The Admissions Office at Mitchell Hamline School of Law works with prospective students to help them determine if law school—and specifically Mitchell Hamline—is the best place for them to pursue their professional goals. Admissions staff travel around the state, region, country, and world to visit with prospective students. They counsel students on the application process and help them prepare for law school. Interested students are provided opportunities to get to know Mitchell Hamline through events, individual and group visits, and by connecting students with people throughout the law school community.
The goal of Admissions is to build an incoming class with a diversity of interests, ideas, beliefs, and backgrounds so that classrooms are places where students can learn the law through a lens that represents the school’s diverse communities. To this end, the Admissions Office works to ensure that every student who applies to the J.D. or LL.M. program gets a full and fair review of their application and that its admissions practices meet the high standards set by the American Bar Association.
Additional information about the Admissions Office may be found on the Prospective J.D. Students webpage.
Admissions Policy
Mitchell Hamline seeks to educate talented, motivated students who will effectively and ethically serve their clients and employers, their local and wider communities, their profession, and their law school. To achieve that goal, the law school and its Admissions Committee hold themselves to high standards of judgment, experience, and fairness.
In making admissions decisions, Mitchell Hamline strives to ensure that:
- all students offered admission are qualified to meet the challenges of law school and of the profession of law;
- each applicant gets full, careful, personalized consideration;
- all relevant information, quantifiable and nonquantifiable, is considered, including undergraduate and graduate school transcripts, Law School Admission Test (LSAT) score(s), career experience and focus, motivation, activities outside of work or school, interpersonal skills, and intellectual and personal breadth and depth; and
- the entering class complements a diverse student body that includes all major racial and cultural groups, as well as a variety of backgrounds, experiences, and viewpoints.
Information submitted to us as a part of an application becomes the property of the law school.
Mitchell Hamline School of Law reserves the right to reject any applicant for admission, regardless of fulfillment of requirements stated in the application booklet or elsewhere. The law school’s nondiscrimination policy is observed in all cases.
Application Review Process
The Admissions Committee evaluates applications after it has received all the following items:
- Completed application through the Law School Admission Council (LSAC)
- LSAT
- Credential Assembly Service report through LSAC
- Letters of recommendation
- Resume
- Personal statement
- Values statement
- Additional statements or addendums (as needed)
Transfer, visiting, and international (foreign-educated) applicants should note their respective additional application instructions.
Admission decisions are made on a rolling basis. Applicants are notified via e-mail and mail of admission decisions. Applications are available from October 1 – July 15.
First-year applicants must indicate whether they are applying to attend Mitchell Hamline for full-time, part-time evening, part-time day, or part-time blended.
Persons with Disabilities or Special Needs
We review and process all applications in compliance with Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 and the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990. Mitchell Hamline also has taken steps to ensure that campus facilities are accessible to persons with disabilities.
For all students with disabilities, the Admissions Committee welcomes supplemental material, including letters of recommendation and brief samples of written work, which will increase the committee’s understanding of the applicant’s academic and professional potential.
Complete information about the application process is available on the Prospective J.D. Students webpage.