Legal Education Commons^™

The Politics Of (Mis)Recognition: Islamic Law Pedagogy In American Academia, Lama Abu-Odeh

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

The combination of presence (of Islamic law) and absence (of legal transplant) in the course materials assigned by Islamic law instructors, the scholarship on law in the Islamic world by Islamic law scholars as well as by Comparatists, betrays an ideological project. I would describe it as an identitarian one with an underlying teleological notion of history. By identitarian I mean the positing of a common identity shared by all "Muslims" based on their religio/legal beliefs, a project that to my mind recalls what I called earlier the "fantasy effect." "[F]antasy is the means by which real relations of identity …

Leaky Boundaries And The Decline Of The Autonomous Law School Library, James G. Milles

Journal Articles

Academic law librarians have long insisted on the value of autonomy from the university library system, usually basing their arguments on strict adherence to ABA standards. However, law librarians have failed to construct an explicit and consistent definition of autonomy. Lacking such a definition, they have tended to rely on an outmoded Langdellian view of the law as a closed system. This view has long been discredited, as approaches such as law and economics and sociolegal research have become mainstream, and courts increasingly resort to nonlegal sources of information. Blind attachment to autonomy as a goal rather than a means …

Teaching Practical Wisdom, Deborah J. Cantrell

Publications

No abstract provided.

The Process For Becoming A Law School Professor In The United States, Daniel H. Foote

Articles

As the process of legal education reform in Japan, centered on the establishment of a new tier of professional graduate schools in law, moves forward, one issue that has arisen is how law professors will be trained in coming years. In that connection, I am frequently asked what the typical route is for training law school professors in the US. Based in part on an examination of the backgrounds prior to entering law teaching for over 500 law professors at eight US law schools and on personal experiences (including serving for three years on the appointments committee at the University …

An Alternative Model To United States Bar Examinations: The South African Community Service Experience In Licensing Attorneys, Peggy Maisel

Faculty Scholarship

This Article examines the system of educating and licensing attorneys in South Africa to determine whether that country’s experience can provide guidance to jurisdictions in the United States that are considering proposals to reduce or eliminate the importance of bar examinations. The analysis set out here is supplemented by a companion article, providing a first-hand account of the South African system by Ms. Thuli Mhlungu, who was educated and sought admission to the bar during the last years of apartheid and the early years of the new democratic regime.

Examining the situation in South Africa makes particular sense because South …

The Lsat, Law School Exams And Meritocracy: The Surprising And Undertheorized Role Of Test-Taking Speed, William D. Henderson

Articles by Maurer Faculty

Within the field of psychometrics, it is widely acknowledged that test-taking speed and reasoning ability are separate abilities with little or no correlation to each other. The LSAT is a univariate test designed to measure reasoning ability; test-taking speed is assumed to be an ancillary variable with a negligible effect on candidate scores. This Article explores the possibility that test-taking speed is variable common to both the LSAT and actual law school exams. This commonality is important because it may serve to increase the predictive validity of the LSAT. The author obtained data from a national and a regional law …

Professor Kingsfield Goes To Delhi: American Academics, The Ford Foundation, And The Development Of Legal Education In India, Jayanth K. Krishnan

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.

Better Writing, Better Thinking: Using Legal Writing Pedagogy In The "Casebook" Classroom (Without Grading Papers), Mary Beth Beazley

Scholarly Works

In this Article, Professor Beazley proposes that a Legal Writing revolution is the next revolution in legal education, and that the revolution is not just coming, it has begun. She offers first steps for law school faculty to take in furtherance of this revolution. Professor Beazley argues that the pioneers of this new revolution are Legal Writing faculty. Section I of this Article examines some ways that the law school culture that segregates Legal Writing faculty has both promoted their opportunities to develop innovative pedagogies and inhibited their ability to share those pedagogies with other faculty. Section II explains certain …

Diversity Matters: Race, Gender And Ethnicity In Legal Education., Nancy E. Dowd, Kenneth B. Nunn, Jane E. Pendergast

UF Law Faculty Publications

This Article presents more evidence of the inequality that persists in legal education for students. Based on a survey of University of Florida law students conducted in 2001, this study reaffirms the existence of differential experience and an inegalitarian culture in legal education. However, it also demonstrates the importance of diversity and the recognition by a significant majority of students of the value of race and gender pluralism. These competing findings provide a clear guide to the future direction of legal education.

