News & Updates

Law schools are being targeted by the media and by former students for failing to provide adequate information about actual employment of graduates, and for graduating more lawyers than the market can bear. Candor and market sensitivity are important, but they are effects—not causes.

The Wall Street Journal is reporting that Congress might be readying for congressional hearings law schools, their job placement numbers, and the debt their graduates are carrying with them.

Educating Lawyers, often referred to in legal circles as the “Carnegie Report,” has found its way into a number of articles and blog posts lately. Just Monday, it was cited by Professor Benjamin Spencer of Washington and Lee School of Law in his Washington Post guest post urging that we reform legal education, rather than deregulate it.

Professor Benjamin Spencer of Washington and Lee School of Law wrote a guest post in the Washington Post, arguing that bringing the Carnegie model to law school is far preferable to the deregulation of the profession.

According to the author, 12% of Canadian law school graduates are currently unable to secure an articling position. In light of this, the article urges Canadian law schools to look to legal education reform efforts in the United States that were inspired by the Carnegie Report.

This week, Rebecca Love Kourlis contributed a guest post to the National Law School's Forum on Legal Education: But, of course, systemic change doesn’t happen overnight. Progress will be incremental. The people who can make it happen are the deans and law professors who are committed to the best possible education for tomorrow’s lawyers.

Dean Larry Kramer of Stanford writes that law schools don't necessarily teach the way they did 20 or 30 years ago. Many, he claims, have evolved to meet the needs of the profession. On the contrary, the professional education law students get today…

A new clinic for victims of domestic violence at the Sandra Day O'Connor College of Law will be named the Ruth V. McGregor Family Protection Clinic in honor of retired Arizona Supreme Court Chief Justice Ruth V. McGregor. Justice McGregor chairs the Advisory Committee for the O'Connor Judicial Selection Project.

Economist and Brookings Senior Fellow Clifford Winston has co-authored a new book that has created conversation around its premise, which is evident in its title: First Thing We Do, Let's Deregulate All the Lawyers. In this New York Times op-ed about the legal profession, he asks: "What if the barriers to entry were simply done away with?"

Two law professors suggest that preparing students for their first couple years fo practice is hardly enough--law schools must strive to prepare students for "for a lifetime of successful, ethical, and personally rewarding practice."

The Institute for Law Teaching and Learning and North Carolina Central School of Law are co-hosting a conference on March 3, 2012, which will focus on the use of technology to enhance teaching and learning in and out of the classroom. They announced…

The American Bar Association's Standards Review Committee will hold a public forum in Chicago on November 11 to allow for comments on proposed changes to the standards. Among the requirements that have drawn concerns are "student learning outcomes," or "requirements that law schools lay out what they want students to learn and design ways to assess whether they are meeting those goals."

The online legal community was abuzz Monday with the news that corporate clients don’t want to foot the bill for new lawyer training thanks to a Wall Street Journal article that asks: “First-Year Associates: Are They Worth It?” We’ve been talking to in-house counsel for months about gaps in legal education and the skills they would like law schools to develop in their students.

The chair of the ABA Section of Legal Education and Admissions to the Bar has directed the Standards Review Committee draft a new standard that provides for "specific and severe penalties for the intentional misreporting of placement data, including…

New York Law School, one of the first law schools to be sued over its job placement data, has filed a motion to dismiss. It claims it is in full compliance with the American Bar Association's procedures for reporting employment data. Click here to…

A survey conducted by the Wall Street Journal for the Association of Corporate Counsel suggests that in-house legal departments are refusing to pay for new lawyers. More than 20% responded that they have refused to pay for work by first- or second…

Four years ago, Professor Andrew Schepard and his colleagues at Maurice A. Deane School of Law at Hofstra University developed a family law class that would strike a balance between doctrine and skills development. This week, we added it to our growing collection of innovative law school courses. In a recent interview, Professor Schepard discussed the course, which he has taught the last three years.

Annita M. Menogan is currently responsible for oversight of all legal matters for Red Robin, including compliance and corporate governance, and is a member of the Educating Tomorrow's Lawyers Advisory Committee. She recently sat down with us to talk about the future for law students and new law graduates in the profession. In her Voices from the Field interview, Menogan raises several issues about the current state of legal education, and some possible solutions.

In a recent presentation, Professor Daniel Martin Katz of Michigan State University College of Law promoted a new law school model that, among other things, blends practice skills with doctrine and favors students with undergraduate majors in science and engineering.

Senator Barbara Boxer continues to push the American Bar Association to require law schools to produce accurate job statistics and called the ABA's actions to date "half measures." Click here to read the article.