Legal Commentary

There has been a lot of conversation about the existence of a legal education bubble, and I have zero expertise on those dynamics.  I do know quite a bit about me, though, so my thoughts at these times naturally turn to the question, what would the post-bubble legal education world have to look like for me to jump back into private practice?

Now perhaps the post-bubble world means non-existence for some law schools, particularly the new ones, which could hasten my return to practice.  I don't think we're in any danger on that front at St. Thomas (having raised nearly $100 million in our short lifespan), so my mind turns to the reasons why life as a law prof is like having found "a loophole in life."  In particular, what could make it seem less like a "loophole" and more like, to put it delicately, what is known as "a job?"

[At this point, I would like my dean -- or anyone who might become my dean down the road -- to stop reading.]  My sense, if my views are remotely typical, is that law schools have quite a bit of cost-saving leeway before they start losing faculty back to the practice world. At St. Thomas, our teaching load is 10 credits per year.  That was a factor (though by no means the most important factor) in getting me to come here from St. John's, where the teaching load was 12 credits.  But even at 12 credits, folks have plenty of time to engage in scholarship throughout the year.  If my school raised teaching loads to 16 credits, would I bolt to a firm?  My mom is a tenured professor at a liberal arts college, and she teaches 18 credits every year.  She still has time to work on scholarship during the semester, though not nearly as much as I do.  Would I be unhappy to lose that extra time?  Yes.  Would I leave teaching?  No.  Does the value that flows from my extra time for scholarship accrue to the school so as to justify having to hire more faculty to cover courses?  I'd like to think so, but I'm not sure.  If teaching loads became so heavy that I had no significant time to engage in scholarship outside the summer, would I bolt?  I would seriously consider it.  Though I enjoy the teaching, I would not stay in teaching simply for the teaching.

Could my school cut my pay and still keep me around?  In past years, I would probably have given a reflexive "yes," since if we cared a whole lot about money, we wouldn't be teaching.  But as I'm starting to do those online college savings calculators, I will admit that I do have a breaking point on money.  I'm not sure where it is, but it's there.

I think there's more room to maneuver on teaching loads, but the obvious caveat is that it depends on what competitor schools are doing.  For the thirty or so schools that purport to be in the top 10, I wouldn't expect much movement on teaching loads given competitive pressures.  But isn't it reasonably foreseeable over the next ten years or so that, faced with significant downward pressure on tuition, a good number of schools outside the top tier will take serious looks at increasing our teaching loads?  And once a critical mass heads that direction, is there any reason why a dean figuring out how to make ends meet shouldn't join them?