Sciences Po Master en Droit

Graduate School
1

<p>Hello Everyone,</p>

<p>I'm an American student considering law school but nervous about the costs/job market in the US. I'm considering applying for the (very new!) masters of law at Sciences Po. It was only started in 2007, so I was wondering whether anyone has experience with it, whether it's a strong program, what admissions expectations are like, etc...? </p>

<p>Also, I suppose the next step would be to come back stateside and do a one-year LLM. What are my chances, after studying at Sciences Po, of getting into a top program?</p>

<p>Any thoughts would be much appreciated!</p>

<p>Thanks!</p>

2

<p>Hi, bonjour,</p>

<p>Sciences Po is not so famous outside France, so I guess you won’t have many answers here.</p>

<p>You should try here: [url=&lt;a href=“http://forum-scpo.com/]Forum-scpo.com”&gt;http://forum-scpo.com/]Forum-scpo.com</a>, le forum des </p>

3

<p>Thanks for posting those forums. I’ll be sure to take a look. </p>

<p>My story: top undergrad in the US, I went to Sciences Po exchange for junior year, I study philosophy but want to transition into work in an IGO, on human rights, etc. I’ve interned at a number of think tanks/IGOs in the past. </p>

<p>I guess I just want to know whether a) I can work as a corporate lawyer in France or the US after graduation for a couple years, just to pay down my debt, and b) how the law program is regarded in France. I know Sci Po isn’t known for law (the program is brand new), I have just heard that, even in France, people see sciences po as being “in decline” or are increasingly skeptical of it. Just wondering about those general attitudes/ideas. </p>

<p>Thanks again!</p>

4

<p>elorica, I think the answer here is going to be complicated.</p>

<p>To practice law in the US, you have to be admitted to the bar of a particular state or similar jurisdiction. In my state, if you have not gotten a JD from an accredited US institution, you will not be eligible to take the bar exam (and thus to practice law, assuming you pass) unless (a) you have been licensed to practice law in a foreign country, (b) you have in fact practiced law in that country for 5 of the previous 8 years, more or less full time, and (c) you have effectively received an LLM from an accredited US law school. </p>

<p>Other states’ requirements may be somewhat different, but not THAT different. Your French degree on its own will not likely be enough to let you take the bar exam here, and thus you will not be permitted to practice in the US without a lot of additional time and expense.</p>

<p>How about practicing in France? Tough to tell. In France, to be licensed as an avocat, it seems you have to get a Diplome de Maitrise en Loi, pass an exam, and then take 18 months worth of additional professional training to get a CAPA certificate. I don’t know, however, that you need a CAPA in order to practice what we call corporate law. I looked at the bios of associates at the French commercial law firm I use as a correspondent there, and I couldn’t tell – only one (a litigator) listed a CAPA among her educational qualifications, but everyone seemed to have a gap of a couple years at least between earning a DML and joining the bar, and some of them had different degrees altogether. (And it looked like all of them got hired by a firm a year before they joined the bar, not afterwards.)</p>

<p>I think you are going to have to find more knowledgeable people, but my gut sense is that this is not an easy backdoor into the practice of law anywhere.</p>

5

<p>I looked more. It looks like the Sciences Po program is three academic years, two years of classwork sandwiched around a pair of semester-long internships. It seems to feed into either bar preparation courses and taking the French bar exam, or taking the exam for entrance in the ENA for a judicial career. They are clearly making a pitch to attract anglophone students, and actually offer an English-only course option. So you ought to be able to practice in France when you are done, provided you can pass the French bar exam (in French, presumably). You still wouldn’t be able to be hired as a lawyer in the US. You might be able to work for a US or UK firm’s Paris office even without passing the French bar, but I would check that out carefully before relying on it.</p>

<p>This seems like an awfully long haul to get into human rights work.</p>

6

<p>Ok, so I got few more informations.</p>

<p>But first, JHS is right: there is a huge issue, we, and I mean us, the French, and you the Americans, have a very different judicial system. So what might be true in France is probably not the same in the U.S., so be very careful.</p>

<p>If you studied at Sciences Po, you probably know the french system works on the European model: 3 years (Licence / Bachelor), 2 years (Master1-Master 2), 3 years (Doctorat / PhD).</p>

<p>To become a corporate lawyer, you do not necessarily need to pass the exam to become a lawyer at the bar in France. Most of the time, the junior corporate lawyer has a Master 2/DEA/DESS (the two old names) in “droit des affaires” (corporate law) or “droit social” (social law).</p>

<p>If I believe what I read, the best way to study law in France is still at the University. Sciences Po as a new program and some very good professors, and a potential network very interesting. But the universities are still the best in this domain. The new head Sciences Po, Richard Descoings, has the ambition to expand the activities of Sciences Po and especially Business and Law, but this a recent development.</p>

<p>There is a french ranking, mostly about business degree but including law related to business, pretty relevant I would argue: [Classement</a> SMBG des Meilleurs Masters, MS et MBA](<a href=“http://www.meilleurs-masters.com/index.html]Classement”>http://www.meilleurs-masters.com/index.html). Go to “classement” and then under the category “Droit” you have the different kind of degree. Paris II (known as Assas) is still the most valuable law faculty (law school) in France, and I agree (and I come from an university with a good reputation for its law faculty). The “Grandes Ecoles” have good degrees if you want to combine Law and Management. </p>

<p>I guess with your profile you can aim for the best degrees. So I would say you have the choice: 1. try to get into a very good “Master 2” at a french University, study one year and work in France as a corporate lawyer 2. go to Sciences Po, and get into degree with partnership with U.S. law school as the one with Columbia (also possible with Paris 1), the MIA/LL with Georgetown or the Finance and Law degree with Pennsylvania. But it’s probably expensive. You might also get in the Sciences Po degree and study abroad a semester in the U.S. (Columbia, Harvard, Cornell, McGill or Sao Paulo, Torino, Frankfurt, Keio and Kyoto). As JHS said, you could also take one year of internship between the two years of the diploma 3. try to get into another double degree, like the J.D./Master 2 between Cornell and Paris 1, but it’s also expensive.</p>

<p>If you really want to study human rights and related issues, it’s gonna be difficult to find a degree where you can work as a corporate lawyer and in a NGO after that. Maybe with a social law degree. You have specific degree about human rights, including one at Paris 2. Or for example, the European degree ([E.MA</a> European Master’s Degree in Human Rights and Democratisation](<a href=“http://www.emahumanrights.org/]E.MA”>http://www.emahumanrights.org/)) but still expensive (but far to be as expensive as a law school). But the best are probably where the experts work: Netherlands (and possibly Belgium and U.K.).</p>

<p>This website might help: [Human</a> Rights Masters and LLM degrees](<a href=“http://www.humanrightstools.org/courses/masters.php]Human”>Loading...)
And so this one: [CREDHO</a> - Enseignements : Liste des DEA et DESS dispensant des cours relatifs aux droits de l’Homme](<a href=“http://www.credho.org/enseignts/deadess.htm]CREDHO”>CREDHO - Enseignements : Liste des DEA et DESS dispensant des cours relatifs aux droits de l'Homme)</p>

<p>But it was before the reforms…</p>