Digital Commons Network^™

Originalism, Methodolatry, And The Only Guarantee Of Wisconsin, Chad M. Oldfather

Faculty Publications

Originalism, loosely defined, commands a majority on the Supreme Court and dominates legal discourse in a way that would have been unrecognizable a generation ago. Yet its actual constraining effect on judicial behavior remains doubtful. This Article offers two contributions to the long-running debate. First, it identifies a pathology in both originalist scholarship and practice that it terms "methodolatry"—a preoccupation with methodological refinement that threatens to elevate method over the purposes interpretation is meant to serve. Second, and more importantly, it argues that debates over interpretive method, however vigorous, fail to address the core problem. Text and history offer relatively …

Turning Risks Of Cheating With Ai Into Opportunities For Better Teaching, John M. Lande

Faculty Publications

Many law school faculty are concerned that students may misuse artificial intelligence (AI) tools to undermine their learning and violate academic integrity policies.  Although some students will inevitably cheat, faculty can reduce the risk – and improve student learning – by rethinking assignment design and classroom communication.

This article frames the risk of AI-related cheating as an opportunity for pedagogical improvement.  It offers practical strategies to help faculty design assignments that enhance student learning, promote good decision-making, discourage inappropriate AI use, and foster responsible AI literacy.  It outlines approaches consistent with the ABA’s new requirement for formative assessment throughout the …

Confessions Of A Beginning Dutch Learner, Kristin Lems

Faculty Publications

I have studied, taught about, and learned new languages throughout my lifespan. In fact, it has been the very core of my teaching career.  Now, I have the humbling experience of testing those truths against a new enterprise:  learning Dutch.  I spent last summer in the Netherlands, pursuing family roots and acquiring what Dutch I could.  I took no formal classes but did attend a free dropin class at the local library, where - believe me - I was the lowest learner in the lowest group! Here are some of my insights, from notes taken during that summer:

Access To Primary Care And Health Care Fragmentation, Sharona Hoffman, Ishani Ganguli

Faculty Publications

This Article examines the growing crisis of long primary care wait times and the health care fragmentation that is associated with them. Patients who feel ill or are worried about new symptoms must often wait weeks or longer for appointments. In the wake of excessive wait times for primary care physician (PCP) appointments, patients increasingly turn to convenience care models such as urgent care centers, retail clinics, direct-to-consumer telemedicine, and at-home testing. While these alternatives offer prompt attention, they sacrifice other core functions of primary care and may exacerbate poor health outcomes and inequities. The Article argues that long wait …

Do Cohort Restatements Generate Contagion? A Re-Examination, Melissa F. Lewis-Western, Timothy Seidel, Michael S. Wilkins

Faculty Publications

Gleason, Jenkins, and Johnson (2008) provide evidence that restatements lead to stock price declines among non-restating industry peer firms, suggesting that investors perceive contemporaneous manipulation within the industry. In contrast, Kedia, Koh, and Rajgopal (2015) find that restatements—especially less severe ones—encourage peer firms to initiate earnings manipulation. These divergent findings, together with the rising prevalence of less severe restatements and advances in monitoring technologies, motivate a re-examination of manipulation contagion. Although we are able to replicate the results of both seminal studies, we find that the results in Kedia, Koh, and Rajgopal (2015) are sensitive to design choices that affect …

When Money Moves In: The Consequences Of Housing Wealth, Darren Aiello, Jason Kotter, Gregor Schubert

Faculty Publications

We construct a novel dataset of millions of household moves over 25 years to examine how housing wealth affects purchase decisions. We find that a $1 exogenous increase in housing equity leads movers to pay a $0.06 premium on their next home, controlling for property characteristics and time-varying local prices. This behavior is driven by search frictions— wealthier households pay a premium rather than incur additional search costs. In aggregate, these decisions spill over to the broader housing market and cause upward regional price pressure. A 10% increase in equity gain among incoming movers increases local house price growth by …

Thriving In The Middle: The Role Of Mindfulness, Psychological Capital, And Supervisor Support For Assistant Principals, Susan Kim, Peter Williams, Mei Jiang, Teresa Farler

Faculty Publications

Purpose: This study investigates the well-being of public-school assistant principals by examining how socio-cognitive mindfulness (SCM), psychological capital (PsyCap), tenure, and perceived supervisor support (PSS) contribute to their experience of thriving, a construct reflecting overall well-being.

