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Full-Text Articles in Law
What Lawyers Can Teach Their Employed Law Students About 'Impactful Legal Writing', Douglas E. Abrams
What Lawyers Can Teach Their Employed Law Students About 'Impactful Legal Writing', Douglas E. Abrams
Faculty Publications
This article concerns the value of teaching employed law students about the potency of “impactful legal writing” – legal writing that can have a substantial impact on someone other than the student writer. Much of the employer’s most instructive teaching about impactful legal writing occurs at the beginning of an assignment, rather than solely during review after the student has completed the assignment. This article identifies four ways an employed law student’s impactful writing when fulfilling assignments differs from the effect of students’ academic writing in law school. Each of the four ways enables the employer to deliver practical lessons …
Let's Teach Our Students Legal Technology... But What Should We Include?, Randy J. Diamond, Darin Fox, Kenneth J. Hirsh, Heidi Frostestad Kuehl, Michael Robak
Let's Teach Our Students Legal Technology... But What Should We Include?, Randy J. Diamond, Darin Fox, Kenneth J. Hirsh, Heidi Frostestad Kuehl, Michael Robak
Faculty Publications
A "renaissance” is often described as a cultural rebirth, a movement ushering in a modern age and leaving behind the old ways of doing things. There is every indication that we are entering a technology-driven renaissance in the legal profession. Artificial intelligence (AI), “big data,” document automation, e-discovery tools, cloud-based case management systems, and communication and collaboration tools are just a few of the ways that technology is transforming the practice of law in the twenty-first century.
Teaching And Scholarship Enrichment Through Involvement In Law Reform, R. Wilson Freyermuth
Teaching And Scholarship Enrichment Through Involvement In Law Reform, R. Wilson Freyermuth
Faculty Publications
One of the most important ways for faculty to enrich their teaching and scholarship is through meaningful connections with the practicing bar. One effective way of developing these connections is through involvement in law reform efforts. This Essay focuses on developing these connections along two dimensions-through the work of the Uniform Law Commission and through involvement with trade organizations or nonprofit groups.
Choosing A Criminal Procedure Casebook: On Lesser Evils And Free Books, Ben L. Trachtenberg
Choosing A Criminal Procedure Casebook: On Lesser Evils And Free Books, Ben L. Trachtenberg
Faculty Publications
Among the more important decisions a law teacher makes when preparing a new course is what materials to assign. Criminal procedure teachers are spoiled for choice, with legal publishers offering several options written by teams of renowned scholars. This Article considers how a teacher might choose from the myriad options available and suggests two potentially overlooked criteria: weight and price.
Impact Of Uniform Laws On The Teaching Of Trusts And Estates, David M. English
Impact Of Uniform Laws On The Teaching Of Trusts And Estates, David M. English
Faculty Publications
Beginning in 1969 with the approval of the Uniform Probate Code (UPC), uniform laws have had a major impact on the teaching of the basic Trusts and Estates course. This is not the place to list the close to thirty uniform acts relating to Trusts and Estates that have been approved. Rather, this Article will focus on the impact that uniform laws have had on the content of what is taught in the Trusts and Estates course. Uniform laws are not written in a vacuum. Like other legislative enactments, they are the product of societal changes and changes in legal …
Escaping From Lawyers' Prison Of Fear, John Lande
Escaping From Lawyers' Prison Of Fear, John Lande
Faculty Publications
Lawyers regularly experience numerous fears endemic to their work. This is not surprising considering that lawyers generally operate in environments that frequently stimulate many fears. Lawyers’ fears can lead them to enhance their performance due to increased preparation and effective “thinking on their feet.” Fear is problematic when it is out of proportion to actual threats, is expressed inappropriately, or is chronically unaddressed effectively. It can lead to sub-optimal and counterproductive performance through paralysis, ritualized behavior, or inappropriate aggression. Some lawyers’ fears unnecessarily prevent them from performing well, producing good results for clients, earning more income, and experiencing greater satisfaction …
Review Essay: Bilingual Legal Education In The United States: An Idea Whose Time Has Come, S. I. Strong
Review Essay: Bilingual Legal Education In The United States: An Idea Whose Time Has Come, S. I. Strong
Faculty Publications
The long-standing and close connection among law, language and the state has traditionally led law schools to provide legal education in a single language. Indeed, bilingual legal education could in some cases be viewed as potentially contrary to state interests, given that "[t]he main instrument of nation-building is the imposition of a common state language. Indeed, bilingual legal education could in some cases be viewed as potentially contrary to state interests, given that "[t]he main instrument of nation-building is the imposition of a common state language."' However, the historical model of monolingual legal education may be in jeopardy. For example, …
Lessons From Teaching Students To Negotiate Like A Lawyer, John M. Lande
Lessons From Teaching Students To Negotiate Like A Lawyer, John M. Lande
Faculty Publications
This article reports my observations from teaching those courses and offers suggestions for future efforts to improve legal education. My experience supports the (1) focus on negotiation in a wide range of situations in addition to the final resolution of disputes and transactions, (2) addition of "ordinary legal negotiation" to the two traditional theories of negotiation, and (3) use of multi-stage simulations in addition to traditional single-stage simulations. These approaches were critical in providing students with a more realistic understanding of negotiation. This article also describes experiments with other teaching techniques in my courses.
