Golden Gate University School of Law, in San Francisco, is ending its JD program at the end of the 2024 academic year, and will not accept any new students to that program. However, the school will continue with its LL.M. programs, a Masters degree, an SJD and Bachelor of Arts programs. It will offer a teach-out option to current JD students, allowing them to graduate from an American Bar Association-accredited law school.
“We know — and regret — the pain and disruption that will come from ending the ABA-accredited JD program,” the university’s board of governors stated. “Given the realities of the marketplace, our Law School’s place in it and a host of related trends and data, we determined it is no longer viable to offer this degree program.”
The decision comes two years after the 122-year-old law school embarked on a bold strategy to reinvent itself. Faced with loss of accreditation because its bar passage rate was below the ABA’s required 75% threshold, GGU decided in January 2022, to reduce enrollment and offer full scholarships to incoming students. This would allow the school to admit students who could pass the bar exam in higher numbers.
Based on this plan, the ABA granted GGU Law a three-year extension in March 2022 to reach 75% bar passage based on assurances from the university that it had the resources to carry out its plan, which would cost the school an estimated $5 million in tuition fees in the first year, and could cost as much as $15 million by year three — the 2024-25 academic year.
“The university committed to three years of deficit financing, but it appears they did not have the reserves to cover it,” said one source close to the situation who questioned whether the plan was built on a house of cards.
The university said the plan fell apart when the San Francisco commercial real estate market took a beating in late 2022. It apparently had plans to sell real estate if necessary. But the San Francisco office vacancy rate rose from 19% to 24% in the fourth quarter of 2022. Valuations are 43% below pre-pandemic levels.
Sources say the university should have had reserves set aside and not relied on a risky real estate market before announcing such a bold strategy.
The university sent notices of discontinuation of tenure to faculty in May, “because faculty members are entitled to have at least one year’s notice if their appointment will not be renewed,” the university said at the time.
“While we are discontinuing the JD program, we are doing so with an orientation to the future of legal education,” the board stated. “We plan to build on areas of greatest potential in the legal profession, including interdisciplinary, cross-University offerings.”
Golden Gate first ran into problems when the American Bar Association passed a new rule that required law schools to attain a 75% bar passage rate within two years of graduation. That rule, which took effect in 2019, has already contributed to the closure of three law schools and led two others to drop ABA accreditation to avoid a similar fate.
The ABA rule has been controversial because it primarily impacts law schools with large minority student bodies. Golden Gate ranks No. 5 on preLaw’s list of most diverse law schools.
Golden Gate’s Class of 2018 had a bar passage rate of 57.5%. In 2019, the number improved to 67%, but still fell below the required 75% mark, leading the ABA to find the school out of compliance.
Facing the risk of losing accreditation, the school drastically reduced the size of its entering class — from an average of 183 in the three prior years to 43 in 2022-23. It also provided all full-time students and half of the part-time students with full scholarships.
