Course Enrollment
Policies regarding registration are established by Emory University and implemented by the University Registrar’s office in coordination with the Law Registrar.
Students with an outstanding debt-hold with the Bursar from a previous semester will not be permitted to register.
It is each student’s responsibility to ensure that they have properly registered for and successfully completed all required courses and the required number of credit hours necessary to complete their degree.
Pre-Registration
Students admitted or approved to select programs and externships may block-enroll for classes by special permission of the instructor or program coordinator. Students for whom priority registration is granted as an accommodation will also be eligible to enroll at this time.
Registration
Registration for the following semester occurs in November and April of the previous semester. Course registration is a multi-step process, providing multiple opportunities for students to choose their coursework.
Emory sets enrollment limits through a tiered enrollment system: not all available seats in a class are opened at the beginning of each registration period. JD students and those with priority enrollment accommodations are assigned to an enrollment appointment, organized by class year, which occur before the Open Enrollment periods. During the enrollment appointment, students may enroll in coursework of their choice, depending on availability of seats in the class. Once these JD-only enrollment appointments have elapsed, all students (including LLM, MLS, and SJD) may add courses or modify their schedule during the period titled Open Enrollment 1 (OE1). A small number of seats may be held until OE1. Waiting lists will be made available once all seats have been released, at the beginning of OE1. After the exam period each semester, students will have a second opportunity to modify their schedules during Open Enrollment 2 (OE2). Courses with restricted access may remove those restrictions during this period; please consult Course Atlas for those details.
The minimum number of credits for students to be considered full time is twelve (12); the maximum in any given semester is sixteen (16). Should a student wish to go above that, they must seek permission from the Associate Dean for Students and Academic Programs or their designee.
The Law Registrar pre-enrolls all first-semester, three-year JD law students. Newly admitted JD transfer students enroll in conjunction with their academic advisor. JM/MLS, LLM, and SJD students enroll with assistance from their respective program coordinator. MCL students are block-enrolled by the Registrar.
First-year JD students may self-enroll in one elective in their second semester, chosen from the predetermined first year elective list published in the Course Atlas. First year students’ remaining courses are block-enrolled by the Registrar.
Students may not take more than eight (8) hours in any classes for credit or transfer credit during the summer term.
JD, LLM, MCL, and SJD students may not earn credit toward their degree for courses offered in the JM/MLS online curriculum. Audits are counted in determining the maximum allowable course load, but do not count toward residency credit requirements.
Electing Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory (Sat/Unsat) Grade Mode
See Electing Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory (Sat/Unsat) Grade Mode.
Add/Drop/Swap (A/D/S)
At the start of each semester, course registration opens during a period of Add/Drop/Swap. During the A/D/S period, students may drop courses without penalty and add courses with open seats so long as they maintain a minimum of twelve (12) and a maximum of sixteen (16) credit hours (for full-time students). JD students may not add or drop courses in which they were block enrolled. Students may withdraw from a course after the A/D/S period only with the consent of both the course instructor and the Associate Dean of Students and Academic Programs or their designee. Courses dropped after the end of the A/D/S period will be reflected as a “W” (withdrawal without penalty), “WU” (unsatisfactory withdrawal), or “WF” (withdrawal while failing) on a student’s transcript. Grades of “WF” are counted as “F” (failing) in computing a student’s GPA.
A student may not withdraw from a course requiring a final examination after the end of classes.
Waitlist
Heavily subscribed courses may have a waiting list (at the professor’s discretion) to enable highly interested students to be automatically enrolled if a seat is available and that student can immediately be enrolled in the course.
Waitlists are added to courses at the instructor’s discretion. Waitlists are made available once all seats in a course have been released.
More information on waiting list procedures may be found on the law registrar’s website.
Low Enrollment
There is no general rule for cancellation of courses based on low enrollment. Emory Law reserves the right to cancel any course at its discretion.
Credit Hour Policy
The credit hours associated with classroom courses shall ordinarily be determined using the following formula: one credit hour for the combination of 50 minutes of classroom time or direct faculty instruction and an additional two hours of out-of-class work per week, over the course of a fifteen (15)-week semester. Designated seminar courses shall be scheduled for two hours per week of classroom time and carry three credit hours based on the substantial weekly reading, research, and writing that they entail. Non-classroom courses shall demonstrate an equivalent amount of work.
Credit for Non-Classroom Coursework
JD students may use a maximum of eighteen (18) credits in non-regularly scheduled classroom session coursework toward their ninety (90)-credit degree requirement. Examples of courses and activities included under the eighteen (18)-credit limit are Journals, Moot Court, Mock Trial, Practicums, and the non-classroom portion of Externships in which students are required to do work outside of the traditional classroom setting. A total of four (4) credits, in any combination, of Directed Research, Directed Study, and Supervised Research may be used toward fulfillment of the eighteen (18)-credit maximum.
Any non-classroom coursework taken above the specified limits will not count toward fulfilling the ninety (90)-credit degree requirement.
***NOTE: Emory sponsored clinics are excluded from the above restrictions.
Credit for Non-Law School Courses
Three-year JD students may use up to six (6) credit hours of coursework taken in other schools or divisions of Emory University toward the ninety (90) credit degree requirement with permission from Associate Dean of Students and Academic Programs or their designee.
Transfer students may not use non-law school courses toward degree requirement fulfillment.
JD dual-degree candidates may not use coursework taken in other divisions of Emory University for JD degree credit, nor take classes for degree credit beyond those accrued as part of the dual-degree program.
LLM and JM/MLS students may take one three (3)-credit class outside the law school and apply those credits toward their degree on a sat/unsat basis with permission of their program director.
Students must formally petition the Associate Dean of Students and Academic Programs or their designee for permission to enroll in any courses offered outside of Emory Law. Petitions must demonstrate a significant nexus between the desired course and the student’s professional goals and must demonstrate that those goals cannot be met with courses offered within the law school.