Best Practices For Legal Education: Law School

Home -> Law Blog Directory -> Law School Blogs

OR PHONE (866) 635-1838 for Bankruptcy Help, (866) 635-6190 for Divorce,
(866) 635-2689 for Personal Injury or (866) 635-9402 for Criminal Defense

Find a Local Lawyer

Bankruptcy (866) 635-1838
Divorce (866) 635-6190
Personal Injury (866) 635-2689
Criminal Defense (866) 635-9402

Law School

Best Practices For Legal Education

Source of information on current reforms in legal education arising from the publication of Roy Stuckey’s Best Practices for Legal Education and the Carnegie Foundation’s Educating Lawyers.
By Mary Lynch, Editor

Post Frequency: 1/day

Last Entry: July 19, 2010 at 23:07:04

National Law Journal Covers Student Learning Outcomes Discussion

Posted on February 22, 2010
LAW SCHOOLS Holding schools accountable ABA is pushing educators to prove their law graduates can cut it. by Karen Sloan February 22, 2010 When 3,500 legal educators convened in New Orleans for the Association of American Law School’s annual meeting in January, one topic dominated the conversation: the American Bar Association’s attempts to add “student learning outcomes” to its [...

Clinical Theory Workshop 25th Anniversary Celebration and Conference

Posted on February 22, 2010
Dear members and friends of the Clinical Theory Workshops: I?m happy to tell you that this year, 2010, marks the 25th anniversary of the Clinical Theory Workshop series. In honor of this birthday, I propose to throw a party ? that is, to hold a conference ? and I?m writing to invite you to participate...

Calling All ?Contracts? Professors: What?s your favorite coursebook?

Posted on February 17, 2010
As we have been implementing Best Practices and Carnegie reforms, many of us have created or have made creative use of coursebooks which facilitate Best Practices learning and teaching. One of my colleagues will be teaching Contracts for the first time this fall, she has extensive practice experience and has excelled at clinical supervision and clinical pedagogy...

Lots of Great Stuff from CLEA ? Check it out

Posted on February 15, 2010
From Kim Connolly and Larry Spain: The February, 2010 issue of the CLEA Newsletter has been published and posted on the CLEA website, http://www.cleaweb.org. It can be found under the What?s Happening Tab. This will also give you an opportunity to explore the new CLEA website...

To access this complete feed in the blog feed reader login or register for free.

Best Practices for Legal Education in Monterrey, Mexico

Posted on February 14, 2010
The States in Mexico are, one by one, revising their criminal law and criminal procedure codes to change from an inquisitional, written system to an adversarial system with oral trials. Of course, this transformation is a major change in their legal culture...

Integrating Internet-Based and Teleconferencing Resources into On-Line Teaching

Posted on February 08, 2010
Note: This is a continuing weblog describing my experiences teaching an on-line course in government ethics. The on-line government ethics course this semester has already benefitted from a number of internet-based resources as well as teleconferencing...

BEST PRACTICES AND LAND USE LAW: a ?natural? merger?

Posted on February 05, 2010
A new article just posted to SSRN examines Best Practices in the field of land use law. The article, “Practically Grounded: Convergence of Land Use Pedagogy and Best Practices” is forthcoming in the Journal of Legal Education. (One can downloand at: http://papers...

Updating Institutional Responses to Best Practices

Posted on February 02, 2010
St. John’s U Law School Professor Gina Calabrese posted this query to the clinic listserv: ?I?d like to hear from other clinicians whose schools are taking steps to study and implement the Best Practices report. What is being done, what issues are being raised?? I think this would make a good public discussion...

On-Line Discussion Boards Create a New Arena for Engaged Learning Environments

Posted on January 27, 2010
What?s better than the Socratic Method to engage all students in a course? On-line discussion boards. One of the challenges in creating the virtual classroom is to strive for students to substitute time that would have been spent sitting in a seat in an actual classroom for time spent engaged in the discussion on-line...