Filling In The ‘Larger Puzzle’: Clinical Scholarship In The Wake Of The Lawyering Process, Susan L. Kay, Frank Bloch, Susan L. Brooks, Alex J. Hurder

Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications

Gary Bellow's and Bea Moulton's The Lawyering Process challenged conventional legal education on every front, from the types of material included to the questions asked about law and lawyers. Their book has inspired a generation (or more) of clinicians to teach and think about law differently. In this article, the authors focus on the impact Bellow's and Moulton's book has had as a teaching text and as early clinical scholarship. The authors discuss four topics addressed in The Lawyering Process--the public role of lawyers, ethics and professionalism, theory of lawyering, and the clinical methodology-and how those topics are addressed in …

Teaching Law Students To Be Self-Regulated Learners, Michael Hunter Schwartz

Law Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Not Thinking Like A Nonlawyer: Implications Of "Recogonization" For Legal Education, Robert J. Morris

Journal of Legal Education

No abstract provided.

Features: Taking Globalization Seriously: Michigan Breaks New Ground By Requiring The Study Of Transnational Law, Mathias Reimann

Law Quadrangle (formerly Law Quad Notes)

Taking globalization seriously: Michigan breaks new ground by requiring the study of transnational law. The faculty acted on the conviction that a fundamental understanding of how law works in the global context must be part of every lawyer's toolkit.

Evidence Teaching Wisdom: A Survey, Calvin William Sharpe

Seattle University Law Review

This Survey secures data on the methods American law school faculty use to teach the law of evidence. The Survey provides insight into the teaching of evidence and facilitates discourse among evidence faculty on how we teach the course, for the benefit of new or occasional instructors as well as veterans. Specifically, the Survey focuses on the question of which classroom instruction approach predominates among evidence professors.

Keiken, Tayōsei, Soshite Hō [Experience, Diversity, And The Law], Daniel H. Foote

Chapters in Books

This essay was published in 2003, in Japanese, as my contribution to a tribute volume honoring Nozaki Ayako, a Ph.D. candidate at The University of Tokyo who passed away suddenly earlier that year. In an article she published in 1999, Nozaki had offered a thoughtful, perceptive critique of an article I had published four years before, dealing with the resolution of traffic accident disputes in Japan. Her article led me to reflect on the reasons for the difference in our views; and that in turn led to this essay. As indicated in the title, two key themes of this essay …

Socratic Ignorance: Once More Into The Cave, James R. Beattie Jr.

West Virginia Law Review

No abstract provided.

American Law Schools As A Model For Japanese Legal Education? A Preliminary Question From A Comparative Perspective, James Maxeiner

All Faculty Scholarship

Law faculties in Japan are asking whether and how they should remake themselves to become law schools. One basic issue has been framed in terms of whether such programs should be professional or general. One Japanese scholar put it pointedly: "[a] major issue of the proposed reform is whether Japan should adopt an American model law school, i.e., professional education at the graduate level, while essentially doing away with the traditional Japanese method of teaching law at university." American law schools are seen as having as their fundamental goal "to provide the training and education required for becoming an effective …

The Professional In Legal Education: Foreign Perspectives, James Maxeiner

All Faculty Scholarship

Japan is about to change its system of legal education. In April 2004 Japan will introduce law schools. Law schools are to occupy an intermediary place between the present undergraduate faculties of law and the national Legal Training and Research Institute. The law faculties are to continue to offer general undergraduate education in law, while the law schools in combination with the national Institute are to provide professional legal education. A principal goal of the change is to produce more lawyers. Law schools are charged with providing "practical education especially for fostering legal professionals." But just what is professional legal …

Rosalie Wahl's Vision For Legal Education: Clinics At The Heart, Ann Juergens

Faculty Scholarship

Rosalie Wahl holds a special place in the hearts of Minnesota lawyers. Many women and girls, especially, were gratified when Governor Rudy Perpich appointed her the first woman on the Minnesota Supreme Court in 1977. There were no more than nine other women on supreme courts around the country at the time, and none on the U.S. Supreme Court. She served on the court until 1994, when the law mandating judges’ retirement at age seventy caused her to step down from the bench. This essay highlights the significance of Wahl’s work as a clinical legal educator and activist for legal …

Part-Time Legal Education: It‘S Not Your Parents’ Old Oldsmobile, Edwin J. Butterfoss

