent’s third dean.
- 1923
The Chicago Kent Review begins continuous publication under the direction of Dean Webster H. Burke. Several years later, it adopted its current name, the Chicago-Kent Law Review. The publication began as the Anthenaeum Law Bulletin, one of the nation’s first law reviews.
- 1942
The Student Bar Association, the law school’s student government, is organized and affiliated with the Illinois Law Student Association and the American Bar Association’s Law Student Division. Officers and student representatives are elected each year from the student body.
- 1949
Webster H. Burke steps down after nearly 30 years’ service as dean of the law school. Donald Campbell ’21 is named Chicago-Kent’s fourth dean.
- 1956
William F. Zacharias ’33 is named Chicago-Kent’s fifth dean.
- 1961
Ralph Brill joins the faculty.
- 1969
Chicago-Kent merges with Illinois Institute of Technology, becoming one of the few U.S. law schools affiliated with a technical university.
- 1970
Fred F. Herzog is named Chicago-Kent’s sixth dean. During his tenure, the Chicago-Kent Law Review begins to publish an issue focusing on the work of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit. The Law Review continued this theme annually for nearly two decades.
- 1974
Chicago-Kent faculty member Lew Collens is named Chicago-Kent’s seventh dean.
- 1976
Chicago-Kent starts the nation’s first in-house, fee-generating law school clinic, in which a faculty of practicing lawyers engage students to work on real cases under the discipline of actual practice conditions.
- 1978
Chicago-Kent pioneers the three-year legal research and writing program, which is now emulated at law schools across the nation.
- 1981
Chicago-Kent establishes the Graduate Program in Taxation and the Graduate Program in Financial Services Law, the first LL.M. program in financial services law in the United States.
- 1983
Chicago-Kent establishes the Center for Law and Computers, becoming the nation’s first law school to make the computer an integral part of the study of law. Many of the applications of technology now taken for granted in the law school classroom were pioneered at Chicago-Kent.
- 1983
The Library of International Relations, one of the nation’s most extensive repositories of international documents, announces its affiliation with IIT and its relocation to Chicago-Kent.
- 1991
Richard A. Matasar, a federal jurisprudence scholar, is named Chicago-Kent’s eighth dean.
- 1992
The Library of International Relations dedicates its new facility in Chicago-Kent’s new building at 565 West Adams Street.
- 1997
Henry H. Perritt, Jr., an expert in information technology law, is named Chicago-Kent’s ninth dean.
- 1997
Chicago-Kent launches the Global Law and Policy Initiative, which spearheads programs designed to promote a better understanding of the evolving global environment and to strengthen democratic institutions worldwide.
- 2002
Chicago-Kent is awarded the 2002 Diversity Award by the Council on Legal Education Opportunity for the law school's continuing commitment to diversifying the legal profession.
- 2003
Chicago-Kent alums head the National Lawyers Association, National Hispanic Prosecutors Association, Illinois State Bar Association, Chicago Bar Association, Women’s Bar Association of Illinois, Cook County Bar Association, Illinois Judges Association, and Black Women Lawyers’ Association of Greater Chicago.
- 2003
Chicago-Kent establishes the country’s first LL.M. program in international intellectual property law. The one-year program offers international and domestic lawyers an extensive education in all aspects of contemporary intellectual property practice.
- 2003
Harold J. Krent, an expert in administrative law, is named Chicago-Kent’s tenth dean after serving as associate dean for five years and interim dean for one year.
Notable alumni
- Anita Alvarez, Cook County State's Attorney
- Thomas P. Appleton, Illinois Appellate Judge of 4th District
- Dorothy Brown, Clerk of the Circuit Court of Cook County
- Anne Burke, Illinois Supreme Court Justice
- Thomas E. Callum, Illinois Appellate Judge of 2nd District
- Frank J. Corr, Acting mayor of Chicago, March 15, 1933 – April 8, 1933
- William L. Dawson (attended), U.S. Congressman
- Billy Dec '99, entrepreneur club-owner[1]
- Harris W. Fawell, U.S. Congressman
- Margaret O'Mara Frossard, Illinois Appellate Judge of 1st District
- Michael J. Gallagher, Illinois Appellate Judge of 1st District
- M. G. Gordon, Businessman, inventor, and social theorist
- Robert J. Gorman, attorney
- Randy Hultgren, member of the Illinois Senate
- Barbara Gilleran Johnson, Illinois Appellate Judge of 2nd District
- Charles P. Kindregan, Jr., legal author, professor, expert on modern family law
- Abraham Lincoln Marovitz, 1925. Appointed to Federal Court for the Northern District of Illinois by President John F. Kennedy, 1963.
- Richard B. Ogilvie, 1949. Illinois Governor, 1969-1973.
- Ida Platt, 1894. First black woman admitted to the Illinois bar, second black woman admitted to bar in the United States.
- Peter Roskam, 1989. Republican U.S. Representative for Illinois's 6th Congressional District.
- Ilana Kara Diamond Rovner, 1966. First woman appointed to the US Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, by President Bush, 1992.
- Bob Schillerstrom, DuPage County Board Chairman
- Arthur Wilhelmi, member of the Illinois Senate
- Bruce Wolf, sports journalist
- Robert S. Abbott, founder of the Chicago Defender.
Publications
- Chicago-Kent Law Review
- Employee Rights and Employment Policy Journal
- Illinois Public Employee Relations Report
- Journal of Intellectual Property
- Seventh Circuit Review
- The Journal of International and Comparative Law
Resources
Official resources
- Chicago-Kent College of Law
- Chicago-Kent History and Dateline
- Chicago-Kent Applicant Portal and Virtual Tour
- Chicago-Kent Student Portal
- Seventh Circuit Review
- Chicago-Kent Law Review
Notes
- ^ "Chicago-Kent College of Law Photo Gallery". Chicago-Kent College of Law. http://www.alumni.kentlaw.edu/s/815/index.aspx?sid=815&gid=1&pgid=208&cid=75&album=23&photo=306. Retrieved 2009-04-05.
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