?I?d like to thank the Academy??: Using Movies in the Law School Classroom

Posted on January 22, 2010
The conversation that follows reminds me that when we, those supportive of the Best Practice model, use words like ?innovation? and ?engagement,? what we really mean is effective innovation and efficient engagement. When venturing away from the traditional delivery methods in the name of engagement and innovation, the most effective and efficient delivery methods must [...

Course Design ? Technology Meets Substance in On-Line Curriculum Development

Posted on January 20, 2010
After setting course learning outcomes for the on-line government ethics course, I had to revise my syllabus to better match my goals and desired outcomes mindful of the on-line format, and I had to develop creative strategies for creating a vibrant virtual discussion that would satisfactorily create a functional equivalent of an in-person classroom discussion...

Support for Empirical Research on Teaching/Assessment

Posted on January 18, 2010
The Need for Scholarship About Law Teaching and Learning When we teach or assess differently, we often wonder: does this actually make a difference? Does it improve student learning? If so, does it improve all students’ learning, or does it only help a particular segment of students? What do students think about this different methodology? Does [...

Setting Goals and Evaluation for an On-Line Course

Posted on January 17, 2010
With the recent focus on outcomes for learning, I decided to provide students taking the first on-line course at Albany Law School with written goals for the semester. The following was posted for the students: COURSE GOALS: By the end of the course, students who participate fully should be able to: 1) APPLY acquired knowledge of government ethics [...

Who are the ?Best Law Teachers??

Posted on January 14, 2010
In 2008, Michael Hunter Schwartz, of Washburn Law School, began soliciting nominations for a study of the Best Law Teachers in this country based on Ken Bain’s book, What the Best College Teachers Do (2004). Professor Schwartz has recently enlisted Best Practices Blog contributors Sophie Sparrow of Franklin Pierce and Gerry Hess of Gonzaga as [...

Objection! Helping Clinical Students Practice Trial Skills

Posted on January 14, 2010
For the better part of the last decade, students in Albany Law’s Domestic Violence Prosecution Hybrid Clinic have used a computer program called “You Be the Judge” to help them sharpen their evidentiary objections. It takes about forty-five minutes for students to complete a simulated trail during which they must object to various pieces of evidence [...

Organizing Technology to Teach On-Line

Posted on January 12, 2010
There are many technical issues to explore when setting up an on-line course. The most important resource with respect to all aspects of technical course design was our superstar instructional technologist at Albany Law School, Darlene Cardillo (here is a link to her technology blog: http://albanylawtech...

Stuckey Comments on Proposed Revisions to ABA Standards

Posted on December 23, 2009
As you know from earlier posts, the ABA Standards Review Committee is having a meeting on its proposed revisions in January during the AALS conference. Best Practices author Roy Stuckey has submitted comments to the Committee (copied below). What do you think of Roy’s comments? of the revisions? Should the Best Practices Implementation committee take a position? MEMORANDUM TO: [...

ABA Accreditation Standards Panel Discussion at AALS

Posted on December 21, 2009
Outcome Measures matters will be the subject of a panel on Friday afternoon put on by the AALS Executive Committee Forum with the ABA Section on Legal Education and Admission to the Bar, entitled Requiring Law Schools to Measure Student Learning: A Forum on ABA Accreditation Standards, 4:00 pm – 5:45 pm (general materials on [...

Washington & Lee?s New 3rd Year Curriculum

Posted on December 21, 2009
Washington & Lee has implemented a new third year curriculum focused on experiential learning. The Washington Post covered this story here. But more interesting is the ongoing conversation had on the Wall Street Journal’s Law Blog on whether the 3rd year of law school is really necessary...

Golden Gate University?s New 1L Curriculum

Posted on December 18, 2009
The faculty at Golden Gate University School of Law unanimously approved changes to the first-year curriculum to go into effect with the class that matriculates in the fall of 2010. They have decided to allocate a total of five credits to Legal Writing & Research for first year students (2 credits in the fall and [...

How Far Will California-Irvine Go?

