Law Commons^™

Fixing Students' Fixed Mindsets: Paving The Way To Meaningful Assessment, Carrie Sperling

Carrie Sperling

Soon every law school in the country will be turning its attention to the important topic of assessment. Responding to a new ABA guideline, schools will be tackling the difficult task of defining, refining, and creating more assessment opportunities for their students. The guideline’s purpose is to improve student learning through more assessment, but nothing in the ABA proposal changes the fact that many of our students fail to react adaptively to feedback. Instead, many students will become hostile, defensive, or despondent and will, therefore, not further develop their competencies.

With the American Bar Association putting emphasis on formative assessment …

The "Plus One" Clinic: Adding (Political) Value To The Clinical Experience By Representing Landlords Alongside Tenants, Raja Raghunath

Raja Raghunath

This article proposes a novel clinical methodology for teaching “political” values, which it defines as values that are not encompassed by the Rules of Professional Conduct, but extend beyond personal morality, and include the values that fall under the Carnegie Report’s “third apprenticeship” of professional education. Under the “plus one” approach, a clinic with an existing docket of eviction defense representation would add to that docket at least one case representing a landlord seeking to evict a tenant, and a clinic representing workers in wage or employment discrimination claims would add at least one case representing an employer defending one …

American Biglaw Lawyers And The Schools That Produce Them: A Profile And Rankings, Paul Oyer, Scott Schaefer

Paul Oyer

We profile the lawyers that work at the largest 300 American law firms as of the Summer of 2008. We show how gender, years of experience, prestige of law school, and other qualities vary across lawyers of different rank and firms of different prestige. Geography is an important determinant of where lawyers work, with many going to undergraduate school and law school near where they ultimately practice. Geography is less important, however, at more prestigious firms and for graduates of higher ranked firms. We then go on to rank law firms based on the prestige of the law schools they …

If You Think Law Schools Teach Students To "Think Like A Lawyer"...Think Again!, Douglas Rush

Douglas Rush

Law school faculty and deans purport to teach law students to “think like a lawyer.” Indeed, this phrase has been repeated so often that it has become legal pedagogical dogma. Professor Wegner, co-author of the Carnegie Report Educating Lawyers: Preparation for the Profession of Law, has stated that “thinking like a lawyer” has been embraced as a ”trope of the core identity” of the legal academy. Unfortunately, whether law schools truly teach their students to “think like a lawyer” has not been previously subjected to empirical analysis.

This article is an empirical examination using logistic regression analysis of two different …

If You Think Law Schools Teach Students To "Think Like A Lawyer"...Think Again!, Douglas Rush

Douglas Rush

Law school faculty and deans purport to teach law students to “think like a lawyer.” Indeed, this phrase has been repeated so often that it has become legal pedagogical dogma. Professor Wegner, co-author of the Carnegie Report Educating Lawyers: Preparation for the Profession of Law, has stated that “thinking like a lawyer” has been embraced as a ”trope of the core identity” of the legal academy. Unfortunately, whether law schools truly teach their students to “think like a lawyer” has not been previously subjected to empirical analysis.

This article is an empirical examination using logistic regression analysis of two different …

Judge Harold Baer's Quixotic Crusade For Class Counsel Diversity, Michael H. Hurwitz

Michael H Hurwitz

In this comment, the author discusses the recent rulings of U.S. District Court Judge Harold Baer, Jr. directing that proposed class counsel provide evidence of its racial and gender diversity. After summarizing the provisions of Rule 23(g) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure that govern the appointment of class counsel, the author analyzes Judge Baer’s rulings in light of Rule 23(g)’s requirements. The author concludes that Judge Baer’s rulings are inconsistent with the Rule’s requirements and, instead, represent the judge’s effort to impose his own policy views over the interests of the class members served by the Rule’s narrow …

"A Bulwark Against Anarchy": Affirmative Action, Emory Law School, And Southern Self-Help, William B. Turner

William B Turner

This article presents archival evidence about Pre-Start, Emory Law School’s affirmative action program from 1966 to 1972. It places that evidence into the context of current legal and scholarly debates about affirmative action in law school admissions and demonstrates that Pre-Start is an extremely important case study for anyone who wishes to think carefully about this important topic. I perform post-hoc strict scrutiny on Pre-Start, showing that it meets, not only the standard of the majority in Grutter v. Bollinger (539 U.S. 306 (2003)), but even the much more exacting standard of dissenting Justice Clarence Thomas. Because white supremacists are …

Some Challenges For Legal Pragmatism: A Closer Look At Pragmatic Legal Reasoning, Andrew J. Morris

Andrew J Morris

Some Challenges For Legal Pragmatism: A Closer Look At Pragmatic Legal Reasoning

Although scholars have discussed legal pragmatism for several decades, the literature does not contain a systematic analysis of the characteristic elements of pragmatic decisionmaking. This article tries to add that analytical perspective. It attempts to make sense of the extensive literature by identifying specific characteristics of pragmatic reasoning, then conducting a methodical comparison of distinctively pragmatic reasoning to more principled reasoning. I identify principled reasoning with legal form: as reasoning that gives some normative force to formal legal reasons. The criteria on which I compare the two modes …

The De-Evolution Of American Legal Ethics, Jennifer Schultz Reed

Jennifer Schultz Reed

That since Legal Ethics became a mandatory course in all ABA accredited law schools in 1974, there has been little, if any, perceptible change in the ethics of the legal profession. The absence of significant discernable impact is due to several factors: the failure to define what the profession means and intends by the concept of legal ethics; the inability of law schools to find coherent and successful ways to teach this subject; and the fact that the public generally continues to regard lawyers with little respect and to equate the misdeeds of some with the conduct of most. In …

Bridging The Gaps: How Cross-Disciplinary Training With Mbas Can Improve Professional Education, Prepare Students For Private Practice, And Enhance University Life, Seth Freeman

Seth Freeman

What can law schools do to address the criticisms in the Carnegie Foundation’s January 2007 report on legal education? That report found that law schools are not teaching students how to be competent lawyers. One particularly promising answer is cross-disciplinary training with MBAs, which leading law schools such as NYU, Stanford, the University of Pennsylvania, and Harvard have embraced in recent years. In this article, I explore the value of such courses, and discuss a cross-disciplinary course that I successfully debuted in the Fall of 2006 at NYU entitled, “Negotiating Complex Transactions with Executives and Lawyers.” More generally, I argue …