Faculty Scholarship

When I am asked to name my accomplishments as dean,' the one that often piques the listener's interest is "starting a weekend law program." Their reaction usually is along the lines of, "A weekend law program? That's different." But depending on to whom I am talking, that "uniform" response needs to be interpreted based on the tone of voice, facial expression, and other body language of the listener If I happen to be talking to a faculty member from another school, the translation is, "I hope my dean doesn't get a crazy idea like that and make me work on …

A Response To Russell Engler By Gretchen Flint, Gretchen M. Flint

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

I am always happy to go back and look at the MacCrate report, and those of you who have been in my clinic know that that's where we start and that's where we end when we talk about the experience of learning. But, as I read Russell's paper, I think the piece that's missing is an acknowledgment of how hard it is for a small group of people who are on the margin to effect change and that institutions have very strong reasons to stay either the way they are or institute very small, incremental changes.

I Didn't Take The Road Less Traveled, And What A Long, Strange Trip It's Been, Brian A. Glassman

Law Faculty Articles and Essays

The author describes his career path and the ways he has sought to combine his interests in law and art. The article concludes with ten survival tips to help others on their career journeys.

Closing The Deal In Contracts: Introducing Transactional Skills In The First Year, David V. Snyder

Articles by Maurer Faculty

No abstract provided.

Opening Remarks, Gary A. Munneke

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

Interestingly, there is hardly any scholarship, and very little discussion, about the MacCrate Report outside of the clinical and skills programs in the traditional segments of legal education. I am not a clinician, although in the past I have taught courses in interviewing and counseling, and negotiations. I teach Law Practice Management and Professional Responsibility, which address professional skills and values; but I teach Torts as well, and my Torts colleagues, like teachers in other traditional subjects, really do not focus on these issues very much. So, one of the things I wanted to do with this symposium was to …

The Document Package Exam As A Teaching Tool, Eric J. Gouvin

Faculty Scholarship

This Article discusses an exam technique that uses realistic hypothetical corporations to test on course material. These fact scenarios are more enjoyable for the students to complete than traditional exams. In addition, the technique helps the Author achieve important pedagogical goals. Students are given a document package composed of corporate articles of incorporation, bylaws, SEC filings, a Standard & Poors Company report, financial statements, and a trust indenture, for example. They have a few weeks before the end of the term to digest the material. They understand that in order to answer the take-home exam questions completely they will have …

Tribute To Harold Jacobson, John H. Jackson

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

Harold Jacobson was not only a fine scholar and excellent teacher who devoted a career to the University of Michigan, but he was also a very trusted colleague and a close friend. His scholarly work was very well recognized and admired. He was one of my colleagues while I taught at Michigan, to whom I willingly recommended students for a multidisciplinary approach to international relations. He was a theorist of political science and international relations who was willing and able to come to grips with the role of law in those fields.

An American Tale, Geoffrey Bennett

Journal Articles

How much influence should the legal profession in England and Wales have over law degree courses? Geoffrey Bennett says to consider the U.S. experience before ditching the idea.

Professor Jonathan I. Charney: Commitment Underpinned By Conviction, James R. Mchenry, Iii

Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law

When I was asked to speak on behalf of the students regarding Professor Charney's contributions to the Law School, I did initially wonder how closely my relationship with him mirrored the experiences of other students. I worked for him for almost two years as a research assistant for the American Journal of International Law; I spoke with him frequently, either in person or via e-mail, about various international legal issues; and he advised me on both my student note for the Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law and on my PhD dissertation. Thus, I knew the image that I had of …

Vii. Legal Education In The Americas, A. An Introduction (Proceedings Of The Third Annual Legal & Policy Issues In The Americas Conference), Jon L. Mills

UF Law Faculty Publications

Proceedings of the Third Annual Legal & Policy Issues in the Americas Conference (2002)

Joining Forces: The Role Of Collaboration In The Development Of Legal Thought, Tracey E. George, Chris Guthrie

Vanderbilt Law School Faculty Publications

For every reason to believe that collaboration has been influential... there is a countervailing reason to believe that it has played a minor role in the evolution of legal thought. It may be easy to bring to mind a handful of prominent collaborations, but most law review articles seem to be written by one author (notwithstanding their lengthy acknowledgment footnotes, suggesting that even single-author works are shaped by the insights and input of multiple scholars). And while it is true that legal scholars often collaborate on their practically oriented works, scholarly articles might not be well suited to collaboration.