Who knows about Courses at Columbia. I am mostly interested in business law. Which courses have a great reputation there? I know about Pr Coffee in corporate and Pr Ginsurg in copyright. Are there other such 'legends' among the Faculty members? Also do you know if there is any good course in IT law there. Pr Moglen is very famous but what does he teach? Thank you

Hi

Does anybody has a view about the best courses to choose at CLS?

I am mostly interested to hear from you in Corporate, Commercial and IP.

Thank you in advance my friends.

The most popular professors at Columbia in your area of interest are: Coffee (Securities & Capital Markets); Gordon (Advaced Corporate Law); Goshen (Corporate); Ginsuburg (IP); Gilson (Deals); Goldberg (Deals); Miller & Morrison (BAnkruptcy); Fox (Corporate Finance), Gratez (TAX)

You should check on law.columbia.edu or in the Leiter Law School rankings under the section business law professor!

Columbia has an outstanding reputation in Corporate/Commercial and IP, you should definetely come here

Thanks. Your answers provide very helpful information and are most appreciated.

Are you currently at CLS? If so don't you mind telling me which courses you have chosen?...the ones you regret to have chosen and the ones you would have liked to choose (if any)?

I was also contemplating choosing courses called law and the film industry or law and the music industry. Have you heard of those?

Hey guys,

I also have a question abt CLS courses. I am interested mostly in international criminal law and found only one course "International and Comparative Criminal Law" on Columbia website under Center on Global Legal Problems. Is that the only course offered on this subject? And does anyone know professors that are good in this field and teach at CLS?
Any reply will be much appreciated!

There are a lot of courses offered in International Criminal Law...maybe you should write to the Graduate Legal Studies and ask them.
This year there are quite a lot of students interested in International Criminal Law...I spoke to one of them just the other day and she told them that the classes she in are fantastic!

hey Ptich,

any suggestions on how to write the personal statement for columbia?

Thanks for your reply Ptich. I will try to contact the Admission Office by email, lets see what they have to say.

Best,

Does anybody know anything about the bankruptcy course, the law & film industry and law & music industry courses at Columbia. Are they any good. Which ones would you recommend? Thank you in advance...

The bankruptcy course is excellent, Prof. E. Morrison is considered the raising star of U.S. bankruptcy. In addition there is a course called "Corporate Reorganization & Bankruptcy" tought by Harvey Miller who is a partner of Weil, Gotshal and the most prominent lawyer in U.S. Bankruptcy (as of today, among others, he represents Lehman in the Chapter 11 proceeding). So you can't be wrong studying bankruptcy at CLS...

As to the Law & film and Law & music courses I don't know anything but I've been told they are very good...

Thank you Pitch! That's great. Are you at CLS?

A friend of mine took Bankruptcy atCLS last year with Morrison and he loved it...apparently it's a lot of work but the professor is fantastic.

Who is at CLS at the moment and would have other tips regarding the courses to take or to avoid? Are there killer courses that should be avoided at all cost? Or courses that cannot be missed?

Hi Koala,

I am right now at CLS so I can give you some tips about the courses I'm taking as well as what my classmates told me so far about their courses.

1. Securities & Capital Markets with Prof. Coffee a TO DO, he is the best professor I ever had in my life and since he is the U.S. Securities "godfather" it is a one of a kind occasion to sit in his class.

2. Deals with Prof. Gilson and Prof. Goldberg: Gilson I think he's one of the smartest person I ever met in my life and Goldberg is really prepared as well.

3. M&A Deals seminar with two partners of Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz: I've been told it is very technical but if you are an M&A lawyer (or want to be one in the future) this is the course to take as Wachtell is the best M&A firm in the U.S. Apparently they give you all kind of models on the deals they are currently working on (e.g., Merrill-BoA).

4. Bankruptcy: Pitch already gave you a description. Anyway from what I know this year only 4 LLMs are enrolled in this course and they are all Bankruptcy lawyers from Europe/Japan with a lot of experience and one of them said that it is very demanding so it better not to take it unless you have substantial experience.

5. Corporations: all courses are very good (the one iI'm taking with Milhaupt is great!)

6. Antitrust: there are many LLMs from the European Commission and they all agreed that the course is excellent.

7. If you are interested in litigation there is a course called Transnational Litigation and a barzilian classmate told me it is really good.

If you have some more specific questions fell free to post them I will be happy to get the answers from my classmates.

L.

Hi

You seem to really be the luckiest to be at CLS! I appreciate and value your feedback.

I was considering taking bankruptcy but I am not specialised and have no experience of it whatsoever...so I will think about it twice now....

I was wondering if you also had more tips to share about CLS courses in IP, IT and in commercial law.

Among the possible options are copyright, the film industry course, the music industry course... I was also wondering whether the course on IT deals is still being taught at CLS (I saw it on the list of courses 2 years ago) and if there is a more general IT course? Do you also know about Tim Wu's courses?

More generally I would like to avoid fluff courses and to focus on 'useful' subjects (i.e. from a professional point of view) but I am aware that it needs to be doable...by the way would you have any idea of the pass/fail rate for the CLS LLM?

Last but not least would you recommend focussing on one field of law only like corporate or to take diverse courses?...from the NY job market's point of view...(even if I understand that the chances to get a job with solely a LLM are quite slim).

In IP there the course with Prof. Ginsburg which is considered one of the best (or the best professor in IP in the U.S.)
Prof. WU course is amazing everybody keeps telling me that...
As to the possibilities of finding a job in NYC, I have to tell you that these are not easy times...
If you have a lot of experience in an international law firm (either English or U.S.) it might be easier but the newly graduates will struggle (we have been told this and I don't know whether it is true or not).
By the way I want to point out this: being at Columbia is an asset in the sense that NYC law firms (such as Cleary, Skadden, Sullivan, etc) organise dinners, cocktail and reception and they invite over LL.M.s
They do it because since you are already living in New York they don't have to pay for your travel or stay (with a subway ride you are everywhere).
In these receptions you can do a lot networking which is the best way to land a job in the U.S.
For example a friend of mine met a partner at law firm in one of these reception and they discussed about arts; the partner was very interested about the discussion and so he invited him for dinner, and so on...at the end of the story my friend got a job at the law firm...of course this was possible because he was in NYC, if he had been somewhere else in the U.S. (Boston or Chicago) this would have never happened.
So when you are thinking about doing an LL.M. in the U.S. don't take into considerations only rankings (because they don't guarantee you a job) but think about all other aspects (location, etc...)
Doing an LL.M. in New York is something unique and I would reccommend it to anyone (either here at Columbia or in the Village at NYU, or somewhere else).

Hope this helps

Pitch

Hi Pitch. Thank you so very much. As usual you are a star! What you say about the courses and the networking aspect of living in NY is especially useful to me. Thank you again and good luck with the LLM and after!

Hello Pitch,

I recently submitted my application to Columbia,but i intend to focus on taxation, what are my chances of getting admitted? Is Columbia tax good?. I do not want to go to NYU although its reputed to have the best tax program. In my country NYU is not that highly regarded. Is there a legitimate way that i can monitor my application and ensure that i am admitted?