Peter Cramer

Peter Cramer, a self-described “lawyer-linguist,” has been working in legal education for over 25 years. 

Experience & Education

Dr. Cramer has worked for a number of law schools across his career.

• He started his law school career at Indiana University Maurer School of Law.
• Later, he went to Georgetown University Law Center, where he served as the Associate Director of the Center for Global Legal English.
• For nine years prior to joining Spivey Consulting Group, Dr. Cramer worked as the Assistant Dean for Graduate and International Students at Washington University School of Law, where he focused primarily on admissions, course counseling, and instruction.
• Dr. Cramer has read and evaluated countless J.D. applications, as he often contributed to the decision-making process for international applicants and those with mixed educational backgrounds. He was frequently consulted by J.D. admissions because of his profound knowledge of foreign cultures and educational systems.

Trained in law in Germany, Dr. Cramer went to the USA to receive a degree in TESOL (Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages); he earned a PhD in Language Education and also received an LLM.

Some of Dr. Cramer’s accomplishments include the following.

• He developed the first 2-Year LLM program in the US at Georgetown and a similar program at WashU.
• He has co-authored a book on drafting contracts in Legal English (a page turner).
• He has taught classes at Harvard, Cairo University, and Aoyama Gakuin University in Japan, and he is a regular lecturer at CUPL in China.
• From 2010 to 2023, he worked on the Washington University Selection Committee for Fulbright Scholarships for English Teaching Assistants (ETA) and Research and Study Fellows and worked closely with the Fulbright Program to review Fulbright applications of international applicants. In this capacity, he reviewed hundreds of applications and interviewed dozens of applicants.
• He ran successful JD student exchange programs with internationally renowned law schools such as La Sorbonne, Bucerius Law School, Utrecht University, Trento Law, CUPL- Beijing, Korea University and others.

Over the course of his work at various law schools, he has reviewed thousands of applications of JD, LLM, JSD, and MLS students, written by native and nonnative speakers alike.

Consulting Approach

Every year, Dr. Cramer advises an equal share of  LLM and JD applicants from abroad or with extensive foreign backgrounds.

Dr. Cramer has developed a profound sense of knowing “what’s good, what’s bad, and what’s terrible.” His advice to any applicant is always to be as genuine and sincere as possible in telling their story.

Personal Note

In his free time, Dr. Cramer is an avid biker. He lives in a tiny home in Saint Louis and regularly travels abroad with his polyglot family.