William & Mary School of Law

Student Rating^? A Alumni Rating^? A ATL Top 50 Rank #27	Tuition $30,800 / $39,800 Total Investment ^? $176,967 / $206,301	Enrollment 645	Student/Faculty Ratio 12.0
LSAT (25/75) 156/164 GPA (25/75) 3.40/3.90	Region M State V	Dean Davison M. Douglas
Applicants who are accepted 36.1 / 100 Admitted students who enroll 1.8 / 10	Top Biglaw Employers ^?	Talking Points Oldest law professorships (aside from Oxford & Edinburgh) in the English-speaking world – held by George Wythe (signer of the Declaration of Independence). Notable alumni include: H. Robert Mayer (Federal Circuit Court of Appeals Judge), LeRoy Millette, Jr. (VA Supreme Court Justice), Rebecca Beach Smith (VA District Court, Chief Judge)

Ratings & Rankings

Colored bars represent the range of average school ratings. Black line is this school's rating.

Academics

Students
vs. all schools

Minimum: 2.25
Mean: 3.64
Maximum: 4

Alumni
vs. all schools

Minimum: 2.4
Mean: 3.62
Maximum: 4

Practical/Clinical Training

Students
vs. all schools

Minimum: 2.14
Mean: 3.36
Maximum: 3.83

Alumni
vs. all schools

Minimum: 1.86
Mean: 3.33
Maximum: 3.8

Career Counseling

Students
vs. all schools

Minimum: 1.29
Mean: 3.11
Maximum: 3.56

Alumni
vs. all schools

Minimum: 1.17
Mean: 2.62
Maximum: 3.25

Financial Aid Advising

Students
vs. all schools

Minimum: 1.5
Mean: 3.04
Maximum: 3.29

Alumni
vs. all schools

Minimum: 1.25
Mean: 2.85
Maximum: 3.5

Social Life

Students
vs. all schools

Minimum: 1.8
Mean: 3.25
Maximum: 3.67

Alumni
vs. all schools

Minimum: 2.4
Mean: 3.24
Maximum: 3.86

More Ratings*

	Student	Alumni
	A	A
	A	A
	A-	A-
	A	A
	A-	A-

US News Rank

#39 - Tie

What do these ratings mean?

from Brian Dalton, Breaking Media Director of Research

The ATL School and Firm Insiders Survey asks self-identified current students, alumni, and practicing lawyers to rate major aspects of life at their law school (academics, social life, clinical training, career services, financial aid advising) and/or law firm (compensation, hours, morale, culture, training). We then translate these ratings into letter grades, where the mean score for each particular ratings category is the equivalent of a “B.”

We require a minimum threshold of responses for each institution before we publish any survey-based ratings content. Using a standard formula for statistical validity, we adhere to a threshold that gives us an 85% confidence level and a 10% margin of error. The precise threshold number will of course vary depending on the size of the individual institution. For example, for a law firm of 1,000 attorneys, we would require 50 responses in order to publish ratings for the firm.

Sector	Anticipated	Actual
Source: ATL Insider Survey and the American Bar Association
Work for a firm	65%	25%
Work for government	22%	19%
Work in non-profit/public interest	4%	4%
Go solo	0%	0%

Insider Reviews

from students and alumni of William & Mary School of Law

Alumni

Instate it is the best bang for your buck (hon. mention: UNC). And if you go to UVA for law school it is inevitable that you’ll come out of Charlottesville a douche bag.
Alumni

William and Mary Law offers what few law schools have: a first-rate faculty and a very smart but friendly student brought together in a laid back, collegial environment.
Alumni

I would assume William and Mary’s employment statistics are as fudged as most schools’ statistics. No one ever sent me a survey or a form to fill out at the 9 month mark about my employment for data collecting purposes. I had been e-mailing casually with someone at OCS about what I was doing (which was making $12.50 an hour at a small firm). But no one explicitly asked for my salary info so I know it wasn’t counted.
Alumni

Students

William & Mary Law is great. But you should know this. ‘Legal Skills’ is awful. Dreadful, really. Luckily, it will be undergoing significant changes in the coming years. The Dean and the administration are phenomenal. They care, a lot. The Dean has hosted numerous town-halls with students and is a great ambassador for the law school. Professors are accessible, have had lunch with some on multiple occasions. They are mostly kind and accomodating. Student body is generally kind, although very clique oriented. Not many gunners, but quite a bit of over-anxious types. The facilities are nice, the law library is among the best looking law libraries you may encounter. Career Services is disappointing. Lame is perhaps the best way to describe them, and not in a teenager ‘this party is lame’ kind of way, but in a literal ‘horse that can’t walk’ kind of lame. Overall, it’s a great place to be. But it’s not without fault.
1L

Professors are fantastic, and the library is top-notch. Everything else kind of blows.
2L

OCS has an open-door policy and is generally very helpful in trying to hook students up with jobs
2L

For anyone from a big city, this will seem like the middle of nowhere (even though it is more like suburbs), so don’t come here and then complain that you have no social life – there is plenty to do if you look for it, but we are not (contrary to ATL reports) a partying school unless you live in the GradPlex and act like a high schooler. / / Students here are more passive than active (though all are very smart) so don’t expect loud debates or opinions from multiple people, and expect the same 20 people to run most of the organizations in the school. / / Everyone here is super nice – you will not meet nicer, kinder, or more helpful people anywhere else. Gunners, you will be mocked. / / Don’t expect to get an A unless you plan to work 80-120 hours per week. Be prepared to choose between an overall experience (running clubs, a social life, getting average grades) or being obsessive about school work. Don’t expect to skate. / With a large population from BYU, non-drinkers and non-partiers are just as welcome at W&M as everyone else. / The LGBT population is growing, and our LGBT group is one of the most active groups on campus this year. However, if you are LGBT, don’t expect to find a date at W&M Law – though you might find one on the undergrad campus.
2L

Absolutely amazing community environment. This combined with the Honor Code creates such a welcoming environment.
1L

Excellent quality of life in Williamsburg. That W&M is a relatively lower cost state school is something of a well kept secret.
2L

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