Founded in 1834 by Judge John Reed, The Dickinson School of Law is the oldest law school in Pennsylvania and the fifth oldest in the nation. Throughout its history, the law school has trained distinguished graduates who have gone on to become leaders of the bar, of the judiciary, of government, and of business. These alumni include the first secretary of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, five governors, three U.S. senators, and more than 100 federal, state and county judges and countless prominent lawyers and civic leaders.
In 2000, we merged with Penn State, one of the country’s premier research universities, and stepped into a new era of legal excellence. We are currently engaged in a $110 million building project, and in the fall of 2006, we began operating as a unified school from two locations — our original home in Carlisle and our new location on Penn State's University Park campus.
In the past few years, applications to Penn State Dickinson have increased by more than 100 percent, and the average academic credentials of our students have risen steadily and significantly — our bottom quarter academic credentials today are higher than our top quarter academic credentials of just a few years ago. At the same time, student body diversity has jumped from less than 8 percent to nearly 25 percent, and we are now ranked by U.S. News and World Report as one of the most diverse ABA-approved law schools in the United States.
Our increasing integration with Penn State’s
top graduate departments and our physical presence
on the University’s flagship campus enable
us to tap into a wealth of academic resources that
give our students an incredibly rich array of interdisciplinary
classes, clinics and practical activities.
