Legal Education Commons^™

Law School Based Incubators And Access To Justice – Perspectives From Deans, Patricia E. Salkin, Ellen Suni, Niels Schaumann, Mary Lu Bilek

Journal of Experiential Learning

At the end of February 2015, law professors, law deans, incubator staff and attorneys, and self-selected others gathered at California Western School of Law for the Second Annual Conference on Law School Incubators and Residency Programs. The incubators that are the subject of this article tend to focus on transition to law practice and access to justice, and some are also working to incorporate technology for the practice of law as a means of enhancing access to justice. As more law schools decide to host, sponsor or offer an incubator, and following our panel discussion at the February 2015 incubator …

Law School Based Incubators And Access To Justice, Patricia Salkin, Ellen Suni, Niels Schaumann, Mary Lu Bilek

Faculty Scholarship

At the end of February 2015, law professors, law deans, incubator staff and attorneys, and self-selected others gathered at California Western School of Law for the Second Annual Conference on Law School Incubators and Residency Programs. The incubators that are the subject of this article tend to focus on transition to law practice and access to justice, and some are also working to incorporate technology for the practice of law as a means of enhancing access to justice. As more law schools decide to host, sponsor or offer an incubator, and following our panel discussion at the February 2015 incubator …

Internprofessional Education, Patricia E. Roberts

Faculty Articles

As legal educators consider how to improve the outcomes of legal education, maximizing the knowledge, skills, and values taught during the law school experience, consideration should be given to increasing interprofessional learning opportunities in the curricula. As Best Practices for Legal Education suggested, the creative thinking necessary for effective problem-solving includes an understanding of interprofessional dimensions of practice, but interprofessional opportunities are still the exception rather than the norm in legal education. Interprofessional legal education intentionally asks law students to blend the knowledge, skills, and values of two or more professions in order to address complex legal problems. Placing students …

"The Millennials Are Coming!" : Improving Self-Efficacy In Law Students Through Universal Design In Learning, Jason S. Palmer

Cleveland State Law Review

The Millennial generation has arrived in law school. This new generation of self-confident and extremely high achieving learners merits a new interdisciplinary approach to legal education. Some institutions have explored formative assessments and regulated self-learning to improve academic success. Other universities have looked to universal design, specifically universal design in learning or universal design in instruction, as a mechanism for furthering educational goals for their students. All agree that a lack of self-efficacy can prevent Millennial students from overcoming challenges in their educational growth, and that high self efficacy, the ability to put forth effort and persistence to successfully accomplish …

Law, Universities, And The Challenge Of Moving A Graveyard, Wendy Collins Perdue

Law Faculty Publications

Against this dark narrative genre, Carel Stolker‘s new book, Rethinking the Law School, stands in sharp contrast. Having been both a law school dean and university president at Leiden University in The Netherlands, Stolker brings the perspective of a dean who has sought to innovate, and of a university president who has dealt with the political, academic, financial, and managerial complications of a modern university. The book offers a broad look at legal education around the world, along with a thoughtful exposition of the challenges facing law schools and law deans. Stolker is no cheerleader for the current state of …

Tyranny Of The Meritocracy?: A Disputation Over Testing With Professor Lani Guinier, Dan Subotnik

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Library Director As Opportunity Identifier, Ronald E. Wheeler

Faculty Scholarship

A successful contemporary law library director should seek opportunities to insert the law library, wherever possible, into projects that benefit the law school and its mission and that draw on the talents and expertise of the law librarians. The goal of the modern law library director should be to make the law library an integral part of each and every undertaking within the law school community. Every facet of the law school and its various departments and offices can benefit from either law library research and instructional services or the creative thinking and analytical orientation that librarians bring to the …

Volume 39, No. 3

The Weldon Times

A student-run newspaper published at the Schulich School of Law at Dalhousie University.

Editor in Chief: Graeme Maitland

Digital Editor: Jenna LeBlanc

Editors: Melanie Gillis, Rohan Rajpal, Sarah Walsh

Volume 39, No. 2

The Weldon Times

A student-run newspaper published at the Schulich School of Law at Dalhousie University.

