By 1990, Western State had expanded to three campuses in California including locations in Fullerton, Irvine and San Diego. At that time, the school was the largest law school in California.[9][11] In 1995, Western State again began pursuing accreditation with the ABA for all three of its campuses.[12] In the latter half of the 1990s, the school underwent several changes as part of the accreditation process. In 1995, the school's San Diego campus became the independently owned Thomas Jefferson School of Law[13][14] and the following year, the school closed its Irvine location and consolidated students to its Fullerton campus.[8] In 1998, the school received provisional accreditation from the ABA[5] and opened a new law library.[15]
In 2000, the college's owners sold Western State to Argosy Education Group, which owned the school for a year before it was purchased by Education Management Corporation.[5][16] Western State was granted full accreditation with the ABA in 2005, and became the third for-profit law school to receive ABA approval.[5] In April 2012, the school was incorporated as one of the colleges of Argosy University and officially changed its name to Western State College of Law at Argosy University.[17] The same year, the school sold its property to California State University, Fullerton for roughly $18 million.[18] In January 2016, the campus moved to Irvine, California.
In October 2017, it was announced that the college of law was sold, along with the rest of Argosy University, to the Dream Center Foundation, a subsidiary of the Dream Center, a nonprofit Pentecostal network of community centers. The transaction was funded in part by the Najafi Companies, a private equity firm.[19]
In 2019, a federal court approved Westcliff University's plan to purchase the school and revert it to for-profit status.[20] The ABA allowed continued accreditation under the ownership of Westcliff University in December 2019.[21]
Academics
Admissions
For the class entering in 2023, the school accepted 45.1% of applicants, with 33.1% of those accepted enrolling. The average enrollee had a 152 LSAT score and 3.16 undergraduate GPA.[22]
Programs
Western State offers both full-time and part-time programs.[5][3] The school offers two areas of focus through their Business Law Center and their Criminal Law Practice Center, which are aimed at preparing graduates for a career in business or criminal law through additional training, internships and networking with lawyers.[23] The law school also offers certificates in Immigration Law, Family Law, and Real Estate.
As of January 2024[update], the school had 213 full-time students, 77 part-time students, and 19 full-time and 34 part-time members of the faculty.[24][22]
Bar passage
The pass rate for Western State alumni taking the California bar exam for the first time in July 2023 was 60%, the lowest of 18 California ABA law schools.[25] The Ultimate Bar Pass Rate, which the ABA defines as the pass rate for graduates who sat for a bar exam within two years of graduating, was 77% for the Class of 2020,[4] but just 68.42% for 2021 graduates, which is below the ABA’s Standard 316 for approved law schools of 75%.[26]
Rankings
U.S. News & World Report ranks the school in the last group of 180-196 out of 196 schools, the bottom 8% at most.[24] In 2020, among all law schools, Western State had the third-highest Diversity Index, as reported by U.S. News & World Report.[27] In addition, in 2020, it received an A+ for Diversity in National Jurist's Best Law Schools.[28]
Costs
The total cost of attendance (indicating the cost of tuition, fees, and living expenses) at the Western State College of Law for the 2018-19 academic year was $63,692 for a student living at home and $77,126 for a full-time student that is self-supporting.[29]
According to Western State's ABA-required disclosures, 88.3% of the Class of 2022 obtained some form of employment ten months after graduation. 25 members, being 58% of the class, obtained JD-required employment, and 7 members, being 16% of the class, obtained JD-advantage employment. Excluding solo practitioners, 55.3% of the class obtained full-time, long-term, JD-required employment with most employed in law firms of 1-10 lawyers.[31]
Notable alumni
This section is missing information about the kind of degree and date granted usually supplied for alumni. Please expand the section to include this information. Further details may exist on the talk page.(January 2024)
^"Areas of Concentration". wsulaw.edu. Western State College of Law at Argosy University. Archived from the original on 15 September 2013. Retrieved 19 September 2013.
^ ab"Alumni Hall of Fame". wsulaw.edu. Western State College of Law at Argosy University. Archived from the original on 15 September 2013. Retrieved 19 September 2013.
