The Defining Point for Legal Education

Daniel Girard, founder and managing partner of a San Francisco- and New York-based litigation firm and a member of the Educating Tomorrow's Lawyers Advisory Committee, recently sat down with ETL to discuss his insights into legal education and what he sees as a the most promising new teaching strategies being implemented by law schools and the qualities that new attorneys need to succeed in the practice of law.

In his Voices from the Field interview, Girard discusses several topics, including:

• The various opportunities that law degrees afford and how the skills learned in law schools transcend private practice.
• How professionalism is a non-negotiable for newly hired attorneys from day one.
• The need for students to be exposed to the types of work that different types of lawyers do before they go into practice.

Daniel Girard is the founder and managing partner of Girard Gibbs LLP, a San Francisco and New York-based litigation firm with a nationwide practice, specializing in representing plaintiffs in class actions and complex litigation. His experience extends to matters involving securities, antitrust, consumer, telecommunications, and civil rights laws. Girard was appointed to the United States Judicial Conference Advisory Committee on Civil Rules by the late Chief Justice William Rehnquist, and reappointed to a second term by Chief Justice John Roberts.