A new program at Alaska Pacific University will allow students to get sequential graduate business degrees and law degrees while staying in Alaska.

The dual MBA-JD program, to start in next fall’s semester, links the master of business administration program that already exists at the small private university in Anchorage with the degree program at Seattle University School of Law. Through dual admission, students who want to combine the degrees will be able to earn them on an accelerated schedule – and stay in Alaska at the same time, the universities said when they announced the program.

Students need not be enrolled in the dual program to get a law degree. They will be able, if they choose, to enroll solely in the law program, university officials said.

During an open house held Thursday on the APU campus, officials with both universities explained the partnership details.

Alaska, with no law school, is considered a “legal desert” requiring would-be attorneys to leave the state for their educations, Anthony Varona, dean of the Seattle University School of Law, said at the open house. Frequently, that results in law students from Alaska moving away for good and practicing law elsewhere, he said.

Through the new partnership, that no longer needs to be the case, he said.

“You are able to stay at home, keep living with your family, not move to Seattle,” he said. And afterward, he said, graduates can “stay where you are to practice law.”

The dual program would start with the MBA coursework, said Lincoln Garrett, an assistant professor of business who directs that program. Some of the courses needed for the MBA would count toward the law degree to be acquired later, he said.

While most of the law coursework — including independent work online — is to be done from Alaska, there would be some required on-site weekend sessions at Seattle University once the law program is underway, Varona and Colin Watrin, the law school’s assistant dean for administration, said in their presentation at the open house.

There are some factors that make Seattle University School of Law and Alaska Pacific University good fits for each other, the schools’ officials said.

Seattle University already has a “Flex JD” program that combines online and in-person learning, and it has proved popular and successful, Varona said.

There are more working attorneys in Alaska who are alumni of Seattle University School of Law than any other law school, Varona and Watrin said.

The law school has a focus on Indigenous studies, with a Center for Indian Law and Policy, and it just hired an Alaska Native law professor to lead the faculty there. Nazune Menka, who grew up in Anchorage and Chistochina and is both Koyukon Athabascan and Lumbee, is the law professor who will start in that position this summer, the school announced.

That Indigenous focus fits with the mission at APU, which is working toward becoming a tribal university.

While there is currently no option for attending law school within the state, there are some existing opportunities through the University of Alaska for students who want to become lawyers.

UAA has a partnership with Willamette University College of Law in Oregon and Case Western Reserve University School of Law in Ohio that allows students to get work through undergraduate and law degrees on accelerated timelines, for example, and UAF offers a prelaw program.