South Texas College of Law Houston (STCL or South Texas) is a
privatelaw school in
Houston,
Texas. Founded in 1923, it is
accredited by the
American Bar Association. South Texas College of Law Houston is the oldest law school in the city of Houston.[4] It was founded in 1923 when the YMCA made the decision to establish a law school with a focus on offering
night classes for working professionals.
Rankings
U.S. News & World ReportRankings of Best Law Schools ranked South Texas College of Law overall 162nd, out of the 196 accredited law schools in the United States.
In 2023, its part-time program was ranked 57th in the country out of the 70 law schools considered.[5]
Programs
South Texas College of Law Houston was named the #1 law school of the decade in
moot court competitions, holding the most national championships of any
public or private law school in the
U.S., by PreLaw Magazine.[6]
Trial advocacy program
The South Texas College of Law trial advocacy program consistently ranks in the top 10 of the nation.[7] South Texas College of Law Houston's moot court program was ranked 1st in the nation according to data compiled by the University of Houston Law Center’s Blakely Advocacy Institute in 2018 and has consistently ranked in the top 4 ever since.[8] The trial advocacy program at South Texas College of Law Houston was ranked 3rd in the country (tied with
Stetson University and
American University) for 2023 by U.S. News & World Report.[9] The South Texas College of Law Houston Alternate Dispute Resolution Program (ADR), where students compete in competitive mediations, negotiations, and as mediators, is also highly ranked.[10] In 2020, U.S. News & World Report ranked the South Texas College of Law Houston's dispute resolution program 31st in the nation.[11] Additionally, PreLaw Magazine named South Texas College of Law Houston as "Top Law School for ADR".[10]
South Texas College of Law Houston has won 133 national championships in advocacy.[12]
Bar passage and employment
Of the South Texas College of Law Houston graduates who took the Texas bar exam for the first time in July 2021, 80.89% passed, vs the overall passage rate of 80.47% for all other law schools of the State of Texas.[3]
According to South Texas College of Law Houston's official 2021 ABA-required disclosures, 66% of the class of 2021 obtained full-time, long-term, JD-required employment nine months after graduation.[13]
Academics
South Texas College of Law Houston is also part of a consortium of four independent
ABA- and
AALS-accredited American law schools—
California Western School of Law,
New England School of Law, and
William Mitchell College of Law.[4] The Consortium for Innovative Legal Education, combines resources designed to enhance and strengthen the educational mission of each school separately and all of them collectively. This partnership provides access to educational programs on a national and international basis.
Students at South Texas can study abroad in
London,
Ireland,
Malta, the
Czech Republic,
France, the
Netherlands,
Denmark,
Turkey,
Chile, and
Mexico.[14] In 2017, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg taught a course for South Texas College of Law Houston in Malta.[15] In previous years, Justice Antonin G. Scalia and Chief Justice John Roberts both taught in international study abroad programs.[15]
Admissions
For the class entering in 2022, South Texas accepted 44.34% of applicants, with 39.16% of those accepted enrolling, and the average enrollee had a 153
LSAT score and 3.30 undergraduate
GPA.[16]
Publications
South Texas College of Law Houston publishes several student-edited journals of legal scholarship, including Corporate Counsel Review, Currents: Journal of International Economic Law, South Texas Law Review, Texas Journal of Business Law, and Hispanic Journal of Law and Policy
South Texas Law Review is a student-edited quarterly
legal journal published at the
South Texas College of Law Houston. It was established in 1954. The review publishes scholarly works as well as comments and case notes. South Texas Law Review has published articles written by five Justices from the
Supreme Court of the United States:
Arthur Goldberg,
William J. Brennan, Jr.,
William Rehnquist,
John Paul Stevens, and
Clarence Thomas. South Texas Law Review has published over 40 symposium issues on a wide range of topics. Since 1994, the review and the law school have hosted an annual
ethics symposium during the fall semester. The symposia include a conference where scholars present papers on the year's topic. The papers are published by the review in a subsequent volume.
Currents (
ISSN1534-388X) is the official journal of international economic law at South Texas College of Law Houston. Debuting in the winter of 1991 and featuring an article by
SenatorLloyd Bentsen,[17]Currents is published twice annually by the law student members and editors, who receive academic credit for writing projects and staff participation. Currents focuses on international trade law in its broadest sense, addressing the legal effects and structure of international trade agreements as well as the legal aspects of international business transactions, including the sale of goods and services, licensing, investment, and dispute resolutions. Individual past editions have focused on the
North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) marketplace, the
European Union,
maritime law,
emerging markets and international finance, and oil and gas transactions in
Latin America.
Costs
Total cost of tuition is $35,550 for 2020, for both in-state and out-of-state students.[18] South Texas College of Law continues to be the 6th least expensive law school in Texas out of a total of 10.[19] The total cost of attendance (indicating the cost of tuition, fees, and living expenses) at South Texas for the 2017–2018 academic year was $56,000.[20]
Community resources
South Texas sponsors the "Direct Representation Clinics", which provide legal representation to low-income residents of
Harris County, Texas, in the areas of family law, probate, estate planning, and guardianship cases.[21] South Texas is also the first Texas law school to provide $400 each month toward student-loan indebtedness for its alumni working for nonprofit legal-aid organizations that provide services to the poor.[22]
Attempt to merge with Texas A&M University
In 1998, South Texas College of Law Houston (at that time, called South Texas College of Law) tried to merge with
Texas A&M University under a private/public partnership. Under the proposal, the law school would have remained a private school, but would have been branded as the Texas A&M Law Center and would have awarded law degrees under the A&M seal.[23] The deal went sour after a lengthy legal fight with the
Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board, the governing body of the state's public institutions. The courts ruled that the schools had failed to obtain the board's approval before entering into the agreement.[24] The University of Houston and other institutions voiced concern about the partnership.[25] In 2013, Texas A&M University entered into a similar arrangement with the Texas Wesleyan School of Law in Fort Worth, Texas, thereby creating the
Texas A&M University School of Law.[26]
Litigation over name change
Until mid-2016, the law school was called "South Texas College of Law". On June 22, 2016, the day on which South Texas College of Law announced a name change to "Houston College of Law", the
University of Houston (which has its college of law within the
University of Houston Law Center) announced that the University was "concerned about the significant confusion this creates in the marketplace and will take any and all appropriate legal actions to protect the interests of our institution, our brand, and our standing in the communities we serve."[27] The University of Houston System filed a lawsuit on June 27, 2016, in the
United States District Court in Houston.[28][29] On October 14, 2016, the U.S. District Court issued a preliminary injunction requiring that South Texas College of law stop using the name "Houston College of Law," pending further developments in the case.[30]
On November 7, 2016, the dean of the law school announced that the name would be changed to "South Texas College of Law Houston".[31]
^Complaint, docket entry 1, June 27, 2016, The Board of Regents of the University of Houston System on behalf of the University of Houston System and its Member Institutions; The University of Houston System; and The Board of Regents of the University of Houston System, Plaintiffs v. South Texas College of Law, Defendant, case no. 16-cv-01839, U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas.