University and Paul M. Hebert Law Center administrators have a few more hoops to jump through before the realignment of the two schools can become a reality, said Law Center Chancellor Jack Weiss.
The University’s accrediting body, the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges (SACSCOC), must approve the realignment, and the Law Center’s accrediting body, the American Bar Association (ABA), must also give its approval before the two campuses are rejoined, said Gil Reeve, vice provost for academic programs.
The realignment of the two schools, approved unanimously at the Board of Supervisors meeting in March, is set to rejoin the autonomous Law Center campus with the flagship in January 2015 if approval is gained from the schools’ accrediting bodies.
Weiss said the administrators of both schools are currently working to create a description of the realignment to submit to the ABA in late May and will also have to submit a document to the SACSCOC in September.
The ABA will then send a group to visit campus and determine if the University’s plan for realignment satisfies all requirements and is truthful to the documents submitted, Weiss said. The SACSCOC and the ABA will both meet in December, and if both approve, the Law Center would rejoin the University after 38 years of separation.
The Law Center became an autonomous campus within the LSU System in 1977 after years of effort on the part of the school’s then-dean and current namesake.
Weiss said in March the realignment would allow the school to better compete in today’s law school world and provide students with the resources needed to receive a practical and interdisciplinary law education.
LSU President F. King Alexander said in March the realignment would allow the University to better develop a pre-law program and communicate with more transparency between the two academic units.
In the last 10 years, the number of students applying to law schools in the state has dropped by more than half, meaning the school has to compete more with other law schools to vie for a piece of the now smaller student group, Weiss said.