Academic

Law School Centers

By Jacqueline Lipton

I posted a while back when I was visiting at Concurring Opinions about the role of academic Centers within the law school enterprise.  That post didn't generate a lot of discussion, but I'd really be interested in whether anyone at the Lounge has any thoughts about the ideal contribution an academic Center can make to a law school.  Is it all about marketing?  Or are there other important contributions a Center can make?  As a center director, I like to think that we might also serve a useful function in terms of academic programming for faculty and students and to use our center website as a hub for collecting information in relevant areas that might be of interest to faculty, students and the broader legal community.  Also, Centers can be useful focal points for interdisciplinary work, both within and outside the school's university.  Other advantages or perceived disadvantages of centers?  [I'm not a center zealot and I understand the political, resouce allocation and other problems centers can cause, so I suppose my question is whether the upsides outweigh the downsides, and in what circumstances...]

Full post as published by The Faculty Lounge on June 17, 2009 (boomark / email).