Law Commons^™

How Lawyers (Come To) See The World: A Narrative Theory Of Legal Pedagogy, Randy D. Gordon

Randy D. Gordon

Even if one believes that law is not an autonomous discipline, few would dispute that it is a conservative institution and that its members are trained via a pedagogical method quite different from that of other professions. A central aspect of this training is the case method and — thus — the specialized narrative form that appellate opinions take. This essay examines the case method and suggests ways to crack it open — without discarding it — and thereby achieve one of the goals set forth in the Carnegie Report: namely, to supplement the analytical, rule-based mode of reasoning inherent …

Portals To Practice: A Multidimensional Approach To Integrating Experiential Education Into The Traditional Law School Curriculum, Myra Berman

Myra Berman

No abstract provided.

Should Law Schools Teach Professional Duties, Professional Virtues, Or Something Else? A Critique Of The Carnegie Report On Educating Lawyers, W. Bradley Wendel

W. Bradley Wendel

No abstract provided.

Law Firm Legal Research Requirements And The Legal Academy Beyond Carnegie, Patrick Meyer

Patrick Meyer

What types of research resources must new hires know how to use, and in which format(s)? To answer this question, this article starts by identifying the historical research deficiencies of new attorneys. The author goes on to summarize four recent and regarded law firm practice skills studies, as well as results of the author's 2010 law firm survey. This article concludes by identifying a three part plan to improve the lacking research skills of new attorneys.

Navigating The Uncharted Waters Of Teaching Law With Online Simulations, Ira Steven Nathenson

Ira Steven Nathenson

The Internet is more than a place where the Millennial Generation communicates, plays, and shops. It is also a medium that raises issues central to nearly every existing field of legal doctrine, whether basic (such as Torts, Property, or Contracts) or advanced (such as Intellectual Property, Criminal Procedure, or Securities Regulation). This creates tremendous opportunities for legal educators interested in using the live Internet for experiential education. This Article examines how live websites can be used to create engaging and holistic simulations that tie together doctrine, theory, skills, and values in ways impossible to achieve with the case method. In …

Best Practices For The Law Of The Horse: Teaching Cyberlaw And Illuminating Law Through Online Simulations, Ira Steven Nathenson

Ira Steven Nathenson

In an influential 1996 article entitled "Cyberspace and the Law of the Horse," Judge Frank Easterbrook mocked cyberlaw as a subject lacking in cohesion and therefore unworthy of inclusion in the law school curriculum. Responses to Easterbrook, most notably that of Lawrence Lessig in his 1999 article "The Law of the Horse: What Cyberlaw Might Teach," have taken a theoretical approach. However, this Article—also appropriating the “Law of the Horse” moniker—concludes that Easterbrook’s challenge is primarily pedagogical, requiring a response keyed to whether cyberlaw ought to be taught in law schools. The Article concludes that despite Easterbrook’s concerns, cyberlaw presents …

Alternative Justifications For Academic Support Ii: How “Academic Support Across The Curriculum” Helps Meet The Goals Of The Carnegie Report And Best Practices, Louis N. Schulze Jr.

Louis N. Schulze Jr.

In the wake of two momentous critiques of legal education, popularly known as the “Carnegie Report” and “Best Practices,” law schools are reconsidering certain basic assumptions about how we educate future lawyers. Even the most forward-thinking reformers, however, struggle with the details of how to implement many of the recommendations of those reports. Providing more formative assessment, for instance, is a laudable objective but one that has serious ramifications in terms of resource expenditures. This article seeks to provide a remedy for many of these struggles: “Academic Support Across the Curriculum.” This piece argues that the reconceptualization of an under-leveraged …

Performance Isn’T Everything: The Importance Of Conceptual Competence In Outcome Assessment Of Experiential Learning, Stefan H. Krieger

Stefan H Krieger

The ABA is on the brink of a seismic shift in its law school accreditation standards. The new standards would require law schools to identify, pursue and assess goals for student learning outcomes. This change in focus has been heavily influenced by the Carnegie Report’s recommendations for reform of American legal education. This report has been hailed in numerous law review articles but has been subject to little critical analysis. This article scrutinizes—and ultimately rejects—the recommendations of the Carnegie Report for outcomes and assessment in the area of experiential education. The Carnegie Report argues that practical education should focus on …

Teaching Law With Online Role-Playing Simulations, Ira Nathenson

Ira Steven Nathenson

This document contains materials prepared for the summer 2011 conference of the Institute for Law Teaching and Learning held at New York Law School. The concise materials include: a listing of useful online tools; documentation for a miniature simulation; suggested components of an "associate" case file; methodology for formative and summative evaluation; and a sample scoresheet incorporating all ten MacCrate skills. A summary of the presentation is provided below: Live websites provide a dynamic “sandbox” for role-playing simulations that cast students as “lawyers” acting for fictional clients. Such simulations, initially crafted for a Cyberlaw class, can also be used in …

