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Articles 1 - 14 of 14

Full-Text Articles in Law

The Court Vs. Educational Standards, Michael Heise Feb 2015

The Court Vs. Educational Standards, Michael Heise

Michael Heise

No abstract provided.


Why Adr Programs Aren’T More Appealing: An Empirical Perspective, Michael Heise Feb 2015

Why Adr Programs Aren’T More Appealing: An Empirical Perspective, Michael Heise

Michael Heise

Standard law and economic theory suggests that litigating parties seeking to maximize welfare will participate in alternative dispute resolution (ADR) programs if they generate a surplus. ADR programs claim to generate social surplus partly through promoting settlements and reducing case disposition time. Although most associate ADR programs with trial courts, a relatively recent trend involves appellate court use of ADR programs. The emergence of court-annexed ADR programs raises a question. Specifically, if ADR programs achieve their goals of promoting settlements and reducing disposition time, why do some courts find it necessary to impose ADR participation? Attention to ADR’s ability to …


State Constitutions, School Finance Litigation, And The "Third Wave": From Equity To Adequacy, Michael Heise Feb 2015

State Constitutions, School Finance Litigation, And The "Third Wave": From Equity To Adequacy, Michael Heise

Michael Heise

No abstract provided.


Courting Trouble: Litigation, High-Stakes Testing, And Education Policy, Michael R. Heise Feb 2015

Courting Trouble: Litigation, High-Stakes Testing, And Education Policy, Michael R. Heise

Michael Heise

High-stakes testing policies did not emerge in an education policy vacuum. Part I of this Article includes a brief description of the major high-stakes tests and their policy rationales. Part II surveys recent litigation challenging one distinct genre of high-stakes testing-high school exit exams. Two cases illustrate courts' current posture toward legal challenges of exit exams. Part III reviews evidence of courts' increased sensitivity to the policy consequences attributable to court decisions that interfere with the implementation of exit exams. Part IV concludes and notes the important normative questions raised by judges' concerns with policy consequences flowing from their decisions.


The Courts, Educational Policy, And Unintended Consequences, Michael Heise Feb 2015

The Courts, Educational Policy, And Unintended Consequences, Michael Heise

Michael Heise

Recent school finance litigation illustrates yet again how law can generate unintended policy consequences. Seeking to improve student achievement and school accountability, more states now turn to educational standards and assessments. At the same time, a multi-decade school finance litigation effort develops and changes its theoretical base. Recently, educational standards and school finance litigation converged in a way that enables school districts to gain financially from their inability to meet desired achievement levels. Specifically, courts increasingly allow litigants and lawsuits to transform standards and assessments into constitutional entitlements to additional resources. As a consequence, increased legal and financial exposure for …


Educational Jujitsu: How School Finance Lawyers Learned To Turn Standards And Accountability Into Dollars, Michael Heise Feb 2015

Educational Jujitsu: How School Finance Lawyers Learned To Turn Standards And Accountability Into Dollars, Michael Heise

Michael Heise

No abstract provided.


Justice Delayed?: An Empirical Analysis Of Civil Case Disposition Time, Michael Heise Feb 2015

Justice Delayed?: An Empirical Analysis Of Civil Case Disposition Time, Michael Heise

Michael Heise

This Article addresses the need to understand better our civil justice system by exploring possible determinants of disposition time for civil cases that reach a jury trial. This study uses one year of civil jury case outcomes from 45 of the nation's 75 most populous counties and identifies locale as one important variable, along with certain case types, results, and characteristics. An empirically moored understanding of the causes of case disposition time will assist public policy and reform efforts that seek to make civil justice speedier and, as a consequence, more inexpensive and just. Findings from this study call into …


Assessing The Efficacy Of School Desegregation, Michael Heise Feb 2015

Assessing The Efficacy Of School Desegregation, Michael Heise

Michael Heise

No abstract provided.


The Gross Beast Of Burden Of Proof: Experimental Evidence On How The Burden Of Proof Influences Employment Discrimination Case Outcomes, David Sherwyn, Michael Heise Feb 2015

The Gross Beast Of Burden Of Proof: Experimental Evidence On How The Burden Of Proof Influences Employment Discrimination Case Outcomes, David Sherwyn, Michael Heise

Michael Heise

Scholarly and public attention to the burden of proof and jury instructions has increased dramatically since the Supreme Court's 2009 decision in Gross v. FBL Financial Services, Inc. Gross holds that the so-called mixed-motive jury instruction, which we call the motivating factor instruction, is not available in age, and possibly disability and retaliation cases. The decision prompted an outcry from the plaintiffs' bar and Congress has proposed legislation to overturn Gross. Despite the outcry, a simple question persists: Does the motivating factor jury instruction influence case outcomes? Results from our experimental mock jury study suggest that such jury instructions do …


No Lawsuit Left Behind, Michael Heise Feb 2015

No Lawsuit Left Behind, Michael Heise

Michael Heise

No abstract provided.


The Future Of Civil Justice Reform And Empirical Legal Scholarship: A Reply, Michael Heise Feb 2015

The Future Of Civil Justice Reform And Empirical Legal Scholarship: A Reply, Michael Heise

Michael Heise

No abstract provided.


Litigated Learning, Law's Limits, And Urban School Reform Challenges, Michael Heise Feb 2015

Litigated Learning, Law's Limits, And Urban School Reform Challenges, Michael Heise

Michael Heise

This Article assesses the likely efficacy of litigation efforts seeking to enhance equal educational opportunity by improving student academic achievement in the nation's urban public schools. Past education reform litigation efforts focusing on school desegregation and finance met with mixed success. Current litigation efforts seeking to improve student academic achievement promise to be even less successful because student academic achievement involves variables and activities located further from the reach of litigation than such variables as a school's racial composition and per pupil spending levels. Moreover, efforts to improve student achievement in the nation's urban public schools--especially high poverty schools--face additional …


The Decision To Award Punitive Damages: An Empirical Study, Theodore Eisenberg, Michael Heise, Nicole L. Waters, Martin T. Wells Feb 2015

The Decision To Award Punitive Damages: An Empirical Study, Theodore Eisenberg, Michael Heise, Nicole L. Waters, Martin T. Wells

Michael Heise

Empirical studies have consistently shown that punitive damages are rarely awarded, with rates of about 3 to 5 percent of plaintiff trial wins. Using the 2005 data from the Bureau of Justice Statistics Civil Justice Survey, this article shows that knowing in which cases plaintiffs sought punitive damages transforms the picture of punitive damages. Not accounting for whether punitive damages were sought obscures the meaningful punitive damages rate, the rate of awards in cases in which they were sought, by a factor of nearly 10, and obfuscates a more explicable pattern of awards than has been reported. Punitive damages were …


State Constitutional Litigation, Educational Finance, And Legal Impact: An Empirical Analysis, Michael Heise Feb 2015

State Constitutional Litigation, Educational Finance, And Legal Impact: An Empirical Analysis, Michael Heise

Michael Heise

No abstract provided.