Alaska's nickname is The Last Frontier—an apt moniker for legal education in the only state without a law school.

That's changing, however. Next week, Seattle University School of Law opens a satellite campus enabling third-year law students to spend a full academic year studying and interning in Anchorage. It's one of a handful of law campuses in the lower 48 with Alaska ties. Duke Law School, Northeastern University School of Law and the University of Washington School of Law also have made inroads in the state through partnerships with local universities, continuing legal education courses, and internship programs.

Before becoming one of the six inaugural participants at the Seattle University School of Law satellite campus in Anchorage, Glen Rice, a third-year student, spent two summers in the city as an intern in federal and local public defender offices. A Seattle native, Rice explored the Anchorage area on a rented motorcycle in the summer of 2014 and opted to return both for the city's outdoor lifestyle and its tight-knit lawyer network.

“The legal community up here is phenomenal,” Rice said of Anchorage. “I've never felt like a stranger, and I was given substantive work from Day 1. That's one of the things that made me come back.”

Seattle's satellite campus expands upon the school's Alaska summer program, which for 13 years has brought students to Anchorage—the heart of the state's legal scene—in two-month stints. The American Bar Association signed off on the long-planned Alaska campus in December.

“As an Alaskan, this was never an opportunity when I was going to law school,” said Stephanie Nichols, who grew up in Fairbanks and serves as the executive director of the Seattle law school's Alaska program. “This first-ever Alaska satellite campus changes the future landscape of Alaska and will have an impact on future generations who decide to enter the legal profession here.”

Open to third-year students from any ABA-accredited law school, the program is geared toward those originally from Alaska or who aspire to move there after graduation. Between the summer program and the third year, students can potentially spend half their law school careers in state rather than “Outside,” as locals call anywhere beyond Alaska's borders.

The Alaska Supreme Court endorsed the satellite campus, as did the Alaska Bar Association and Alaska Pacific University, which is housing the satellite law campus. The court system is lending a courtroom and its law library to the effort.

“We are very interested in increasing the diversity of the Alaska bar and bench,” said Alaska Supreme Court Justice Dana Fabe. “Alaskans, and particularly rural Alaskans, have always been forced to relocate for three years to get a law degree. Our view is that if more rural Alaskans and Alaska Natives can complete one half of their law school education in state, that will be a wonderful step forward in increasing the diversity of the bar, and eventually the bench.”

Seattle Law's third-year program is starting small with just six students, including one each from the University of Wyoming College of Law and the University of North Dakota School of Law. Students from other law schools are treated as visitors at Seattle Law and will receive their diplomas from their home institutions.

Bob Onders, a physician and third year at Wyoming, enrolled in the new program as a way to stay involved in Native Alaskan health issues. He previously spent five years on the Alaskan island of Kodiak working in a Native Alaskan health clinic and handling policy matters.

“I think it's a great opportunity if you are going to stay in Alaska and want to be connected to the legal community here,” Onders said.

Seattle isn't the only law school eyeing Alaska.

“We've been very interested in Alaska for a number of years,” said Patricia Kuszler, vice dean at the University of Washington School of Law. “We've been working with the University of Alaska Anchorage's Justice Center to build a pipeline program to identify promising students and bring them in through our 3+3 program.”

Both Washington and Willamette University College of Law in Salem, Oregon, have launched so-called “3+3 programs” with the University of Alaska Anchorage in recent years. Those partnerships allow qualified students to complete both an undergraduate degree and a law degree in six years instead of the typical seven.

Washington Law holds a monthly continuing legal education session that pairs a faculty member with a local practitioner to discuss legal topics of interest to the local bar, Kuszler said. And last year the school convened a group discussion with other law schools about opportunities in the state and possible collaborations. Willamette, William Mitchell College of Law, Duke, and Northeastern were among the participants.

Duke publishes the Alaska Law Review with funding from the Alaska Bar Association.

Northeastern has longstanding ties to the state through its co-op program and claims nearly 100 graduates working there, including Justice Fabe, said dean Jeremy Paul. Many Northeastern students completed co-op work placements in Alaska over the years, fell in love with the state, and opted to return after graduation, he said.

The University of Alaska conducted several law school feasibility studies over the past 40 years, but concluded that there is not enough local demand to justify opening a campus, said Alaska Bar Association Executive Director Deborah O'Regan.

Bar membership currently stands at 4,283, though less than 2,500 lawyers live and practice in the state. About 140 people apply to take the Alaska bar exam in a given year. “Alaska undergraduates gravitate toward the law schools in the Northwest—the three schools in Washington and the three schools in Oregon,” said Ryan Fortson, a legal studies professor at the University of Alaska Anchorage who counsels students interested in law school. “I tell students there are a lot of connections between those schools and Alaska, which is helpful if they want to return here and practice. But some of his students never pursue a law degree because they don't want to leave the state, he added.

Historically, many of Alaska's lawyers grew up elsewhere, but things are starting to change, O'Regan said.

“Now, when I'm looking at bar exam applications, I'm seeing second-generation names,” she said. “That means people whose parents are lawyers and they're coming back to take the bar. I'm seeing a lot more homegrown lawyers now. That's the nature of the population and of Alaska, kind of growing up.”

For Rice, the small size of Alaska's bar means many opportunities for law students and young lawyers. He plans to stay in Alaska and become a public defender.

“I don't know where I could have gone in Seattle to get the same experience, in terms of the sheer number of cases I've been a part of and the number of bail hearings I've handled,” he said of his most recent internship. “When you get thrown into the deep end, you learn to swim very fast.”

Correction: A previous version of this story misidentified Alaska's nickname. Also, a term in a quote by Alaska Supreme Court Justice Dana Fabe has been changed from “Native Alaskans” to “Alaska Natives,” the accurate term for indigenous people.