Sea Change: The Seismic Shift In The Legal Profession And How Legal Writing Professors Will Keep Legal Education Afloat In Its Wake, Kirsten A. Dauphinais

Kirsten A Dauphinais

2010 found us in the midst of what commentators have called "The Great Recession" and the effects on the legal profession have been profound. Law firms have lost their immunity to recession and industry leaders are concluding that the recession has and will continue to have an enduring impact on the profession, including extensive layoffs, salary decreases, hiring freezes, firm closures, and even deaths. Many observers have predicted that these changes may prove to be permanent, not only because of the magnitude of the economic downturn, but also because the present predicament is only an acceleration of the decline of …

Reinventing The 1l Curriculum: Sequenced "Writing Across The Curriculum" Assignments As The Foundation For Producing Practice-Ready Law Graduates, Alice M. Noble-Allgire, Suzanne J. Schmitz

Alice M. Noble-Allgire

This article describes an integrative, sequenced “Writing Across the Curriculum” (WAC) program to help first-year law students master legal analysis and writing by systematically developing these skills though writing assignments in doctrinal courses, thereby enhancing the instruction that students receive in the Lawyering Skills course. The article discusses the key components of the program --- writing assignments sequenced to build skills incrementally from simple to complex; prompt and consistent feedback based upon a competency model; and transparency in setting forth the professor’s expectations, both in advance of the exercise and in the feedback --- and assesses some of the benefits …

‘Best Practices’: What’S The Point?, Ira P. Robbins

Ira P. Robbins

In a separate article - Best Practices on “Best Practices”: Legal Education and Beyond - Professor Robbins formulated a paradigm for “best practices” and applied it to the book, Best Practices for Legal Education. Professor Robbins concluded that the book did not meet any of the criteria necessary to constitute best practices and, further, that using the concept of best practices when thinking and writing about legal education is misleading and inappropriate. The primary author of the book, Roy Stuckey, responded, claiming that “best” can mean something other than best, that the difference really doesn’t matter, and that the debate …

Best Practices On ‘Best Practices’: Legal Education And Beyond, Ira P. Robbins

Ira P. Robbins

“Best practices” has become one of the most common research and development techniques in the United States and throughout the international community. Originally employed in industry, the concept sought to identify superior means to achieve a goal through “benchmarking,” thereby allowing companies to obtain a competitive advantage in the marketplace. In recent decades, the use of best practices has become widely popularized, and is frequently utilized in the areas of administrative regulation, corporate governance, and academia. As the term has grown in popularity, however, so too has room for its abuse. In many instances, the term has been invoked to …

‘Best Practices’: What’S The Point?, Ira P. Robbins

Ira P. Robbins

In a separate article - Best Practices on “Best Practices”: Legal Education and Beyond - Professor Robbins formulated a paradigm for “best practices” and applied it to the book, Best Practices for Legal Education. Professor Robbins concluded that the book did not meet any of the criteria necessary to constitute best practices and, further, that using the concept of best practices when thinking and writing about legal education is misleading and inappropriate. The primary author of the book, Roy Stuckey, responded, claiming that “best” can mean something other than best, that the difference really doesn’t matter, and that the debate …

How Lawyers (Come To See) The World.Pdf, Randy D. Gordon

Randy D. Gordon

Refashioning Legal Pedagogy After The Carnegie Report: Something Borrowed, Something New, Debra M. Schneider

Debra M Schneider

The Carnegie Foundation published in 2007 its ground-breaking book titled Educating Lawyers: Preparation for the Profession of Law, in which it pointed out significant pedagogical imbalance in legal education. In particular, the Carnegie report said that law schools should infuse their curricula with more practical and ethical training. How a law school ought to accomplish the Carnegie aim is another challenge, one that this paper squarely addresses.

Traditional legal education is sorely imbalanced. A law student receives rigorous training in legal doctrine and analytical skills—he learns to “think like a lawyer”—but is left with little training in practical skills or …

What Law Schools Should Teach Future Transactional Lawyers: Perspectives From Practice, Michael A. Woronoff

Michael A Woronoff

Since at least the 1980’s, law schools have been chided for doing a poor job at teaching skills. This criticism has been accompanied by pressure to increase their emphasis on skills training. The pressure increased with the publication of the McCrate Report in 1992, and then again with the publication of the Carnegie Report in 2007. This article is based on my remarks given on June 10 at the 2009 mid-year meeting of the AALS Conference on Business Associations. In those remarks, I respond to the questions “Are law schools teaching students adequate transactional skills?” and “From the standpoint of …