Penn State University is tenth among all U.S. universities in research expenditures and is home to many graduate departments commonly recognized as among the top few in the world. The University combines strength in traditional academics with a forward-thinking approach to interdisciplinary studies and internationalization. Penn State alumni can be found in every state and most countries around the world and are well-known for their achievements and influence.

Penn State University's Dickinson School of Law is America's fifth-oldest law school with a long tradition of training remarkably distinguished graduates, including the first secretary of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, five governors, three U.S. senators, more than 100 federal, state, and county judges, and innumerable prominent lawyers and civic leaders. Our curriculum is designed to prepare students for legal practice in a world where law is increasingly interconnected with science and technology and where knowledge of international and comparative law is crucial. Penn State is investing more than $120 million in new law school facilities and an additional several million dollars annually to support new programs and unparalleled faculty appointments.

Penn State Dickinson's LL.M. program for non-U.S. trained lawyers is one of the oldest and most prestigious in the nation. LL.M. students take one required course, Introduction to the United States Legal System, and then choose from an extensive selection of elective courses to design a course of study tailored to their individual professional aspirations. The professors at Penn State Dickinson include one of America's most prominent corporate law and mergers and acquisitions scholars; the world's preeminent scholar of the law of Russia and public international law; an internationally renowned human rights scholar who served as the first counsel to the African Union and later as counsel to the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights; the senior legal advisor to the 2003 European Union presidency who shares a joint appointment as the Sir John Lubbock Professor of Banking Law at the University of London's Queen Mary College; an esteemed scholar of international and domestic arbitration; and the former legal director of Amnesty International at its London Secretariat.

 

Additional opportunities for advanced international study are available through Penn State University's new School of International Affairs, which is housed administratively within the Law School. The School of International Affairs is highly interdisciplinary and draws extensively upon the intellectual resources of faculty in several academic colleges of the University. As students work toward a Penn State master's degree in international affairs, they will undertake in-depth analyses of international economic, political, and scientific issues and the cultural, historical, and legal factors that shape them. The program is designed as a modern and cosmopolitan community of students, faculty, scholars, and researchers, sharing the common goals of enhancing international understanding, knowledge, and discourse, as well as serving the public interest. Its mission is to prepare exceptional students for careers and leadership positions in both the private and public sectors of an increasingly interdependent world.

LL.M. students are eligible for concurrent enrollment with the School of International Affairs.