You are an attorney. Whether you have been practicing for several years or just graduated from law school, there are several reasons why taking that extra year to obtain an LLM might be a good move for you.

The benefits can far outweigh the personal costs, depending upon your reasons for pursuing the advanced degree. The typical demographics for LLM degree programs are those attorneys who are: (1) pursuing an academic career, for which an LLM degree is useful; (2) practicing in a field of specialization, such as tax, in which most practitioners have the advanced degree; (3) retooling their skills to practice in a field of law outside their existing practice; (4) seeking to update their knowledge of their field of law; and (5) relocating to a new geographic area. Each of these groups of individuals have their own motivations for considering an advanced degree, and certain benefits flow more for one group than for another.

In general, those law graduates who have their ambitions set on teaching law benefit from spending the extra post-graduate year focusing on a field of law in depth. While law schools provide a solid base legal education and, more frequently, the opportunity to undertake a specialization, the additional year of study provides an opportunity to do research and significant writing in the field.

It is not uncommon for attorneys to experience a transitional period for personal or professional reasons. While this can be a period of growth, pursuing an LLM degree helps focus the attorneys on a field into which they can more confidently step. In this way, an LLM degree can help attorneys retool, explore career opportunities, and gather additional legal knowledge. Retooling, as a term of art, means that an attorney with one set of skills (e.g., general litigation skills) wants to either apply those skills to another field (e.g., intellectual property litigation) or wants to begin developing a new set of skills (e.g., moving from litigation to corporate transactions). The year spent on the LLM can help these attorneys move forward with their practice change.

One significant benefit of participating in an LLM degree program is the opportunity to network with other attorneys and within the legal community of the university. For every attorney in an advanced degree program, the ability to meet other attorneys with a common goal is invaluable. Whether you are relocating, retooling, or reevaluating your current practice, the ability to meet similar-minded attorneys through an LLM degree program can be one of the best decisions of your career.

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Elizabeth E. Powers is assistant dean for the International and Comparative Law programs at Santa Clara University. Vicki Huebner is assistant dean for the Law Career Services department at Santa Clara University School of Law.