Design/Methodology: This cross-sectional quantitative study explored the mediating role of PsyCap, PSS, and tenure in the relationship of SCM and thriving among public school assistant principals in Texas.

Findings: SCM, PsyCap, and PSS were all positively associated with holistic thriving. PsyCap fully mediated the relationship between SCM and thriving, but PSS did not mediate it. This study identified a portable resource-building route (SCM → …

Excellence In Onboarding: A Case Study Of Campus Leader Support For Early-Career Teachers, Kelsey Bowles, Peter E. Williams, Alicia Piechowiak

Faculty Publications

Purpose: It is critical in industries experiencing labor shortages and high attrition rates, as is the case for early-career teachers (ECTs) in Texas, to understand effective early-career supports and how they contribute to career persistence and effectiveness. This study examines the context-specific onboarding experiences of ECTs and the leadership practices they found valuable.

Design/Methodology: This qualitative, collective case study used a positive deviance approach to examine teacher onboarding experiences. Located in a high-needs, urban public-school campus with atypically low teacher turnover and high student academic achievement. We interviewed eight mid-career teachers about their early-career experiences of supervisor and organizational …

Teaching Evolution After Kennedy And Mahmoud, Alexander Gouzoules

Faculty Publications

One of the longest running disputes at the intersection of education law and the First Amendment has involved conflict over evolutionary biology in American public schools. Through a century of nearly continuous litigation, creationist legislation and parental demands to exempt students from science instruction have been constrained by longstanding First Amendment doctrines.

That settlement is now unraveling. In Kennedy v. Bremerton School District, the Supreme Court abandoned its prior approach to the Establishment Clause in favor of a history-and-tradition analysis that is ill-suited to questions about modern scientific education. And in Mahmoud v. Taylor, the Court held that students' compulsory …

Regulatory History And Judicial Review, Todd Phillips, Anthony L. Moffa

Faculty Publications

The Administrative Procedure Act requires federal agencies to simply "incorporate in the rules adopted a concise general statement of their basis and purpose" after they receive comments from the public, and the Supreme Court ruled in Overton Park that courts are to adjudicate whether rules are arbitrary and capricious based on agencies' contemporaneous rationales. Judge-created doctrines incentivize agencies to rely on these "concise" statements to elucidate their rationales, and as a result, rulemaking preambles have ballooned in size as agencies seek to insulate themselves from critical courts.

This article contends that although the APA's statutory requirement is in tension with …

Rosenwald Rural School Libraries, Suzanne Marie Stauffer

Faculty Publications

The Rosenwald Rural School Libraries Program was created as an adjunct to the Rosenwald Rural Schools Program, which funded the construction of 4,977 rural Black school buildings in fifteen Southern states, 395 of them in Louisiana. However, it soon became apparent that providing textbooks was not enough to promote literacy and develop self-directed reading among students. The officers and agents of the Fund realized fairly early in the Rural Schools Program that there was a want of reading materials in the South in general. Beginning in 1927, the Rosenwald Fund began providing collections of graded fiction and non-fiction books to …

Grandmothers Of Invention: A Commentary On Fifty Years Of Hazards And Disasters Research And Practice In The United States, Susan L. Cutter, Kathleen Tierney

Faculty Publications

This commentary highlights the role of “grandmothers of invention”: women in the United States who were the first to enter the field of hazards and disasters as core researchers and who played key roles in advancing the science and practice of hazards/disasters research since 1975. We examine the evolution and transformation of the field from the perspective of the women who were initially entering a male-dominated field. The innovations in theory, concepts, tools, topics, and mentoring the next generation of scholars and practitioners are highlighted. Notably, emphasis on these women's singular and collective influence on practice and policy highlights the …

Reinforcement Learning-Enabled Control And Design Of Rigid-Link Robotic Fish: A Comprehensive Review, Nhat Dinh, Darion Vosbein, Yuehua Wang, Qingsong Cui