Reforming Legal Education To Prepare Law Students Optimally For Real-World Practice, John M. Lande
Reforming Legal Education To Prepare Law Students Optimally For Real-World Practice, John M. Lande
Faculty Publications
This article synthesizes major points in the October 2012 symposium of the University of Missouri School of Law Center for the Study of Dispute Resolution, entitled "Overcoming Barriers in Preparing Law Students for Real-World Practice." There is a growing consensus that American law schools need to do a better job of preparing students to practice law. Teaching students to think like a lawyer is still necessary but it is not sufficient for students to act like a lawyer soon after they graduate.
Teaching Legal History In The Age Of Practical Legal Education, Douglas E. Abrams
Teaching Legal History In The Age Of Practical Legal Education, Douglas E. Abrams
Faculty Publications
Historian Henry Steele Commager said, “History is useful in the sense that art is useful--or music or poetry or flowers; perhaps even in the sense that religion and philosophy is useful .... For without these things life would be poorer and meaner.” For law students who anticipate a career representing private and public clients and participating in public discussion, however, study of legal history carries rewards beyond intellectual stimulation and personal satisfaction. Law students contemplating client representation should ponder Justice Holmes's advice that “[h]istory must be a part of the study [of law], because without it we cannot know the …
The Potential Contribution Of Adr To An Integrated Curriculum: Preparing Law Students For Real World Lawyering, John M. Lande, Jean R. Sternlight
The Potential Contribution Of Adr To An Integrated Curriculum: Preparing Law Students For Real World Lawyering, John M. Lande, Jean R. Sternlight
Faculty Publications
This Article briefly reviews the long history of critiques of legal education that highlight the failure to adequately prepare students for what they will and should do as attorneys. It takes a sober look at the hurdles reformers face when trying to make significant curricular changes and proposes a modest menu of reforms that interested faculty and law schools can largely achieve without investing substantial additional resources.This Article emphasizes the special contributions that alternative dispute resolution (ADR) can provide to legal education more generally. ADR instruction is an important corrective to a curriculum that routinely conveys the erroneous implication that …
Developing Better Lawyers And Lawyering Practices: Introduction To The Symposium On Innovative Models Of Lawyering, John M. Lande
Developing Better Lawyers And Lawyering Practices: Introduction To The Symposium On Innovative Models Of Lawyering, John M. Lande
Faculty Publications
This article provides an overview of a symposium sponsored by the University of Missouri Center for the Study of Dispute Resolution in 2007 that featured leading practitioners and scholars to analyze innovative models of lawyering, including Collaborative Law and other processes. The authors include David Hoffman, Nancy Welsh, Julie Macfarlane, Richard Shields, Pauline Tesler, Scott Peppet, Forrest ("Woody") Mosten, Jeanne Fahey, Kathy Bryan, Lawrence McLellan, and John Lande. The articles address issues including: teaching law students to "feel" like lawyers and not just "think" like them, using "conflict resolution advocacy" (which is not necessarily oriented to the courts), developing lawyers' …
How Much Justice Can We Afford?: Defining The Courts' Roles And Deciding The Appropriate Number Of Trials, Settlement Signals, And Other Elements Needed To Administer Justice, John M. Lande
Faculty Publications
This article discusses how the U.S. court system can function optimally given declining trial rates and the limited resources available. The question of how much justice we can afford is a challenge that becomes more difficult as budgets fall behind the increasing demand for and cost of court services. Presumably most analysts would agree that courts should try cases when appropriate - and help litigants find just resolutions without trial when it is not needed. The courts' ability to provide trials in some cases is possible only if the vast majority of other cases are not tried.This article provides background …
Advancing Public Interest Practitioner Research Skills In Legal Education, Randy J. Diamond
Advancing Public Interest Practitioner Research Skills In Legal Education, Randy J. Diamond
Faculty Publications
The information revolution has dramatically altered the legal research landscape, expanding the bounds of legal authority. Practitioner research requires more than traditional legal research. It also encompasses factual investigation, non-legal information, interdisciplinary and audience research. Many new lawyers are ill-prepared to research novel and unusual situations, to cope with unwritten laws and local customs, and to meet shifting authority expectations.
