Pre-Law: Bringing the law to life

“Show, don’t tell” should be a mantra for Pre-Law students. Through careful construction of a fluid academic and extracurricular experience, students will apply to law schools with an academic record that speaks for itself.

The Pre-Law adviser assists students who are interested in pursuing law school by helping them plan their undergraduate careers and prepare for the law-school admissions process. Students choose a major that interests them and work to create an overall curriculum relevant to their interests for law school and beyond, including courses that will refine their writing, research and argument-formation abilities.

Law-school admission committees have vocalized their belief in the usefulness of a liberal-arts education prior to law school combined with relevant extracurricular experiences. Overall academic success, including a student’s GPA and LSAT scores, are far more important than a student’s choice of major.

Professor Harry Pohlman leads a group of eager policy-studies majors in his Constitutional Law class in a heated debate about a particular interpretation of the Constitution.

Local Opportunities
The Carlisle and Harrisburg areas afford Pre-Law students numerous academic and extracurricular opportunities related to law.

During their studies, students can:

• discuss prison life with inmates serving life sentences at the state penitentiary
• ride along on patrol with local policemen
• talk with the county coroner
• interview judges, prosecutors and defense attorneys
• question juveniles who are incarcerated at a Pennsylvania boot camp
• work alongside faculty members, and contribute to the latest research in law and public policy
• attend on-campus lectures by leaders in the field. Recent lecturers have included:
• then-Supreme Court Chief Justice William Rehnquist
• Nadine Strossen, president of the American Civil Liberties Union
• Mary Jo White, former U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York
• Samantha Power, professor in public policy at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government
• Louis Fisher of the Congressional Research Service
• Geoffrey Stone, dean of the University of Chicago Law School
• John Yoo, professor of law at the University of California, Berkeley
• and Frank Dunham, federal public defender and Yaser Hamdi’s attorney.

These experiences can be augmented through internships with organizations such as:

• Cumberland County Assistant District Attorney’s Office
• Legislative Research Office in the Pennsylvania House of Representatives
• Office of the U.S. District Court
• U.S. Army Military History Institute
• The Powell Group
• Immigration and Refugee Services
• American Cancer Society
• Sierra Club
• W.H. Newbold’s Son & Co. Inc.

Local politicians, judges, law officers and alumni in related fields are frequent visitors to Dickinson. Here, Pennsylvania Representative Todd Platts shares his experience with one of Professor Andy Rudalevige’s classes.

Partnership
Dickinson has the unique ability to offer students access to the resources of an accredited law school, as the Dickinson School of Law of the Pennsylvania State University borders our campus. Students can gain library privileges at the law school and be invited to sit in on classes. In other words, students are given a firsthand look at what law school really will be like so that if they choose that path, they know exactly what to expect and are better prepared.

Students also can take advantage of Dickinson’s joint-degree program, whereby qualified students are admitted into the law school and receive both a B.A. or B.S. and a J.D. in six years—one year less than the normal time to complete both degrees. For more information, check out the Career Center’s Web site: www.dickinson.edu/career.

Recommended Courses
The following list of courses is meant to give Pre-Law students an idea of the kind of academic breadth that prepares a student for law school.

Economics:
ECON 100: Contemporary Economics or ECON 111: Introduction to Microeconomics
ECON 244: Law and Economics

History:
HIST 117, 118: American History

Philosophy:
PHILO 112: Ethics
PHILO 121: Logic

Political Science:
POLSC 120: American Government
POLSC 220, 221: Constitutional Law I, II

English: Students should take several writing-intensive courses to refine their writing, research and argument-formation skills. Possibilities include:
ENGL 211: Expository Writing
ENGL 212: Writing: Special Topics
Any of the literature courses offered by the department

Department Profiles: Educating through experience

Back to Admissions