Law Commons^™

A Litigation-Oriented Approach To Teaching Federal Courts, Michael Wells

Scholarly Works

The traditional focus of the course on Federal Courts has been the study of highly abstract principles of separation of powers and federalism. This paper argues that most students are better served by a course that focuses on what lawyers need to know in order to litigate issues regarding the types of disputes federal courts may address and the division of authority between federal and state courts. With that aim in mind, the paper suggests that the course should focus largely on the opportunities and obstacles faced by lawyers seeking to advance federal constitutional or statutory claims in the federal …

Thinking Like A Research Expert: Schemata For Teaching Complex Problem-Solving Skills, Paul D. Callister

Faculty Works

The difference between expert and novice problem solvers is that experts have organized their thinking into schemata or mental constructs to both see and solve problems. This article demonstrates why schemata are important, arguing that they need to be made explicit in the classroom. It illustrates the use of schemata to understand and categorize complex research problems, map the terrain of legal research resources, match appropriate resources to types of problems, and work through the legal research process. The article concludes by calling upon librarians and research instructors to produce additional schemata and develop a common hierarchical taxonomy of skills, …

Pedagogic Techniques: Multi-Disciplinary Courses, Annotated Document Review, Collaborative Work & Large Groups, Anthony J. Luppino

Faculty Works

No abstract provided.

Center News/Faculty And Staff Updates, Human Rights Brief

Human Rights Brief

No abstract provided.

Center News/Faculty And Staff Updates, Human Rights Brief

Human Rights Brief

No abstract provided.

Center News/Faculty And Staff Updates, Human Rights Brief

Human Rights Brief

No abstract provided.

Against Practice, Anthony V. Alfieri

Articles

No abstract provided.

Professionalism’S Triple E Query: Is Legal Academia Enhancing, Eluding, Or Evading Professionalism?, Nicola A. Boothe-Perry

Journal Publications

The focus of this Article will be law schools' specific role and responsibility in the propaedeutic instruction of professionalism in the legal community. This article is composed of five sections. Part II of this paper discusses the ubiquitous yet illusory definition of professionalism. Part III addresses the practicing bar's approach to the issue of professionalism, reflecting in Subsection A on the public's perception of lawyers, and discussing in Subsection B the response of the governing bodies to such perception. Part IV highlights the role of legal education in fostering professionalism, discussing in Subsection A the fertile ground for change in …

Balancing Law Student Privacy Interests And Progressive Pedagogy: Dispelling The Myth That Ferpa Prohibits Cutting-Edge Academic Support Methodologies, Louis N. Schulze Jr.

Faculty Publications

Controversy exists over whether the Family Education Records Privacy Act prohibits certain progressive law school academic support methodologies. This Article analyzes these claims, using the text of the statute, the related regulations, case law from the Supreme Court of the United States and other federal courts, and statements from the Department of Education. The thesis of this Article is that most academic support methods are perfectly lawful and that FERPA and progressive pedagogy can peaceably coexist.

Teaching Multiple Skills In Drafting & Simulation Courses, Karen J. Sneddon

Articles

Good morning. I am really excited to be at this conference as a transactional lawyer who never drafted anything before she went into practice and had very, very little experience with any of the other transactional skills that I would be using on a daily basis. I am really excited to hear about the number of courses and opportunities that students have now. Of course, I am thrilled to speak about the opportunities that I offer the students in my courses.

What I do is provide two opportunities to learn about counseling. Every student at Mercer University School of Law …

The Twenty-First Century Law Library, Richard A. Danner, S. Blair Kauffman, John G. Palfrey

Faculty Scholarship

On November 6, 2008, the J. Michael Goodson Law Library at the Duke University School of Law held a number of events in celebration of its newly renovated and expanded space. This is an edited version of the program, “The 21st Century Law Library: A Conversation,” that was held as part of that celebration. The conversation explores the role of the academic law library in legal education in an increasingly digital environment.

