Law Commons^™

Institutional Triage: Reflections On Being Acquired, Aric K. Short

Faculty Scholarship

On June 25, 2012, I walked into the dean's office at Texas Wesleyan University School of Law. He and I had been summoned by our university president to a hastily called meeting to discuss the law school's "academic program." Since I helped oversee our academic program as Associate Dean for Academic Affairs at the time, I was not particularly looking forward to the meeting. I assumed there would be bad news of some sort.

Instead, we were told that Texas Wesleyan University ("TWU") and Texas A&M University ("TAMU") were in negotiations that, it was expected, would result in a "strategic …

Foreword: Legal Malpractice Is No Longer The Profession's Dirty Little Secret, Susan Saab Fortney

Faculty Scholarship

In 1994, Professor Manuel R. Ramos published a law review article called, Legal Malpractice: The Profession's Dirty Little Secret. As suggested by the title, Professor Ramos argued that legal malpractice was a "taboo subject" that has been "ignored by the legal profession, law schools, mandatory continuing legal education ("CLE") programs, and even by scholarly and lay publications." Thirty years later, legal malpractice is an ever-present threat that lawyers cannot afford to ignore.

The Uspto Patent Pro Bono Program, Jennifer M. Mcdowell, Saurabh Vishnubhakat

Faculty Scholarship

In recent years, the United States Patent and Trademark Office has systematically been engaging the legal community with inventor assistance beyond the agency’s usual business of examining applications for patents and trademarks. The purpose of the USPTO’s effort has been to support innovators who are constrained by a lack of resources to pay for patent counsel necessary to protect the full scope of their inventions. This Article describes the brief history, flexible structure, and ongoing growth of that effort, embodied in the USPTO Patent Pro Bono Program. The Patent Pro Bono Program is a national network coordinated by the USPTO …

Incubating Community Law Practices: Post-Graduate Models For Lawyer Training & Access To Law, Luz E. Herrera

Faculty Scholarship

While the greatest number of lawyers practice in solo and small firms, law schools do not devote sufficient resources to preparing law students for the opportunities and challenges that these types of law firms present. The recent economic recession has highlighted the need to better train lawyers to launch law practices right out of law school. However, experienced lawyers, law professors and state bar policy makers worry that individuals who start their own practices are not sufficiently trained to practice and could irreparably harm a client. Many new lawyers share that concern but also worry about the financial instability that …

Teaching Remedial Problem-Solving Skills To A Law School's Underperforming Students, John F. Murphy

Faculty Scholarship

This article describes a course called the "Art of Lawyering" developed by the Texas A&M University School of Law to help the bottom quarter of the 2L class develop the critical-thinking and problem-solving skills they should have learned in their first year of law school. Students in the bottom quarter of the class at the beginning of their 2L year are most at risk for failing the bar exam after graduation. The Art of Lawyering gives these students the structural framework necessary to solve problems like a lawyer, improve their performance in law school, and pass the bar exam.

The …

Launching The Los Angeles Incubator Consortium, Laura Dym Cohen, Luz E. Herrera, William T. Tanner

Faculty Scholarship

This Article offers a snapshot of the initial two-month development process of a new law firm incubator program-the Los Angeles Incubator Consortium (LAIC). LAIC is a collaborative project of Pepperdine University School of Law, Southwestern Law School, and UCLA School of Law that was launched in collaboration with the Los Angeles Law Library and various local legal aid providers through seed funding from the California Commission on Access to Justice.14 Part II discusses the leadership role of California's Commission on Access to Justice in promoting incubators as models to increase the availability of affordable legal services for the modest-means population. …

What's It Worth To Keep A Secret?, Gavin C. Reid, Nicola Searle, Saurabh Vishnubhakat

Faculty Scholarship

This article is the first major study of protection and valuation of trade secrets under federal criminal law. Trade secrecy is more important than ever as an economic complement and substitute for other intellectual property protections, particularly patents. Accordingly, U.S. public policy correctly places a growing emphasis on characterizing the scope of trade secrets, creating incentives for their productive use, and imposing penalties for their theft. Yet amid this complex ecosystem of legal doctrine, economic policy, commercial strategy, and enforcement, there is little research or consensus on how to assign value to trade secrets. One reason for this gap is …

Virtuous Billing, Randy D. Gordon, Nancy B. Rapoport

Faculty Scholarship

Aristotle tells us, in his Nicomachean Ethics, that we become ethical by building good habits and we become unethical by building bad habits: “excellence of character results from habit, whence it has acquired its name (êthikê) by a slight modification of the word ethos (habit).” Excellence of character comes from following the right habits. Thinking of ethics as habit-forming may sound unusual to the modern mind, but not to Aristotle or the medieval thinkers who grew up in his long shadow. “Habit” in Greek is “ethos,” from which we get our modern word, “ethical.” In Latin, habits are moralis, which …

Preventing Legal Malpractice And Disciplinary Complaints: Ethics Audits As A Risk-Management Tool, Susan Saab Fortney

Faculty Scholarship

This column examines the value of firm lawyers conducting and supporting ethics audits as an integral feature of a comprehensive risk-management program. For decades, legal malpractice experts have urged lawyers to implement systems, policies, and procedures related to the delivery of legal services. Once a firm adopts systems, policies, and procedures, a meaningful risk-management system requires a periodic examination to monitor lawyers’ compliance. Rather than waiting for a professional liability insurer to recommend or require such a systematic examination, proactive firm leaders and lawyers should seriously consider devoting time and resources to periodic ethics audits.

Monroe Freedman: Servant Leader, Bridge Builder, Susan Saab Fortney

Faculty Scholarship

Without question, Monroe was dedicated to serving others, wholeheartedly committed to helping clients and community members achieve their potential. As many have attested, Monroe epitomized the servant leader who freely gives time and support to others. I hope that the many people whom Monroe touched will continue to be sustained by Monroe’s ethic of service.