Editor in Chief: Graeme Maitland

Digital Editor: Jenna LeBlanc

Editors: Melanie Gillis, Rohan Rajpal, Sarah Walsh

Online Alternative Dispute Resolution And Why Law Schools Should Prepare Future Lawyers For The Online Forum, Jordan Goldberg

Pepperdine Dispute Resolution Law Journal

Goldberg discusses traditional law school curriculums and how the addition of ADR courses has supplemented the traditional law school curriculum in a way that helps law schools achieve educational and academic recommendations, suggested by various studies including the Carnegie Report and the Best Practices for Legal Education. The author then shows that the effects of globalization and the increased use of technology in daily life have caused a higher demand for OADR in legal practice. Further, because there is a growing use of technology in K-12 curriculums and the nation’s youth are becoming more technologically savvy every year, it is …

Teaching “The Wire”: Crime, Evidence, And Kids, Andrea L. Dennis

Scholarly Works

I have a confession: I have only watched Season 1 of The Wire, and it has been many years since I did that. Thus, both my knowledge and pedagogical use of the show are limited. What explanation can I offer for my failings? I am a Maryland native with family who resides in Baltimore City, or Charm City as it is affectionately called. I worked for several years as an assistant federal public defender in Baltimore City. Over time, I have seen the city evolve, and I have seen it chew up and spit out many good people and some …

Law School Training For Licensed 'Legal Technicians'? Implications For The Consumer Market, Elizabeth Chambliss

Faculty Publications

In January 2014, the ABA Task Force on the Future of Legal Education released its report calling, among other things, for limited licensing and the expansion of independent paraprofessional training by law schools. In Washington State, all three law schools are collaborating with community college paralegal programs to design and deliver specialized training for “Limited License Legal Technicians” (LLLTs), who will be licensed to deliver limited family law services beginning in 2015. At least three other states, including California and New York — which together contain nearly twenty-six percent of U.S. lawyers and seventy-six law schools — are actively seeking …

Teaching First-Year Law Students To Read So Carefully That They Discover A "Mistake" In A Judicial Opinion, Jane Bloom Grisé

Law Faculty Popular Media

In this column for The Learning Curve, Professor Grisé discusses how to teach critical reading skills to first-year law students.

In Memoriam: Professor Patrick A. Randolph Jr., Timothy E. Lynch

Faculty Works

A memorial in honor of Professor Patrick A. Randolph Jr., a long-time faculty member at the UMKC School of Law and an academic trailblazer into China.

Erasing Boundaries: Inter-School Collaboration And Its Pedagogical Opportunities, David I. C. Thomson, Ian Gallacher, Amy R. Stein, Robin Boyle

Sturm College of Law: Faculty Scholarship

Experiential learning is all the rage in legal education today. And yet, educators throughout history have known that involving students in their learning and exposing them to practical applications of what they are learning increases student engagement and retention. But legal education is coming to this way of thinking somewhat late. This article, based on a presentation that the authors gave at the AALS conference in New York in January of 2014, suggests that technology opens up new possibilities for law schools by allowing students from different schools to participate in complex inter-school simulations that can, if carefully prepared, teach …

Two Decades Of Therapeutic Jurisprudence, David B. Wexler

Touro Law Review

No abstract provided.

Cultivating Professional Identity & Creating Community: A Tale Of Two Innovations, Jan L. Jacobowitz

University of Arkansas at Little Rock Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Emotionally Intelligent Law Professor: A Lesson From The Breakfast Club, Heidi K. Brown

University of Arkansas at Little Rock Law Review

No abstract provided.

Volume 37, No. 5

The Weldon Times

A student-run newspaper published at the Schulich School of Law at Dalhousie University.

Editor in Chief: Suzanne Kittell

Layout Editor: Kate Rothschild

Editors: Hannah Choo, Paul Neville, Alex Hartwig

Curricular Limitations, Cost Pressures, And Stratification In Legal Education: Are Bold Reforms In Short Supply?, Nora V. Demleitner

Scholarly Articles

Many critics of legal education and reformers alike demand "bold reforms," though so far most change seems restricted to haphazard modifications of the curriculum, the hope for quick fixes, and a focus on shedding staff and faculty to balance budgets with a smaller student body. Whether those changes alone amount to bold action, defined as "not afraid of danger or difficult situations; showing or needing confidence or lack of fear; very confident in a way that may seem rude or foolish," is questionable. Curricular changes may merely camouflage or even detract from the crucial need to strategically rethink cost structures, …

Surgeons Or Scribes? The Role Of United States Court Of Appeals Law Clerks In "Appellate Triage", Todd C. Peppers, Micheal W. Giles, Bridget Tainer-Parkins

Scholarly Articles

Using original survey data, we explore how federal courts of appeals judges select and use their law clerks—a question that we answered in an earlier article about federal district court clerks. As with that first article, we do not intend to tackle such normative issues as whether courts of appeals law clerks possess too much influence over the judicial process or whether the selection criteria used by these judges is appropriate. What we will present, however, is descriptive data on the criteria that courts of appeals judges use to pick their law clerks as well as the tasks assigned to …

