University of Alabama School of Law


The University of Alabama School of Law, located in Tuscaloosa, Alabama is the only public law school in the state. It is one of five law schools in the state, and one of three that are ABA accredited. According to Alabama's official 2023 ABA-required disclosures, 89.4% of the Class of 2023 obtained full-time, long-term, JD-required employment nine months after graduation. An additional 4.8% of the Class of 2023 obtained JD-advantage employment.
Approximately 428 JD students attended Alabama Law during school year 2022–2023. 51 undergraduate institutions, 23 states, and 3 countries are represented among the class of 2026, and the student-faculty ratio is 6.7 to 1.

Academics

Alabama Law offers the Juris Doctor degree, as well as an International LL.M., an LL.M. in Taxation, and an LL.M. in Business Transactions. In conjunction with the Culverhouse [College of Business and Manderson Graduate School of Business|Manderson Graduate School of Business], the law school also offers a four-year joint J.D./M.B.A. program. Students may also pursue a number of graduate degrees through established dual enrollment programs for M.A. or Ph.D. in Political Science, M.P.A., Ph.D. in Economics, or LL.M. in Taxation. Certificates in Public Interest Law, Governmental Affairs, and International and Comparative Law are also available.
Admissions have been increasingly selective. The class of 2026 has a median LSAT score of 167 and median undergraduate GPA of 3.95. The 75th and 25th percentile for these metrics are 168 and 4.00, and 159 and 3.63, respectively.

Law clinics

Alabama Law guarantees that every interested student has the opportunity to participate in at least one law clinic before graduating. It is one of the few law schools in the country to make this guarantee.
  • The Children's Rights Clinic works with the Alabama Disabilities Advocacy Program to assist youth with disabilities in the juvenile justice system.
  • The Civil Law Clinic is Alabama's oldest clinic and provides free legal advice and representation to University of Alabama students and community members in civil matters. Civil clinic students handle over 200 cases annually.
  • The Criminal Defense Clinic represents indigent defendants in misdemeanor and felony criminal matters for both bench and jury trials.
  • The Domestic Violence Clinic takes a holistic approach to assisting survivors of domestic abuse in Tuscaloosa County, Alabama. In addition to providing comprehensive legal services, clinic students also perform outreach and education.
  • The Entrepreneur & Nonprofit Clinic provides free transactional legal services to small businesses, start-ups, and nonprofit organizations. The suite of services include preparation of formation documents, agreement negotiation and drafting, and regulatory compliance.
  • The Mediation Law Clinic provides an alternative to the adversarial litigation process for families to settle disputes more promptly and with a reduction in emotional trauma.

    Publications

In 2007 Jarvis & Coleman ranked the Alabama Law Review 36th "on the basis of the prominence of their lead article authors." This represents an incredible 63 position improvement from the rankings of ten years prior. For 2015–2016, ExpressO, UC Berkeley's manuscript submission service, ranked the ALR at 10th in terms of "number of manuscripts received." In 2015 Washington and Lee's methods rank ALR at 46th in both the number of citations from other journals and the combined score. These show an improvement of 10 and 26 positions, respectively, over the preceding 5 years.
Approximately 40% of students graduate with journal experience. This is a slightly lower percentage than many of Alabama's peer schools, but nonetheless above the national average.

Employment

According to Alabama's official 2023 ABA-required disclosures, 89.4% of the Class of 2023 obtained full-time, long-term, bar passage required employment within nine months after graduation. 26% of 2023 graduates were employed by a national law firm and 11.4% found judicial clerkships. Alabama's Law School Transparency under-employment score for 2023 is 4.9%, indicating the percentage of the Class of 2023 who were unemployed, pursuing an additional degree, or working in a non-professional, short-term, or part-time job nine months after graduation.

Costs

Tuition and fees at the University of Alabama School of Law for the 2018–2019 academic year total $23,920 for residents and $42,180 for nonresidents. 69.2% of students received discounts during the 2017–2018 school year; the remaining 30.8% paid full price. Law School Transparency estimated debt-financed cost of attendance for three years at full price to be $157,785 for residents and $231,042 for nonresidents.

Notable alumni