hello to all and tia to any who reply.

I am a practicing US attorney. I have been practicing in various areas of the law for 12 years. I graduated from a top 35 (at the time) law school when I was 22. I was enrolled in a 3+3 program after 2 years of college; I began college when I was 17; = 22. I say all of that to say -- nobody cares. I did not graduate in the top 25 so I am SOL when it comes to finding a top job or an in-house position. I'm not doing terribly, but I'm stuck in the south and don't seem to have the resume or contacts to get a position elsewhere.

I am thinking that if I obtain an LLM in IP with top marks I may be able to land a good in-house position. Of course, I do not have the means to take a year off. The only distance learning IP programs seem to be those offered in the UK.

Can anyone give me solid advice whether such a course of action will actually help me land an IP position (in the US and/or internationally)? I have no prior IP experience, but I have a lot of commercial transaction and litigation experience. Do schools such as Edinburgh offer career placement assistance? Does anyone know of companies who recruit from such programs? Again, any advice will be greatly appreciated.

BTW: I am married to a Russian and quickly learning Russian. I studied French and will refresh -- will those languages be helpful? I know that theoretically they are helpful, but I not sure how Russian will help outside of Russia...

Not sure if you ever found a programme for your distance learning query but if still interested, you should check out the University of Edinburgh's distance IP/IT programmes. It runs through the on-campus dedicated research centre SCRIPT. http://www.law.ed.ac.uk/distancelearning/programmes/
Edi is a great school and the IP/IT LLM would probably be a great help. I am also a US attorney and did my LLM at Edi and now am writing my PhD here. Best of luck!