Should Antitrust Education Be Mandatory (For Law School Administrators)?, Thom Lambert, Royce De R. Barondes
Should Antitrust Education Be Mandatory (For Law School Administrators)?, Thom Lambert, Royce De R. Barondes
Faculty Publications
The purpose of this essay is merely to examine the pertinent antitrust issues. The essay proceeds on the assumption that the AALS policy, whose terms are precatory, speaks to what is in fact an agreement among law schools. As noted below, the policy itself contemplates that law school deans will seek waivers, in individual cases, extending the time periods for up to two months. Were the policy to be litigated, law schools might dispute the existence of an agreement. We believe, though, that the nature of the policy strongly suggests that it represents an agreement among law schools and that …
What Law Schools Can Learn From Billy Beane And The Oakland Athletics , Rafael Gely, Paul L. Caron
What Law Schools Can Learn From Billy Beane And The Oakland Athletics , Rafael Gely, Paul L. Caron
Faculty Publications
In Moneyball, Michael Lewis writes about a story with which he fell in love, a story about professional baseball and the people that play it. A surprising number of books and articles have been written by law professors who have had long love affairs with baseball. These books and articles are a two-way street, with baseball and law each informing and enriching the other. For example, law professors versed in antitrust, labor, property, tax, and tort law have brought their legal training to bear on particular aspects of baseball. Law professors also have mined their passion for baseball in extracting …
Taking Back The Law School Classroom: Using Technology To Foster Active Student Learning , Rafael Gely, Paul L. Caron
Taking Back The Law School Classroom: Using Technology To Foster Active Student Learning , Rafael Gely, Paul L. Caron
Faculty Publications
Law schools (and indeed all of higher education) have witnessed an explosive growth in the use of technology in the classroom. Many law teachers now deploy a wide array of technological bells and whistles, including PowerPoint slides, Web-based course platforms, in-class Internet access, and the like. Students, in turn, increasingly come to class armed with laptop computers to harvest the fruits of the classroom experience. Yet in recent years there has been something of a backlash, with various law teachers arguing that this technology is interfering with, rather than improving, pedagogy in the classroom. According to the critics, the technology …
Damages: Using A Case Study To Teach Law, Dispute Resolution, And Lawyering , Melody Richardson Daily, Chris Guthrie, Leonard L. Riskin
Damages: Using A Case Study To Teach Law, Dispute Resolution, And Lawyering , Melody Richardson Daily, Chris Guthrie, Leonard L. Riskin
Faculty Publications
Seven law school faculty members and one practicing attorney recently developed and taught a wholly new kind of law course based on an already published case study, Damages: One Family's Legal Struggles in the World of Medicine, by Barry Werth, an investigative reporter who spent several years researching to write the book. Damages, an in-depth account of a medical malpractice case, presents the perspectives of the injured family, the defendant physician, the lawyers, and the three mediators. In this Symposium Introduction, the authors provide a summary of Werth's book, explain why they decided to create a course based on his …
Imagine: A Comment On "A Liberal Education In Law", Melody Richardson Daily
Imagine: A Comment On "A Liberal Education In Law", Melody Richardson Daily
Faculty Publications
While I was impressed with Professor Parker's paper for many reasons, to me her single most striking assertion is this: "Practicing law--and learning law-is at heart an imaginative enterprise."' It is a sentence that should be carved above the entrance to every law school. Few practicing attorneys would disagree with Professor Parker's observation. After all, if imagination is the ability to deal creatively with reality, then imagination is essential for each of the ten fundamental lawyering skills listed in the MacCrate Report. For example, no lawyer can succeed in problem-solving without first engaging in the process of imagining multiple possible …
(Seven Principles For Good Practice In Legal Education): Principle 5: Good Practice Emphasizes Time On Task, R. Lawrence Dessem
(Seven Principles For Good Practice In Legal Education): Principle 5: Good Practice Emphasizes Time On Task, R. Lawrence Dessem
Faculty Publications
Time plus energy equals learning. Efficient time-management skills are critical for students and professors alike. Allocating realistic amounts of time means effective learning for students and effective teaching for faculty. How an institution defines time expectations for students, faculty, administrators, and other professional staff can establish the basis for high performance for all. The fifth principle for good practice in undergraduate education is almost a truism: good practice emphasizes time on task. In their original statement of the seven principles, Arthur W. Chickering and Zelda F. Gamson expressed this as a mathematical formula: “Time plus energy equals learning.” Time on …