Faculty Publications

With the rising demand for maritime surveys of infrastructure, energy resources, and environmental conditions, autonomous robotic fish have emerged as a promising solution with their biomimetic propulsion, agile motion, efficiency, and capacity for underwater inspection, monitoring, data collection, and exploration tasks in complex aquatic environments. Inspired by fish spines, rigid-link fish robots (RLFRs), a category of robotic fish, are widely utilized in robotics research and applications. Their rigid, actuated joints enable them to reproduce the undulatory locomotion and high maneuverability of biological fishes, while the modular nature of rigid links between joints makes them cost-effective and easy to assemble. This …

Navigating Racist Spaces Through Radical Self-Care: A Photovoice Exploration Of The Experiences Of Black Graduate Students, Laetitia Adelson, Cherese Fine, Dion Harry, Keneisha Harrington, Rebecca Lynn Morgan Ph.D., Tomiko Smalls, Jerad Green, Courtney Allen, Anuoluwapo Bankole, Robin Phelps-Ward

Faculty Publications

This manuscript examines the impact of racist campus climates for Black graduate students at a predominantly white institution. Using a photovoice methodological design, this study illuminates students’ ability to thrive through radical self-care despite the many racist factors, incidents, and systems at the institution. The paper ends with recommendations for improving campus racial climate in graduate education.

"For Their Benefit": The Lost History Of Parental Consent And Minors' Rights, Naomi Cahn, Maxine Eichner, Mary Ziegler

Faculty Publications

The principle of parental involvement is nonpartisan: Red and blue states agree that parents should generally be involved in the lives of their children. Meanwhile, the goal of children’s well-being—which may sometimes be at odds with parental involvement—has become a touchstone for legal reform efforts across a variety of domains. The embrace of both the goals of children’s well-being and parents’ rights to be involved in decision-making regarding their children conceals deeply contested questions about when, why, and how the law should require parental consent of minors’ decisions.

Drawing on archival material housed at six different universities, we make sense …

Moving Forward Together For Cancer Recovery: Collaborative Guide For Researchers And Cancer Care Organizations, M. Madison Kindred, Karen E. Wickersham, Daneille E. Ostendorf, Bernardine M. Pinto

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Hyena: An Observing System Simulation Experiment For Hypothetical Energetic Neutral Atom Imagers, Joel Tibbetts, Amy Keesee, Matina Gkioulidou, Robert Demajistre, Viacheslav Merkin

Faculty Publications

Mesoscale plasma sheet flows are widely understood to be a critical component of the overall picture of energy, particle, and magnetic flux transport during periods of geomagnetic activity. Without simultaneous measurements with true global coverage, the short lifetime (~10 min) and localized spatial extents (~1–3 R_E in azimuth) of these structures make obtaining a global picture of their contributions to stormtime magnetosphere dynamics difficult to characterize. Energetic neutral atom (ENA) imaging can enable remote mapping of plasma energization in the magnetosphere; however, its line-of-sight integrated nature, coupled with the challenging-to-characterize attributes of the target physical phenomena, means that numerous …

Maesa Ramentacea Leaf Extract Protects Against Gentamicin-Induced Nephrotoxicity In Wistar Rats By Modulating Renal Oxidative Stress, Inflammation And Apoptosis, Fahmida Akter, Md Shafiqul Islam Sovon, Baizid Hossain, Md Ariful Islam, Subrato Das, Anik Biswas, Md Sohorab Uddin, Md Mahmudul Hasan

Faculty Publications

Background: Gentamicin-induced nephrotoxicity continues to be a significant clinical concern, while effective and safe protective options remain limited. The nephroprotective potential of Maesa ramentacea has not yet been explored. To address this gap, the present study investigated the ethanolic leaf extract of M. ramentacea (MR-LEE) for its effects on gentamicin-induced kidney injury in Wistar rats. Methods: GC-MS profiling was employed to identify bioactive metabolites. Rats were categorised into five groups: control, gentamicin (100 mg/kg), gentamicin combined with silymarin (100 mg/kg), gentamicin combined with MR-LEE (200 mg/kg) and gentamicin combined with MR-LEE (400 mg/kg). Renal biomarkers, oxidative stress indicators, inflammatory and …

