Rule 9 Certification

Rule 9 Application

Washington Supreme Court Admission and Practice Rule (APR) 9 grants a limited license to law students, Washington Supreme Court APR 6 law clerks, and recent law school graduates to practice law under the supervision of a lawyer who has at least three years of active legal experience.

Eligibility

You must have completed two-thirds of your program (60 credits for full-time students; 54 credits for part-time students) by the time you will start as a Rule 9 intern. Please contact lawreg@seattleu.edu for any questions about this requirement.

Process

You will fill out the online application on the WSBA website: admissions.wsba.org/home. One of the additional forms you have to upload is the "Certificate for Law School". You will email the Registrar's Office (lawreg@seattleu.edu) a copy of this form with your name filled out for our office to complete. Please allow 48 business hours for turnaround.

We no longer require a completed copy of the Rule 9 Application for your file. However, it is your responsibility to let us know if you submit something relating to Character and Fitness with your Rule 9 Application that you did not disclose on your application to law school. If you are unsure what you reported on your law school application you can email lawreg@seattleu.edu for a copy. Please allow up to 48 business hours turnaround.

Helpful Tips:

• You cannot submit your application earlier than 4 weeks before you are scheduled to start your intern/externship.

• When answering the first question "Please Answer one of the following questions to determine..." select the first option if you will complete two-thirds of your program by the time you start as a Rule 9 intern (60 credits for full-time; 54 credits for part-time) by the time you start as a Rule 9 intern you are eligible.

• You will need to provide all residences for the last 10 years or since you were 18 years old; whichever is longer.

  • If you are unsure of all the address you lived at, some good places to see your former addresses are credit checks (Credit Karma does this for free without a hard check on your credit) and online retailers (i.e., the address book from Amazon keeps track of all addresses you have ever sent a package to).

• You will also need to provide a list of all employers and supervisors (including contact email) for the last 10 years or since you were 18; whichever is shorter.

• The question about "is the program entirely online?" does not apply to COVID times as the program is intended as an in-person program.

• When you select "country" in the numerous address fields, it sometimes does not stick, and you will have to go back in and re-select it. The application will notify you if something is missing on any given section, so you will be able to easily find the issue and fix it.