Law And The Wisconsin Idea, Erika Lietzan, Paul D. Carrington
Law And The Wisconsin Idea, Erika Lietzan, Paul D. Carrington
Faculty Publications
We recall a summer of contentment when American law was suffused with optimism, a season ending a long winter of despair and disorder. For the first fifteen years of this century, many (and perhaps most) American lawyers were filled with confidence that America had healed the wounds of civil war and was healing those of class struggle. We could, and we would, overcome all obstacles to peace and prosperity, not only for our people but for all mankind. This, it was widely believed, would be our century. As early as 1879 Daniel Coit Gilman, the premier educator of his time, …
The Revolving Door Part I: A Federal Prosecutor Returns To School, Frank O. Bowman Iii
The Revolving Door Part I: A Federal Prosecutor Returns To School, Frank O. Bowman Iii
Faculty Publications
Law teaching is hard work. To my trial lawyer friends who expressed envy at the easy life I must be enjoying, I often said they should imagine having to prepare and present five or six oral arguments a week, every week, for months on end. To the novice teacher presenting several courses for the first time, the task often feels just that daunting. As practicing lawyers, we flatter ourselves that we are "experts" in our fields, and thus that it would be a simple matter to step over to the local law school and, with minimal preparation, unburden ourselves of …
Judicial Knowledge, William B. Fisch
Judicial Knowledge, William B. Fisch
Faculty Publications
This paper reviews rules governing the use by judges in United States courts of their personal knowledge - as distinguished from that supplied by the parties in the adjudication of a civil case, whether of the particular facts out of which the dispute arises, or of general information with which the particular facts must be processed, or of law which is to be applied to the particular facts.
The Legal Profession, Legal Education, And Change, Robert H. Jerry Ii
The Legal Profession, Legal Education, And Change, Robert H. Jerry Ii
Faculty Publications
The accounts of how the legal profession has changed in recent years are as abundant as the changes themselves. The common message is clear: the magnitude of change is immense, and the pace is unprecedented.
Missouri Law Review Fellows Program Inaugurated, Dale A. Whitman
Missouri Law Review Fellows Program Inaugurated, Dale A. Whitman
Faculty Publications
The Missouri Law Review has a distinguished history of service to the legal profession and the academic community. First published more than fifty years ago, the Review has printed many articles and student notes which have served to improve the administration of justice, while at the same time providing hundreds of second- and third-year law students with a uniquely valuable experience in legal analysis, scholarship, and editing. Membership on the Review has become an important credential, reflecting credit on the student members and enhancing their attractiveness to law firms seeking associates and judges seeking clerks.
Preface: Missouri Law Review--1913-1936-1986, Dale A. Whitman
Preface: Missouri Law Review--1913-1936-1986, Dale A. Whitman
Faculty Publications
The half-century from 1936 to 1986 has seen astonishing growth in the law and in legal education. Among countless illustrations are the enormous expansion of the law of products liability, the promulgation and adoption of numerous Model and Uniform Acts and Codes, and the adoption of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure and of Evidence. In Missouri, procedural civil and criminal codes have been created, a new Constitution has been adopted, and the judiciary has recently abandoned the doctrine of contributory negligence in favor of a system of pure comparative fault, working a fundamental change in our common law of …
The Design Of Videotape Systems For Legal Education, Dale A. Whitman, Gerald R. Williams
The Design Of Videotape Systems For Legal Education, Dale A. Whitman, Gerald R. Williams
Faculty Publications
Over the past 20 years in which videotape technology has been commercially available, considerable literature has offered encouragement and advice concerning its general educational applications. More recently, a developing body of literature, materials, and practices has brought videotape to the attention of legal educators. One of the chief impediments to realization of the full potential of videotape in legal education, however, is the lack of an adequate description of the necessary facilities and electronic equipment. This comment will discuss the basic uses of videotape in legal education and the physical facilities and equipment (including types, arrangement, and costs) that might …