Paralegal Requirements in Oregon: Education, Certification and State Rules

Oregon's paralegal regulation is the Licensed Paralegal (LP) program: the Oregon Supreme Court granted the program final approval in July 2022, and licenses have been issued since 2024.

An LP is licensed for limited-scope legal work — advising and representing clients in settlement in family law and landlord-tenant matters — under the Supreme Court's Rules for Licensing Paralegals.

Outside the LP license, our research found no Oregon rule requiring a paralegal who works under an attorney's supervision to hold a license; the sources we read do not say this outright, so confirm with the Oregon State Bar.

As far as our research found, the supervised law-firm role is an education-and-hiring question, not a licensing one.

Our research did not surface an Oregon rule setting an education minimum for paralegals, so what employers ask for is a read-the-posting question.

What the state's own rules do set is the education the LP license recognizes: an associate's or higher paralegal degree, any bachelor's degree, or an ABA-accredited JD.

Education alone does not qualify an LP applicant — Oregon pairs it with 1,500 hours of substantive paralegal experience in the prior three years (750 hours in 18 months for JD holders), 20 hours of approved professional education and a pass on the LP subject-matter exams.

National certification eligibility sketches the preparation routes paralegals bring to that market: NALA's first CP eligibility category counts graduation from a paralegal program with ABA approval, an associate degree program, a post-baccalaureate paralegal certificate program, a bachelor's in paralegal studies, or a paralegal program of at least 60 semester hours with at least 15 semester hours of substantive legal courses.

A paralegal certificate and a paralegal certification are different things, as NALA draws the line: a certificate recognizes completing a learning program, a certification validates mastery against a professional standard, and finishing a paralegal course does not by itself make you a certified paralegal.

For a state-level credential, NFPA counts 16 state-level voluntary paralegal certifications, and an Oregon Certified Paralegal is on its list — our research did not verify that credential's requirements or sponsoring body.

The national options are NALA's Certified Paralegal, which runs a Knowledge Exam then a Skills Exam; NFPA's entry-level PCCE, which earns the CRP designation, and its advanced PACE, which earns the Registered Paralegal (RP) designation; and NALS's ALP, CLP and PP, with no NALS membership required for its exams.

These credentials carry weight in Oregon's own scheme: the LP education requirement can be waived for holders of the NALA CP, NFPA RP or CRP, or NALS PP, among other waiver categories.

Our research did not catalog Oregon's paralegal programs — no Oregon school appears in the sources behind this page — so we name none, and we state no count of ABA-approved programs: the ABA's directory page was not readable when we researched, so the count is not confirmed.

What the research does establish is how ABA approval works: a program chooses to seek it, the process runs through a self-evaluation report and an on-site visit, the ABA House of Delegates gives final approval, and approval lasts seven years — approval of programs, not a credential for individual paralegals.

Approval status matters to the routes Oregon's rules recognize: NALA's first CP eligibility category includes graduation from a paralegal program with ABA approval, and the LP education routes include an ABA-accredited JD.

For current options, search the ABA's paralegal program directory and confirm a program's status with the ABA and the school before you enroll.

The LP license is a license to practice in limited matters, not a title certificate.

LPs may help with divorce, separation, custody and parenting time, child and spousal support, and residential landlord-tenant and eviction (FED) cases; the scope excludes most appeals, Family Abuse Prevention Act cases and commercial or agricultural tenancies.

Qualifying takes the package described above — being at least 18, one of the recognized degrees, 1,500 hours of substantive paralegal experience in the prior three years (750 in 18 months for JD holders), 20 hours of approved professional education and a pass on the subject-matter exams — with education waivers for experienced paralegals, holders of the NALA CP, NFPA RP or CRP, or NALS PP, and military paralegals.

Keeping the license means CLE: active LPs complete 40 credit hours every three years, including 5 ethics hours and 26 hours specific to each licensed practice area.

As of October 2026, the Oregon State Bar's LP page lists the next LP subject-matter exams: Landlord-Tenant on October 24, 2026, and Family Law on April 30, 2027.

The program is young — approved in July 2022, licensing since 2024 — so treat the bar's LP pages as the running record, and confirm dates, registration and fees with the Oregon State Bar; LP fees were not captured in our research.