Law School Hires Branding Firm In Search for Unified Name

Boalt Hall School of Law administrators are working with a corporate identity and brand strategy consultant to rename the school in an effort to make it more recognizable.

The school has hired Marshall Strategy Inc., based in San Francisco, to help them develop a more standardized name in response to concerns that there is no consistent identifier.

According to Susan Gluss, a law school spokesperson, the school’s communications department goes by University of California, Berkeley, School of Law (Boalt Hall) but the institution is also commonly referred to as Berkeley Boalt Hall School of Law, UC Berkeley School of Law or Boalt Hall.

“There really is no one name that is used, you’ll see dozens of different iterations of the name,” she said. “We want one single strong standardized name.”

Boalt is working with the company to brainstorm potential names and the school will have the final say in the decision, which is set to be made public in January, Gluss said.

According to Nan E. Joesten, president of the Boalt Alumni Association, the current name lacks association with UC Berkeley and causes confusion for students and alumni.

“It can get very disjointed,” Joesten said. “If you look at our peer schools, it’s NYU School of Law, Harvard Law School, Stanford Law School. Very few of them go by a name different than their parent school.”

When graduates from the law school begin practicing many clients who are unfamiliar with the legal field find the name Boalt Hall unrecognizable, Joesten said. Instead, she said a more direct identification with UC Berkeley could alleviate confusion.

“(When) you say UC Berkeley law school, people know who you’re talking about,” Joesten said.

The renaming project is part of the mission of a recently formed strategic identity committee which is working towards communicating a better understanding of the law school, she said.

Sybil Wyatt, the executive director of communications and marketing for Boalt Hall and the leader of the renaming project, was unavailable for comment yesterday.

Some law students said they felt changing the name represents an attempt to increase the law school’s prestige.

According to Chia-Chi Li, a third-year law student, the school should focus more on maintaining funding and faculty.

“The more important question is what we’re doing to preserve a top-tier institution,” he said.

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