Three Ways Of Looking At A Health Law And Literature Class, Jennifer Bard, Thomas W. Mayo, Stacey A. Tovino

Scholarly Works

The authors of this Article participated in a panel at the American Society of Law, Ethics & Medicine Conference in 2008 that discussed the use of literary materials in law school to teach medical ethics (and related matters) in a law school setting. Each author comes at the topic from a different perspective based on his or her own experience and background. This Article and the panel on which it was based reflect views on how literature can play a valuable role in helping law students, as well as medical students, understand important legal and ethical issues and concepts in …

John Henry Wigmore, Richard D. Friedman

Book Chapters

Wigmore, John Henry (1863-1943). Law professor and dean. Wigmore was born and reared in San Francisco. His parents were both immigrants, his mother from England and his father, of English heritage, from Ireland. Harry, as he was known familiarly, was the oldest and most favored of his extraordinarily doting mother's seven children. The family was prosperous - his father had an importing business - and Harry was educated principally in private schools. He then attended Harvard College, prompting the mother to move the family to Massachusetts to be close to him. After graduating in 1883, he spent a brief interlude …

Against Practice, Anthony V. Alfieri

Michigan Law Review

This Review examines the theory/practice dichotomy in legal education through the prism of the Carnegie Foundation's Educating Lawyers: Preparation for the Profession of Law. Descriptively, it argues that the Foundation's investigation of law school curricular deficiencies in the areas of clinical-lawyer skills, professionalism, and public service overlooks the relevance of critical pedagogies in teaching students how to deal with difference-based identity and how to build cross-cultural community in diverse, multicultural practice settings differentiated by mutable and immutable characteristics such as class, gender, and race. Prescriptively, it argues that the Foundation's remedial call for the curricular integration of clinical lawyer …

Advocating For Our Future, Sarah J. Mirsky

NYLS Law Review

No abstract provided.

Another Voice For The 'Dialogue': Federal Courts As A Litigation Course, Arthur D. Hellman

Articles

The traditional course in "Federal Courts" - built on the model established by the great Hart and Wechsler casebook - focuses on issues of federalism, separation of powers, and institutional competence. That focus provides a powerful intellectual model for organizing the materials that make up the field of study, and it is hard to imagine anyone teaching a Federal Courts course today without drawing heavily on that model. But the traditional model is deficient in one important respect. Most of the students who take a Federal Courts course do so because they think it will help them to practice law …

Starting Out: Changing Patterns Of First Jobs For Michigan Law School Graduates, Terry K. Adams, David L. Chambers

Articles

In the early 1950s, the typical graduate of Michigan Law began his career working as an associate in a law firm with four other lawyers and earned about $5,000 in his first year. Surprising to us today, in his new job he would have earned slightly less than other classmates whose first jobs were in government. Fifty years later, in the early 2000s, the typical graduate still started out as an associate in a law firm, but the firm she worked for had more than 400 lawyers. She earned about $114,000 in her first year, about three times as much …

American Moment[S]: When, How, And Why Did Israeli Law Faculties Come To Resemble Elite U.S. Law Schools?, Pnina Lahav

Faculty Scholarship

Following independence in 1948, the Hebrew University of Jerusalem founded a law faculty and modeled it on the European example (Continental and British). Today, the Israeli law faculty is much more similar to the U.S. law school than to institutions of legal education in Europe. This Article traces the history of the changes in Israeli legal education. It argues that the shift began after 1967, faced resistance in the 1980s, and gained momentum in the 1990s. Presently we may be witnessing the beginning of a shift away from U.S. influence and back to Continental Europe or even Asia. The Article …

Interactive Group Learning In The Legal Writing Classroom: An International Primer On Student Collaboration And Cooperation In Large Classrooms, Roberta K. Thyfault, Kathryn Fehrman

Faculty Scholarship

Research has long shown that students who work in small groups learn and retain more than students who are taught by other techniques. This crucial bit of information has led many scholars and educators to explore a variety of models for supporting and involving students in group learning. Part II of this article will provide an overview of the scholarship of collaborative and cooperative learning and the associated definitions and techniques. Part III discusses the application of collaborative and cooperative learning techniques in the law school classroom and special considerations and suggestions for international and large law school classrooms. Finally, …

Clara Shortridge Foltz Professorship Acceptance, Barbara Cox

Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Honors Convocation, University Of Michigan Law School

Commencement and Honors Materials

Program for the May 8, 2009 University of Michigan Law School Honors Convocation.