Posted on December 14, 2009
An article in the August, 2009, ABA Journal profiled the new law school at the University of California at Irvine which was entering its first year. The article reported some interesting things, including a claim that ?it is designed to be among the most innovative law schools in the nation...

Clearer Goals For Legal Education: Coming Soon to A School Near You

Posted on December 11, 2009
The theme of the regional conference at Albany Law School last week was “Developing and Defining Measurable Goals for Teaching Law Students.” On the Tuesday night before the conference, I received a copy of proposed changes to ABA Accreditation Standards 301-305...

Call for Papers and Proposals for SALT Teaching Conference (in Hawai?i!)

Posted on December 07, 2009
Deadline for Panels and Papers–January 15, 2010 Teaching in a Transformative Era: The Law School of the Future will examine the most pressing challenges law schools face in the 21st century. In the midst of the nation?s worst economic crisis since the Great Depression, law schools must stay relevant and incorporate a curriculum that keeps pace with [...

Educators Convene at Albany Law School to Discuss Outcomes & Objectives

Posted on December 07, 2009
On December 4, 2009, Albany Law School Dean Thomas Guernsey and keynote speaker Roy Stuckey headlined the 2009 Northeast Regional Conference “Developing and Defining Measurable Goals for Teaching Law Students.“ Professor Stuckey, author of Best Practices for Legal Education and a Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Law at the University of South Carolina School of Law, spoke [...

Apprenticeships ? a best practice?

Posted on November 11, 2009
I recently returned from Serbia and Macedonia on a Public Interest Law Institute trip to help assess which Balkan law schools should join PILI?s expanding legal education reform project. Some professors were surprised that US law schools are also wringing their collective hands about how to give ideally all law students more meaningful experiential [...

Another Interdisciplinary Collaboration?this time with a Professor of German!

Posted on November 08, 2009
The University of New Mexico International Studies Institute has a relationship with the German government in which the Institute runs a summer program at a castle near Dusseldorf known as Schloss-Dyck. In summer 2010, I am going to have the privilege of teaching in the program with a Jason Wilby, a UNM visiting Professor of [...

Standards Review Committee

Posted on November 07, 2009
Anything new with the ABA Section of Legal Education & Admissions to the Bar?s Standards Review Committee? Best Practices devotees know that in Sept. 08 the committee began a comprehensive review of standards that includes considering the contents of reports by two special subcommittees, on Outcome Measures and Security of Position and comments on the [...

Cost of Legal Education

Posted on November 07, 2009
A recent GAO report, HIGHER EDUCATION: Issues Related to Law School Cost and Access is garnering attention in the blogosphere ( clinicians -with-not-enough-to-do, poverty law) and more conventional media. Responding to a GAO survey, law schools blamed a move toward ” a more hands-on, resource-intensive approach to legal education” and competition for US News rankings for [...

Collaborative Externships Update

Posted on October 22, 2009
Almost seven months ago I blogged about the the Laurel Rubin Rural Externship Advocacy Project sponsored by the Washington State Access to Justice and the Law School’s committee. Externship Collaborations In June the Project was formally launched at the WA Access to Justice Conference, the first cohort of students, one from each of the Washington law [...

Orientation Programs

Posted on October 22, 2009
A fun aspect of getting a few gray hairs: we might be around long enough to see our ideas come to fruition. Some years ago I wrote about the important role of experiential learning in providing context for law students. Passion, Context, and Lawyering Skills: Choosing Among Simulated and Real Clinical Experiences, 7 Clin...

Previous | Next

Related Law Bulletins

Update on AILF's Legal Action Center Visa Bulletin Litigation (Updated 7/10/07)
The following is the latest update from AILF regarding its pening ...

The Immigrant Legal Resource Center Legislative Forecast
The ILRC Forecast on Immigration ReformJudith Golub, Executive Dir...

The Christian Legal Society and "discrimation": Response to Susan
In response to Susan's post, I'm inclined to think that, yes, the ...

Stacy Scnheider Legal Commentator Apprentice

Catholic Legal Theory and life and death
Tom Berg’s question regarding the propriety or not of capital pu...