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Law School

Law School Innovation

By Douglas A. Berman, Anupam Chander, Gene Koo, Mark W. Osler et al.

Post Frequency: 0.1/day

Last Entry: February 05, 2010 at 10:41:22

Technology in practice

Posted on February 05, 2010
Over the decade I have been teaching, I have seen the way my students communicate with one another change profoundly, and I have (more slowly) adapted to these changes. Instead of email and phone calls, now we have texts and...

Orientation Time

Posted on August 18, 2009
We all wing it, don't we? While there is a lot of cross-school dialogue about classes and methodology, I haven't seen much relating to how we all handle orientation. Based on what I have heard from colleagues at other schools...

PLI becomes first (but surely not the last) to put its law books on the Kindle

Posted on July 15, 2009
As detailed in some of the posts linked below, various folks have chatted for years in this forum about the Kindle and other e-readers as a possible forum for legal materials. This press release spotlights the first major legal publishing...

Working with students, chronicled

Posted on March 23, 2009
Like most law profs, I collaborate with students and former students in a variety of ways, including drafting briefs, researching for articles, and working on pro bono cases. Some students, of course, I remember better than others, and a few...

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Will new grading systems really lead law schools away from traditional exams?

Posted on February 28, 2009

Forget the laptop debate ... how about cellphones in the classroom?

Posted on February 17, 2009
This past sunday's New York Times brought this fascinating article about technology in the classroom, headlined "Industry Makes Pitch That Smartphones Belong in Classroom." Here is how the article starts: The cellphone industry has a suggestion for improving the math...

"Wanted: Law School Deans -- Lots of Them"

Posted on February 02, 2009
The title of this post is the title of this intriguing article in The National Law Journal. Here are some snippets: Even in this economy, there seems to still be a demand for one high-paying job: law school dean. At...

Another law professor takes on another big job in the Obama Administration

Posted on January 19, 2009
The BLT Blog reports on another law professor taking on an important role in the Obama Administration as second banana in the Office of the Solicitor General: "Legal Timeshas confirmed that Georgetown law professor Neal Katyal, who successfully argued the...

Livestreaming litigation as real-world education

Posted on January 15, 2009
Prof. Charlie Nesson convinced Judge Nancy Gertner (US District Court, MA) to allow videocameras to stream coverage of the proceedings in RIAA vs. Tenenbaum, one of the most high-profile (and perhaps last) cases in which the record industry is going....

CSO Innovations

Posted on January 12, 2009
At many law schools, especially those below the top 20, there is a fair amount of unhappiness with the Career Services Office. This unhappiness is especially apparent among those not in the top quarter of the class, who feel they...

Student survey on laptops in the classroom, legal writing and other LSI topics of note

Posted on January 07, 2009
A new piece from The Chronicle of Higher Education, headlined "Survey Gets Law-School Students' Thoughts on Laptops, Writing, and Ethics," covers a lot of topics that often garner our attention here at LSI. Here are a few snippets from this...

Will legal academics in top DOJ posts mean innovation in government or law schools?

Posted on January 06, 2009
As everyone probably already know, and as detailed in this official press release, the Obama team has named two prominent academics to fill two important spots in the Justice Department: Harvard Law Dean Elena Kagan was tapped to be Solicitor...

What does everyone think about free tuition and other early UC-Irvine innovations?

Posted on December 31, 2008
Last week the AP had this story, headlined "SoCal law school tempts students with free tuition," about the efforts by UC-Irvine to get a flying start with top students in its first class. Here are snippets from the story: A...

Success and the narrow path to professorhood

Posted on December 28, 2008
In my last post, I reflected a bit on Malcolm Gladwell's Outliers and the formation of law professors. Having finished the book, I have a few more thoughts, which suggest that the way we select law professors is to the...

Law Profs and the 10,000 hours

Posted on December 23, 2008
Malcom Gladwell's book Outliers contains a fascinating theory: That the most successful people in a field tend to be those who met a certain threshold of intelligence or talent, and then practiced their skills for at 10,000 hours before attaining...

