« Friendships in the Courtroom | Main | The February submission season is almost here. What about August? »
Wednesday, February 01, 2012
curricular reform in 350 words
Taking my own experiences teaching two first-year courses (with the hopes of soon shifting to a third) and thinking about some of the curricular reforms that Ed Rubin spearheaded when he was dean at Vanderbilt, I've come up with at least a logic for reconstructing the first two years of law school. I don't claim originality, nor do I make claims that it's perfect or even that it's good. I think it's marginally better than the current system, but what do I know? You tell me.
The first two years would be split into four modules that can be offered in any order in the first four semesters. There are no doubt very good arguments for stipulating an order to the modules, but I would assert, first, rock-paper-scissors (A might be better before B but C might be better before before A but would be better after B, etc.); and second, having no predetermined order creates scheduling flexibility for administrators and for faculty who would be engaged in team-teaching or at least communicating with each other extensively.
Semester A: Civil private litigation. Including torts, civ pro, and evidence, with writing and skills needed for litigators.
Semester B: Criminal law and litigation. Including substantive criminal law and all of the basic criminal procedure; and, again, with writing and skills needed for prosecutors and defense attorneys.
Semester C: Transactional lawyering. Including contracts and property (with a focus in the latter on transactional property), with related writing and skills instruction.
Semester D: Public law. Including constitutional law, legislation/ regulation, with related writing and skills instruction (including especially appellate advocacy and advocacy before government agencies).
Left out of this is the advanced curriculum, including especially business law, but also different forms of regulatory work and subject matters. These would be available to students in concentrations during the third year when, having had a taste of these different areas, they could make a better decision about their interest. The third year would also leave time available for experiential learning (externships, etc.).
Lots of holes, LOTS of logistical and transitional problems, but what do you think about the logic at work here?
Posted by Mark Fenster on February 1, 2012 at 11:40 AM | Permalink
TrackBack
TrackBack URL for this entry:
http://www.typepad.com/services/trackback/6a00d8341c6a7953ef01630087e14a970d
Listed below are links to weblogs that reference curricular reform in 350 words:
Comments
International law is strangely absent from this list. (And tax?)
I wonder if it also undervalues sequencing. For example, in the public law area, it often makes sense to take these courses in sequence, rather than simultaneously: First Constitutional Law, then Administrative Law, then Environmental Law, then maybe specialized courses in toxic torts or international environmental law or whatever. Similar sequences run in many other areas,. Module + 3rd year doesn't really seem like enough semesters to run these.
Posted by: Michael Froomkin | Feb 1, 2012 1:10:07 PM
Michael: Excellent point on international law; I think that belongs in the public law module in some form or another, although its extent could be the subject of negotiation. I think tax can be one of the 3rd year concentrations, as well as part of a business concentration (and T&E concentration), and an elective for everyone who might prefer not to concentrate in the third year and take a smattering of courses from across the curriculum. I'm not convinced that tax has to be in the second year, though I suppose a problem would be whether a concentration in tax would be possible in two semesters without the basic course having already been taken. (You could solve that with a short course at the beginning of the fall for those in the tax concentration, I suppose.)
As for environmental law, I can imagine a sequence of courses for 3rd years that takes them from the entry-level (the classic duo of environmental law and natural resources, as well as water law and land use) in the fall, and then more advanced courses in the spring.
I think we overestimate the role that sequencing plays, and I would point to the quite different sequences law schools use in their first (and for some, second) year curricula. Some schools defer constitutional law until second year; some appear to be teaching Leg-Reg either with or before Con Law. We teach Torts before Civ Pro, which I think is kind of crazy, but then if we flipped them the Civ Pro teachers would complain.
But if we run Torts and Civ Pro together, and have the faculty talking with each other and planning courses or at least syllabi together, and then maybe bring in skills people, and then even bring in evidence, well, that would be really cool -- which was kind of the germination of the module model. Which is to say that sequencing matters with subjects that are truly tied to each other in practice, and then what matters is not what comes first but that the subjects are viewed as they are by practitioners, as part of the same cases and workload.
Posted by: Mark Fenster | Feb 1, 2012 2:28:00 PM
"though I suppose a problem would be whether a concentration in tax would be possible in two semesters without the basic course having already been taken."
I think it would be wise to include tax in the 2L public law semester. Students need to take income tax before they will understand more advanced course like corporate tax or partnership tax. I don't think a short course could lay the necessary foundation.
One could argue that future tax lawyers can get more depth from a tax LL.M. if they so desire, but a "more debt/more school" mandate for tax lawyers seems especially insensitive at this time.
Posted by: GU | Feb 1, 2012 8:33:27 PM
I think this makes a lot of sense. Nice work. Look forward to Florida or some new law school you found adopting this soon.
Posted by: Jason Solomon | Feb 1, 2012 11:19:40 PM
Just to clarify, you're not suggesting that individual students could order the semesters in different ways, just that schools could, right? Otherwise you're going to get a huge amount of basic material duplicated between semesters.
Posted by: Andrew MacKie-Mason | Feb 2, 2012 4:17:48 PM
Andrew: Oh, good heavens, no. Scheduling would be managed by the administration, based on faculty availability. My guess would be that the scheduling dean would likely decide on a particular rhythm of offerings in order to simplify the scheduling process; this would likely lead over time to a kind of sequencing -- though in much the same way as my school does it now, where we have a general policy as to what goes in the first and second semesters of the first year, but the scheduling dean may depart from that because of faculty availability.
GU: I think tax could certainly go in the public law term. It could, for example, be one of several additional options from which students could choose beyond the required courses of con law and leg-reg. I'm not convinced that every student has to take tax in the second year or, frankly, take tax at all in law school, although I suspect my tax colleagues and others would disagree with at least the latter point. But there would certainly be value in making it available, especially if there's demand.
Posted by: Mark Fenster | Feb 2, 2012 6:14:49 PM
Ok, that makes more sense then!
My only other concern is that this curriculum might encourage students to view the law as made up of discrete chunks rather than looking for connections between the different fields. But maybe that's silly.
Posted by: Andrew MacKie-Mason | Feb 2, 2012 7:09:45 PM
Agreed, tax shouldn't be mandatory, but it should be available prior to 3L. Having it as a choice in the public law semester is exactly what I had in mind.
Posted by: GU | Feb 3, 2012 9:32:35 PM
