CHICAGO - Northwestern University Pritzker School of Law is taking a big step in furthering its students’ understanding of business by offering a suite of five courses taught exclusively for law students by full-time professors at the University’s Kellogg School of Management, beginning in the fall of 2017.
The courses are identical to the ones that every Kellogg MBA is required to take and will go a long way in strengthening the law students’ understanding of modern business practices.
Courses build on Northwestern Law’s partnership with Kellogg
The courses are Accounting for Decisionmaking; Business Analytics; Business Strategy; Finance 1; and Leadership in Organizations. Each of the five classes will consist of 65 students, bringing the total of offered seats to more than 300.
These courses will deepen the relationship between Kellogg and Northwestern Law and strengthen the Law School’s interdisciplinary approach to preparing students to thrive in today’s complex global and technological economy. They arise through work of the Center for Practice Engagement and Innovation that reaffirmed that clients increasingly expect their lawyers to have a strong understanding of business.
Today’s legal clients expect lawyers to have a strong business understanding
Long a leader in law and business, the Law School offers a three-year JD-MBA program that is by far the largest in the country with an annual enrollment of more than 80 students. Even during and since the 2008 financial crisis, more than 99 percent of graduates of the program were employed within nine months of graduation.
“The new course offerings bolster our commitment to preparing strong business-minded lawyers,” said Daniel Rodriguez, dean of Northwestern Law. “We are preparing our graduates to be T-shaped lawyers -- lawyers with deep-rooted foundational legal knowledge, who also possess broad cross-disciplinary perspectives and understanding in relevant areas.”
Northwestern Law is strongly committed to a multi-disciplinary education that breaks down silos in professional education and prepares students to be strategic problem-solvers across disciplines throughout their careers, he added.