Building Capacity, Driving Impact: A Landscape Analysis Of Community Engagement And Outreach Cores' Activities, Emily Frankel, Stephanie Broyles, Stephenie Kennedy-Rea, Casey Solsrud, Elizabeth K. Woods, Deborah Goebert, Zsolt Nagykaldi, Holly Huye, Lee M. Pachter

Faculty Publications

Community Engagement and Outreach (CEO) Cores are a key component of the IDeA Clinical and Translational Research (IDeA-CTR) Program, serving to develop and implement capacity-building initiatives that empower communities to engage and collaborate with investigators in community-engaged research. To strengthen collaboration and shared learning across sites, a CEO Special Interest Group was established. In 2022, the group conducted a landscape analysis to systematically characterize and categorize CEO Core activities across the IDeA-CTR network, with a focus on capacity-building efforts related to knowledge transfer, co-learning, and infrastructure development. The analysis revealed several common approaches to community engagement and capacity building across …

Education Theory Integrated In Business Law, Robin Boyle-Laisure

Faculty Publications

Education theorists have identified three pedagogical techniques that enhance student learning and retention of knowledge, namely, scaffolding, interleaving, and schema-building. These techniques help students transfer knowledge from short-term to long-term memory, where it is best retained for future use. Scaffolding involves part-task sequencing and whole-task sequencing. By interleaving tasks, professors present steps out of order or new material before the prior material is fully understood. Assisting students in developing schemas can help them store their knowledge in long-term memory. This article explains and explores these techniques as applied in an undergraduate business law course. The appendices provide detailed exercises that …

Using Network Models To Understand Biological Signaling Architecture, Russ White, Emily Brown Reeves, Gerald L. Fudge

Faculty Publications

Engineers have developed abstract network models to better understand the recurring problems faced by communication systems. This paper argues that these models can be generalized to describe biological communications systems given that they share many requirements with human-designed systems, including functional requirements and physical constraints. Leveraging collaboration, biologists and engineers can work together to use well-understood communication systems, designed to carry data across a computer network, as a model for analyzing less well-understood biological communication systems in order to make predictions and uncover previously unknown functionalities. To illustrate this approach, we apply the Recursive Internet Network Architecture model (RINA) to …

Performance Of Shcc Brick Infill And Nsm Reinforcement Systems For Strengthening Rc Deep Beams With Large Openings, Ahmed Badr El-Din, Mohamed Ghalla, Galal Elsamak, Ayman El-Zohairy

Faculty Publications

The presence of large web openings in reinforced concrete (RC) deep beams often disrupts the natural load-transfer mechanism, leading to severe reductions in shear strength and premature failure. This study introduces a novel hybrid strengthening system incorporating strain-hardening cementitious composite (SHCC) bricks, stainless-steel and galvanized-steel sheets, and near-surface-mounted (NSM) steel reinforcements to restore and enhance the shear performance of RC deep beams with large openings. A comprehensive experimental program was conducted on sixteen beams under concentrated loading to evaluate the influence of different infill and strengthening configurations on load capacity, stiffness, ductility, and energy absorption. The results revealed that the …

Tax In The Echo Chamber, Kathleen Delaney Thomas

Faculty Publications

This Essay explores the concept of social media echo chambers in the context of tax law. Specifically, in addressing this Symposium’s topic of “AI in Tax Law,” the Essay argues that a significant and growing number of taxpayers encounter information about the tax system through their interaction with social media content that is selected by machine-learning algorithms. Tax information, commentary, and advice abound on social media, and nearly eighty percent of those considered Gen-Z or millennials seek out tax and financial advice on social media platforms. Policymakers who are interested in keeping the public informed about the tax system, thereby …

The Arbitrary Myth: Challenging Trademark Law's Elevation Of Arbitrary Marks, Dustin Marlan

Faculty Publications

Under its Abercrombie spectrum, trademark law grants “arbitrary” marks—like APPLE for computers or AMAZON for retail—its highest form of protection, treating them as equivalent to fanciful marks such as KODAK or EXXON. This Article challenges that foundational assumption. Unlike fanciful marks, which are invented and enjoy strong source-identifying capacity due to their novelty, arbitrary marks draw on existing language through catachresis: a rhetorical move that repurposes a common word in novel commercial context. In doing so, arbitrary marks generate layered metaphoric meanings that more closely resemble the associative leaps of suggestive marks, rather than the invented distinctiveness of fanciful ones. …

