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About NWCULaw

Northwestern California University School of Law (NWCULaw®) was founded 42 years ago in 1982. The school offers a fully California accredited online law study program leading to the presentation of the Juris Doctor (J.D.) degree. It currently has approximately 800 enrolled students, and over the many years of the school's history, a large number of its graduates have gone on to successfully practice law.

The law study program was developed so that economic obstacles, family commitments, remoteness of location, and other hardships would not prevent deserving individuals from studying law.

The school is particularly distinctive because it is:

  • The oldest existing degree-granting distance education law school in the United States.
  • The first school in the world to intersect physical and digital presence through live face-to-screen class sessions in a degree program over the Internet.

NWCULaw has a proven record of success for online law schools and distance learning. Graduates of the school have transitioned to jobs as private practice lawyers and litigators, deputy public defenders, deputy district attorneys, deputy attorney general, deputy county counsels, city attorney, patent attorneys, tax attorneys, immigration lawyers, bankruptcy lawyers, admiralty & maritime lawyers, arbitrators, mediators, administrative court judges, and staff attorneys working for law firms, private corporations, organizations and governmental agencies.

The school's high quality, very affordable online program is offered over the Internet through a course management system and technology platform featuring online discussion boards, online audio and video lectures, and virtual classrooms to provide dynamic collaboration and communication between students and faculty members. 

The faculty consists of law professors who are available to all students for instruction, course-specific questions, discussions and reviews on discussion boards and in virtual classrooms. Students have access to an electronic law library, through LexisNexis®, can network with the professors and each other, and can participate in the online "real-time" classes, through the online law school's Internet campus. The school's faculty members conduct the instructional sessions with students over the Internet by means of online modern interactive videoconferencing technology.

The law study program at Northwestern California University is environmentally progressive at a time when being GREEN is increasingly important. The innovative eco-friendly feature of the NWCULaw program is that the school's faculty members and students do not travel to meet with one another. Instead they meet "virtually" on their computers at specified times for discussions of study materials, to attend live classes, to see and hear pre-recorded lectures, and to download coursework. The savings in energy and facility resources that result are good for the school, its students and the environment.

Click here: Tuition & Fees

Click here: Notable NWCULaw Alumni

World-Class Online Education in Law 

Our Guiding Principles: "Quality, Opportunity, Affordability"