ABA Approved Online Law Schools

Are there any ABA approved online law schools? In the modern world of ever expanding online learning opportunities, it is not surprising that many individuals are interested in the prospect of attending law school online.  The primary obstacle to success in this instance is that there are no online Juris Doctor programs approved by the American bar Association. This does not impact you from receiving a Juris Doctor degree from the various online programs but it has a very definite impact on sitting for the state bar exam required to actually be able to practice law in a given state.

With the exception of California, all states require a Juris Doctor degree from a law school accredited by the American Bar Association. California allows the graduates of all law schools, online, ABA accredited and non-ABA accredited traditional schools, to take the bar exam immediately after receiving their degree. The primary difficulty is that there is no reciprocity of bar exams between the states, so a graduate of an online program is currently limited to only being able to pass the bar exam in California. There has been a recent individual case of an online graduate passing the bar in California and then successfully petitioning his home state of Massachusetts to sit for the bar there.  This is, so far, an isolated case.

Online law programs, therefore, allow you to be awarded a Juris Doctor degree but only be able to sit for the bar exam in the state of California.  This is a serious limitation on the employment opportunities available for online law program graduates. While there are employment opportunities for JD holders who have not passed the bar, they are definitely lower paying and have far less chance of advancement in either the private or corporate legal fields than graduates who have passed the bar examination.