Failing Law Schools, Only Dedicated Law Students Survive

The law school system has been held in Korea since several years ago. One of our members go to the law school and he wanted to share his opinion on the law school system. Especially, if you would like to survive at the heated competition, you should read this! Share your ideas through the comments, please!

Failing Law Schools, Only Dedicated Law Students Survive 

Jeong, Sul-ki

Jeju National University Law School 

Department of Law 

         Now the term ‘law school’ sounds quite familiar to Korean people, because the law school system replaced the previous judicial examination. The previous system will be abolished in 2017, and those who want to be a lawyer have to spend 3 years and law school tuition. The law school in Korea is controversial due to its high cost. In Korea, when the debates go about law school, U.S. case often appears because U.S. has long history in terms of law school. 

        Lawyer’s social position in U.S. is relatively high which is not so much different from Korea. Many American used to believe that they will make a lot of money once they become a lawyer. Their belief is at variance with the truth, and grounds for the argument are well presented in the book Failing Law Schools, written by Brian Z. Tamanaha. It warns the fact that you will have to pay two hundred thousand dollars for graduation from law school. Although you pay the money, become a lawyer, it does not guarantee you to get high income jobs. In short, there are more lawyers than the jobs they can seek for. He argues that entering law school is not cost-effective at all. Further, recent article from Bloomberg clearly shows the falling popularity of law school in U.S. According to the article, some law schools decided not to require Law School Admission Test (LSAT) score which is one of the most essential criteria for the admission¹.

        Regardless of law school in U.S. or Korea, its tuition is considerably expensive, and job-seeking is very hard. The amount of competition in law school, however, still remains the same. Perhaps it will be even harsher than before. So guess what? In failing law schools, only dedicated law students survive. 


¹ 1 Kitroeff, Natalie. (2015, Feb 25). The First Two Law Schools to Drop the LSAT Could Be Just the Beginning. Bloomberg. Retrieved from http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-02-24/thefirst-two-law-schools-to-drop-the-lsat-could-be-just-the-beginning