Marking The Path Of The Law, Stephen Ellmann

Articles & Chapters

This article, published in South Africa's Constitutional Court Review, focuses on the Constitutional Court of South Africa in order to discuss the nature of constitutional judging more generally. Looking to Brown v. Board of Education as an example, it argues that technical skill – though obviously important – is not the highest virtue of the constitutional judge, and that a central attribute of constitutional judging is commitment to the values of the constitution. But commitment to values is more than a matter of rational assent. As everyday experience and neurological evidence teach us, commitment naturally and unavoidably involves the judge’s …

Lawyering In The Academy: The Intersection Of Academic Freedom And Professional Responsibility, Peter A. Joy

Scholarship@WashULaw

The legal academy has given little thought to how practicing law within law schools affects professional responsibilities and is different from representing clients in a traditional law firm or how notions of academic freedom affect lawyering in law schools. Yet repeated attempts to interfere with law clinic representation starkly illustrate how lawyering in the academy might be different, under notions of professional responsibility and academic freedom, from other lawyering or typical law teaching.

Scholarship on interference in clinical programs has focused primarily on the impropriety of interference on the institutional autonomy of law schools by those outside the university, such …

How To Critique & Grade Contract Drafting Assignments, Robin A. Boyle, Sue Payne, David Epstein

Faculty Publications

(Excerpt)

I have to give this disclaimer. I am high grader when it comes to contract drafting. So even though my presentation is on critiquing and grading, truthfully it’s more about critiquing for me. I will get into that in a minute. My name is Robin Boyle, and I teach at St. John’s University School of Law. First, my background. I was an evening student at Fordham and worked in law firms during the day in both litigation and corporate practices. By the time I graduated, I worked at a large law firm, which I had summered at and then …

"We Reserve The Right To Refuse Service To Anyone.", Jennifer S. Hendricks

Publications

This essay is based on remarks at the 2008 teaching conference of the Society of American Law Teachers, on the theme Teaching for Social Change When You're Not Preaching to the Choir. It reflects on my experience as a liberal/progressive teaching constitutional law in a conservative southern state. It also explores the importance of not just training students in the skills of a junior lawyer but also preparing them for their long-term obligations as citizens and members of the bar.

A Derivatives Market In Legal Academia, Paul H. Edelman

Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications

Building on the success of derivatives markets in the financial arena, I show how similar markets can be used to hedge risk in legal academia. Prudent use of these markets will generate cash, mitigate errors in hiring, and increase the academic prestige of law schools. In short, they can do for legal academia what they have already done to the financial world.

The Madoff Scandal, Market Regulatory Failure And The Business Education Of Lawyers, Robert J. Rhee

UF Law Faculty Publications

This essay suggests that a deficiency in legal education is a contributing cause of the regulatory failure. The most scandalous malfeasance of this new era, the Madoff Ponzi scheme, evinces the failure of improperly trained lawyers and regulators. It also calls into question whether the prevailing regulatory philosophy of disclosure is sufficient in a complex market. This essay answers an important question underlying these considerations: What can legal education do to better train business lawyers and regulators for a market that is becoming more complex. One answer, it suggests, is a simple one: law schools should teach a little more …

Do “Sea Turtles” Creep Faster Than “Soft-Shell Turtles”: A Quantitative Study Of Academic Performance Of Law Faculty In Premier Chinese Law Schools, Wei Zhang

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

Since the adoption of the “Reform and Opening” policy in 1978, China has revived its century long tradition of sending students and scholars to study in western countries. In recent years, the unprecedented economic growth, paired with an increasingly competitive rate of compensation, has attracted a considerable number of such foreign degree holders back home to work or teach. In modern Chinese vocabulary, these returning talents are named as “sea turtles”, a word mimicking the pronunciation of the Chinese equivalent of the English phrase “coming back from abroad”. On the other hand, in compliance with the ancient Chinese rhetorical technique …

Using Blogs As A Teaching Tool In Negotiation, Ian Macduff

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

This article reports on the experimental use of blogs as a teaching tool in a course on negotiation and mediation. The blogs were of two kinds: individual journal blogs accessible only by the student author and the course instructor, and a class or collective blog, accessible by all members of the course. The use of blogs builds on the familiar use of journals as a tool for reflection and personal review and adopts the technology of online communication with which the student body is increasingly familiar and comfortable. The article reports on the student response to this development and the …

Bringing Sexual Orientation And Gender Identity Into The Tax Classroom, Anthony C. Infanti

Articles

A recent piece in the Journal of Legal Education analyzing student surveys by the Law School Admission Council reports that, despite improvement in the past decade, LGBT students still experience a law school climate in which they encounter substantial discrimination both inside and outside the classroom. Included among the list of "best practices" to improve the law school climate for LGBT students was a recommendation to incorporate discussions of LGBT issues in non-LGBT courses, such as tax. In a timely coincidence, the Section on Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity Issues held a day-long program at the 2009 AALS annual meeting …