The Michigan State University College of Law was originally founded as Detroit College of Law and was the first law school in Detroit. In 1995, the school joined Michigan State University and moved from Detroit to a building on MSU's main campus in East Lansing two years later. Though its students use the university's research facilities, MSU Law remains a private law school and receives no funding from the university or the state. The school's academic specialties include indigenous law and child and family advocacy, and it offers certificates in both areas.

Mandatory classes occupy half of the required credit hours for graduation; the curriculum deviates from the traditional first-year core with an additional business enterprises class. Its collaboration with MSU allows the school to offer 12 formal dual degree programs with other departments across the university, including forestry, labor relations, and urban and regional planning. MSU also has a joint JD/LLB program, training students to practice in the U.S. and Canada, in which participants split their time between MSU Law and the University of Ottawa Faculty of Law.

MSU Law's alumni network is particularly strong in the upper Midwest and Canada, and most grads take jobs in Michigan. The school maintains graduate housing near the school, a perk many law students snatch up. The social atmosphere of the school has all the elements of a Big 10 school--a focus on sports and bars--and MSU Law has plenty of student organizations to choose from.