Judicial Assistants Or Junior Judges: The Hiring, Utilization, And Influence Of Law Clerks, Chad Oldfather, Todd C. Peppers

Scholarly Articles

Law clerks have been part of the American judicial system since 1882, when Supreme Court Justice Horace Gray hired a young Harvard Law School graduate named Thomas Russell to serve as his assistant. Justice Gray paid for his law clerks out of his own pocket until Congress authorized funds for the hiring of “stenographic clerks” in 1886. The Gray law clerks, however, were not mere stenographers. Justice Gray assigned them a host of legal and non-legal job duties. His clerks discussed the record and debated the attendant legal issues with Justice Gray prior to oral argument, conducted legal research, and …

And Now A Crisis In Legal Education, James E. Moliterno

Scholarly Articles

The current crisis in legal education coincides with a crisis in the practice of law. Law practice has changed as a result of technology, globalization, and economic pressures. The market for legal education's product, law graduates, have diminished. Law schools cannot remain the same in this environment. Except for a very small number of elite schools, those that do not adjust are at serious risk of failing.

An economic change has taken place against a system in which mostly corporate clients willingly paid for the training of beginners at major law firms. Law firms could absorb those costs if partners …

On Legal Scholarship, Danielle K. Citron, Robin West

Shorter Faculty Works

Academic critics contend that legal scholarship is overly argumentative or too “normative,” simply stating what the law should be, as well as what the law is. It isn’t about pure scholarship’s pursuit of knowledge within the discipline of a recognized academic field. Critics from the bar and the judiciary proffer the opposite complaint: legal scholarship is too academic and not professional enough, enamored with fads, unmoored from any discipline and of little use to the practicing lawyer or sitting judge. Law schools’ legions of cost-conscious critics complain that paying high salaries to professors with low course loads drives up tuitions. …

Beg, Borrow, Or Steal: Ten Lessons Law Schools Can Learn From Other Educational Programs In Evaluating Their Curriculums, Debra Curtis

Faculty Scholarship

INDISPUTABLY, LAW SCHOOLS are under attack.' Because of concerns about the legal field and legal education's responsibility in the crisis of new graduates without jobs, law schools are clamoring to respond by seeking and working toward curriculum change. Generally, higher education institutions acknowledge a "responsibility to endeavour to prepare graduates who are able to manage and respond effectively to change and its inherent demands challenges and tensions." However, there are questions about law schools' ability to do just that. There have been many years of repeated criticisms of the case method and active discussions regarding curriculum reform. 

Teaching Legal History Through Legal Skills., Howard Bromberg

Book Chapters

I revolve my legal history courses around one methodology: teaching legal history by means of legal skills. I draw on my experience teaching legal practice and clinical skills courses to assign briefs and oral arguments as a means for law students to immerse themselves in historical topics. Without distracting from other approaches, I framed this innovation as teaching legal history not to budding historians but to budding lawyers.

Adapting To Change In The Legal Profession, Janet Levit, Valerie K. Couch, Joseph Harroz Jr.

Articles, Chapters in Books and Other Contributions to Scholarly Works

No abstract provided.

The World Needs More Rod Macdonald: The Potential Of Big Ideas, Kim Brooks

Articles, Book Chapters, & Popular Press

In this article, the author makes the case for thinking boldly and experimentally about the possibilities for legal education and law schools and urges us to embrace the potential for big ideas. She illustrates this approach through the lens of admissions, curriculum, and research. Within each of those aspects of legal education, the article suggests some guidelines that might be used to evaluate reform proposals and proposes one major change to spur reflection.

Teaching “The Wire”: Crime, Evidence, And Kids, Andrea L. Dennis

Scholarly Works

I have a confession: I have only watched Season 1 of The Wire, and it has been many years since I did that. Thus, both my knowledge and pedagogical use of the show are limited. What explanation can I offer for my failings? I am a Maryland native with family who resides in Baltimore City, or Charm City as it is affectionately called. I worked for several years as an assistant federal public defender in Baltimore City. Over time, I have seen the city evolve, and I have seen it chew up and spit out many good people and some …

Public Policy Research & Drafting: A Pro Bono And Law Library Collaboration, Tara L. Casey, Suzanne B. Corriell

Law Faculty Publications

As the Carrico Center for Pro Bono Service at the University of Richmond School of Law continued to grow its programs, forays into the areas of public policy and advanced legal research grew as well. for a number of years, our law students volunteered with nonprofit organizations during the General Assembly session, learning firsthand how issues develop into policy, which sometimes then develops into Jaw. This experience required our students to expand their legal research and writing skills beyond the traditional case law and brief writing methods. Furthermore, a growing number of students were interested in pursuing legislative or public …