The AALS Conference and the Law School Crisis

Tomorrow I'm off to DC for the annual AALS conference.  For those unfamiliar with it, it is an annual occasion on which law professors from across the country gather together to sit in hotel lobbies, checking their Iphones and surreptitiously glancing at other people's conference badges.  They also occasionally, and mostly accidentally, attend panels.  (The obvious exception here is the Law and Religion Section, which always has superb programs.  This year's is on how blasphemy is dealt with in various countries.  The Section is also co-sponsoring with the state and local government law section a terrific panel on the impact of RLUIPA on state and local governments, featuring the always entertaining pairing of Douglas Laycock and Marci Hamilton.)  

I have been wondering about whether and how the experience of the conference should be any different for the fact of all the attention devoted recently to the law school crisis--and, more important, not just the attention devoted to it but the crisis itself.  That includes, obviously, things like the Campos blog and so on, and the increased attention that many former students are paying to the doings of law school professors.  But, again, it means most centrally the actual facts of the crisis: concerns about law school dishonesty and lack of transparency, about the fate of former law students, about the misuse of entry scholarships for students and upper-year transfers, and so on.  

Since I have never disdained the role of scholarship in law schools, I'm unwilling to suggest that there is anything wrong about attending a conference to discuss issues of legal theory and so on, even in the midst of what I think can genuinely be called a crisis.  I won't dwell too much on whether there is an irony or worse in hanging out on law schools' dime, eating good food and carousing or networking with friends (and discussing, say, income inequality and other social injustices), while many former students go without jobs--except perhaps for those law professors who self-righteously condemn that kind of behavior in others, berating one President or another for golfing while Baghdad burns or New Orleans floods; they have every reason to question their own behavior.  I'm not one for sackcloth and ashes; but that doesn't mean there ought to be no room for a little self-reflection.

I will say that there are many programs on this year's schedule that are relevant to the law school crisis, and that law professors should seriously consider leaving their chairs in the lobby and attending some of them.  I will also express my strong regret that the AALS rejected a number of "hot topics" proposals that would have discussed these matters (including one that I was involved in), although I'm unwilling to ascribe any motives to it in rejecting those proposals.  Certainly there is no good reason for us not to fully inform ourselves not only about present conditions, but also about the many genuine efforts that various individuals and institutions have made to reform the system--and also about the efforts some institutions have made to resist reform, and the many schools that continue to game the system in whole or in part.  

Lastly, the "scamblogs" are often full of former students complaining, in a decidedly Judean People's Front-like fashion, that less talk and more direct action is needed.  For those folks, protest is always an option: I doubt it would do much good, but they could always adopt as their slogan "Occupy the Marriott Wardman Park Washington Hotel."  (For those who are interested, the conference takes place between Wednesday and Sunday at that hotel.)  Many law professors enjoy mixing their attendance at the AALS with a little picketing, given the labor issues that often surround these conferences; I see no reason why students inclined to protest the law schools should deprive themselves of a like opportunity.