IMPORTANT NOTICE FOR APPLICANTS INTERESTED IN BAR ADMISSION

The Harvard LL.M. program is not intended to prepare students for bar eligibility or admission.  Admission to the LL.M. program and completion of degree requirements do not guarantee that a student will be eligible to sit for a bar examination or gain admittance to a state bar in the United States. The Graduate Program is unable to advise applicants or students as to their eligibility to sit for any state's bar examination.  Consult each state's bar admission materials and contact the respective board of bar examiners directly to find out whether and under what conditions you would be eligible to sit for a bar examination and/or become licensed by that state's bar.
 

For applicants interested in admission to the New York Bar: The New York Court of Appeals has instituted a requirement that students seeking admission to the New York bar must also satisfy a Skills Competency Requirement (in addition to all existing bar admission requirements). This requirement was effective as of August 1, 2018 for LL.M. students who plan to qualify for the bar exam using their LL.M. degree (and was effective for all others as of August 1, 2016). For more information about the requirement, please consult the New York Board of Law Examiners website at http://www.nybarexam.org/Skills/skills.htm.  

The Skills Competency Requirement can be satisfied in one of five ways, but at this time the only ways that are applicable for LL.M. students at Harvard Law School are “Apprenticeship” (22 NYCRR 520.18(a)(4)) (at least six months in duration) and “Practice in another jurisdiction” (22 NYCRR 520.18(a)(5)) (at least one full year of full-time work or two years of half-time work). Both the “Apprenticeship” and “Practice in another jurisdiction” requirements can be satisfied before or after the LL.M., but please note that completing this requirement after the LL.M. program may preclude international students from taking advantage of the authorization they could otherwise obtain to work in the U.S. after graduation for nine months to a year (depending on their student visa type).  

Accordingly, for students who may want to seek admission to the New York bar, it may be advisable to satisfy the Skills Competency Requirement before enrolling in the LL.M. program. This is particularly relevant for applicants who have recently completed (or will soon complete) their qualifying law degrees because we do not expect to be able to grant deferrals to give admitted students time to complete the Skills Competency Requirement before enrolling. Instead, recent (or future) graduates who are planning to seek admission to the New York bar should consider waiting to apply to the Harvard LL.M. program until (at least) a year after they graduate so that they can complete the Skills Competency Requirement before the LL.M. program.  

By way of example, to apply for the Harvard LL.M. program, an applicant must have received a qualifying law degree by June of the year in which they wish to start the LL.M. So, while a June 2024 graduate would be eligible to apply to the Harvard LL.M. program in the fall of 2023 for matriculation in August 2024, if that student is admitted to the 2024-2025 LL.M. class, then the student would have to complete the Skills Competency Requirement after completing the LL.M. On the other hand, if the student wishes to complete the Skills Competency Requirement before the LL.M. program, the student should wait until the fall of 2024 to apply to the LL.M. program so that their “Apprenticeship” or “Practice in another jurisdiction” requirement will have been satisfied before they start at Harvard Law School in August 2025.


*Please note that seeking admission to the New York bar is completely optional and fewer than half of the LL.M. students at Harvard pursue this option; if you are not interested in seeking bar admission, then this does not apply to you.