Naming innovations at law school

Posted on December 20, 2008
The National Law Journal has this interesting article, headlined "Fla. law school takes 'naming rights' concept to a new level." The piece discusses one law school's innovative approach to naming rights. Here are some excerpts: While all law schools seem...

An innovative legal magazine ... which some law schools might emulate?

Posted on December 17, 2008
I keep getting e-mail telling me about the soon-to-be published new magazine pictured here. The magazine's website provides this information about the publication: Introducing a brand new publication designed specifically for women professionals in the litigation practice specialty...

The Quandary of the Beautiful Tangent

Posted on December 02, 2008
It is something most law teachers have come across at least once: You are working your way through some kind of a doctrine or point of legal history, and a student comes up with a brilliant and compelling question. It...

An exciting honor from the ABA for LSI

Posted on December 01, 2008
I was both extraordinarily excited and quite surprised to discover that LSI has won a place on the ABA's latest and greatest list of the best legal blogs. This post on the ABA's blog, titled "50 New Sites Make 2nd...

"Law school dean trying to break into Top 10 rankings"

Posted on November 13, 2008
The title of this post might be the title of a mission statement for just about every law school ranked somewhere in the top 50. But, in fact, it is the headline of this interesting local article discussing the goals...

Innovation and a big move

Posted on October 23, 2008
Last week I traveled to rural Buie's Creek, North Carolina to give the Professionalism Lecture at Campbell Law School. Campbell is an interesting place, but the real intrigue (and innovation) will occur next year.Put simply, Campbell is picking up and...

The University of Louisville's law faculty SSRN aggregator page

Posted on October 21, 2008
� Reprinted from The Cardinal Lawyer and MoneyLaw � The University of Louisville is justifiably proud of its law faculty and of the high-impact academic work generated by this community of scholars. In earlier posts (like this and this and...

Great (though incomplete) look at HLS, innovations, and the future of elite law schools

Posted on October 20, 2008
The Boston Globe yesterday had this terrific article discussing the recent past, present and future of Harvard Law School. The article has lots of interesting passages for would-be law school innovators: For the first time in years, Cambridge is home...

Future of the Law School Coursebook wrapup

Posted on September 30, 2008
Coverage of the event in the local press and by John Palfrey. I will try to post audio of the event shortly. My own takeaways: We need to distinguish strongly between electronic distribution of textbooks and new methods of creating/authoring...

Do lawyers now need to know all about web searching and wikis?

Posted on September 25, 2008
Perhaps the only thing I took away from the my law school legal research class a couple decades ago was that I should always remember to check the pocket part for new developments. Though I know hard-copy pocket parts are...

What if Westlaw merged with SSRN?

Posted on September 21, 2008
Legal scholarship truly is bizarre, in that the status of our work is largely determined not by our peers, but by students (the law review editors) at schools other than our own. We all know this-- that status correlates to...

ABA's Outcome Measures and Tenure Proposals

Posted on June 11, 2008
The ABA's Section of Legal Education and Admissions to the Bar has released two special committee reports that could be influential in reforming legal education in the US, namely, Interim Report of the Outcome Measures Committee and Report of the...

Will Palfrey's Appointment Lead to Technological Innovations at HLS?

Posted on April 28, 2008
John Palfrey has been appointed Associate Dean, Library and Information Resources and a tenured professor of law at Harvard Law School. Bios here, here and here. John's name should ring a bell. He is Executive Director of the Berkman Center...

What if there were two competing rankings?

Posted on April 18, 2008
In an earlier post, I suggested the idea of a BCS calculation for law school rankings, which would combine the U.S. News poll with other, less prominent, rankings. It is a project I intend to pursue, and am now evaluating...

Vision 2020: Digital Ubiquity and University Transformation

Posted on April 18, 2008
The University of Cincinnati College of Design, Architecture, Art and Planning (DAAP) is hosting Vision 2020: Digital Ubiquity & University Transformation: 2008 Higher Education Leadership Summit, August 6-8, 2008. The conference is co-sponsored by Apple...

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