Mandatory Cooperation Under International Law, Evan J. Criddle, Evan Fox-Decent

Faculty Publications

Humanity in the twenty-first century faces serious global challenges and crises, including pandemics, nuclear proliferation, violent extremism, refugee migration, and climate change. None of these calamities can be averted without robust international cooperation. Yet, national leaders often assume that because their states are sovereign under international law, they are free to opt in or out of international cooperation as they see fit. This book challenges conventional wisdom by showing that international law requires states to cooperate with one another to address matters of international concern – even in the absence of treaty-based obligations. Within the past several decades, requirements to …

The Specter Of Jury Nullification, Anna Offit

Faculty Publications

Attention to the trial of Luigi Mangione has renewed debate about nullification—the jury’s inviolate power to acquit a defendant contrary to the evidence presented. Jury nullification proponents hold that it is a mechanism of last resort for refusing to apply laws that conflict with the public conscience. Opponents, by contrast, argue that nullification undermines the law by diminishing its legitimacy. To prosecutors and defense attorneys, however, these arguments are immaterial: Jury nullification is part of the institutional landscape of the contemporary jury trial and thus must be treated as a potentiality—a feature of the agnostic, strategic, and ethical terrain of …

(Reverse) Piercing The Trust Veil, Eric Kades

Faculty Publications

Emergent doctrine deems trusts legal entities distinct from their trustees and beneficiaries. Venerable doctrine empowers creditors to "pierce the veil" separating entities' and their owners' property to avoid inequitable treatment. This article weaves together the new and old to craft a legal roadmap for reversing the ongoing race to the bottom among the states authorizing indefensible self-settled asset protection trusts (SSAPTs) designed solely for the purpose of swindling creditors. As a matter of both policy and doctrine, piercing (more precisely, reverse piercing) an entity's veil is ideally suited to empower the creditor of a SSAPT beneficiary to get paid from …

My Negotiation Chatbot Toby And Pedagogical Governance, Renee Henson

Faculty Publications

The use of artificial intelligence (AI) chatbots is exploding. Adolescents increasingly prefer interactions with AI companions over peers. Adults rely on these systems for health planning, therapy, administrative assistance, nutrition guidance, and even simulated “romantic relationships.” Individuals and institutions are adopting AI tools at a pace that far exceeds the development of governance frameworks.

I developed Toby for use in my first-year Lawyering: Problem-Solving and Dispute Resolution (“Lawyering”) course to expose students to the dynamics of negotiating against an opposing counsel with a difficult personality—a type of adversary all too common in legal practice, yet difficult to prepare for. Toby …

Mental And Physical Humanlikeness In Artificial Intelligence Influencers: Effects On Humanness, Eeriness, And Consumer Responses, Terry Kim Ph.D., Hyunjoo Im

Faculty Publications

Artificial intelligence (AI) influencers, nonhuman characters powered by AI, have garnered a significant following on social media in recent years. Through two between-subjects online experiments (n = 957), this study investigates the impact of AI influencers' appearance realism and self-disclosure on consumer perceptions (humanness and eeriness) and their downstream responses (intention to self-disclose, intention to follow the advice, and brand attitude). Drawing from anthropomorphism and theory of mind, this study emphasizes the distinction of two dimensions of AI influencers' humanlikeness (physical and mental) which differently affect the humanness and eeriness of the AI influencer. Results indicate that the AI …

De-Skilling Or Re-Skilling? The Case For Smarter Writing Assignments, John Lande

Faculty Publications

This article challenges the assumption that AI inevitably leads to the de-skilling of law students.  Some faculty understandably fear that students will use AI to bypass critical thinking and avoid meaningful effort.  This article reframes AI as a potential catalyst for improving legal education rather than inherently a threat.

Concerns about de-skilling generally are based on the assumption that faculty will not change traditional writing assignments.  This article analyzes why these assignments often fail to help students develop strong analytical and writing skills. These include limited instruction in basic writing skills, poor design, lack of feedback, and faculty inertia in …