The dean of Elon University School of Law offers four steps to reinvent legal education in an April 15 article for the ABA Journal’s “The New Normal” series.
Dean Bierman notes in the article that the American Bar Association task force on the future of legal education called for “sweeping changes to the law school curriculum, pricing and overall value delivered to law students.”
“What kinds of skills does a 21st century lawyer need to succeed and how do we adapt the traditional strengths of legal education to develop those skills?” Bierman asks in the article. “How can we adjust our tuition and business models to be responsive to cost and debt questions while retaining the positive attributes of professional education?”
Bierman’s proposal calls for “better training in writing, business skills, project management, technology, data analytics, leadership development, and communication.”
“These qualities are coveted by law firms and enable lawyers to blossom from narrow technicians into strategic thinkers, deal makers, problem solvers and community leaders,” Bierman writes. “But in most law schools today, students simply do not get opportunities to learn these skills early enough, if at all.”
Bierman also calls for “full-time, course-connected legal residencies to become a staple of the law school experience.”
“We need to require hands-on learning through partnerships with law firms, judges, nonprofits and government agencies – where students can learn by doing in immersive and iterative programs,” Bierman writes. “The experiential dimensions of legal education should be integrated and strategically sequenced with rigorous courses from day one to graduation, providing students with increasing levels of responsibility for real legal work at each stage of their development.”
In a third proposal for reinventing legal education, Bierman calls for stronger connections between practicing attorneys and law schools.
“Rather than hoping that students will carve out a career path on their own, we should provide them with professional advisers and mentors, including faculty, attorneys, career consultants, and executive coaches who counsel them on course selections, practical experiences and custom pathways to career success,” Bierman writes.
Finally, Bierman argues that law schools must become more affordable.
“If we are really serious about the long term best interests of students, and thus their future clients, we need to lower the tuition and guarantee that it will not increase for the entire course of study,” Bierman writes. “One way to do that is to realign the curriculum so that all students can accelerate their studies and graduate in less than the typical three years.”
“These proposals for reforming law school may seem aggressive, but this is not a time for incremental adjustments; it is a time for bold action,” Bierman concludes. “Elon Law has adopted a new curriculum that addresses each and every one of the elements discussed above, and the faculty worked hard to adopt these changes in less than six months … we redesigned the law school experience for the 21st century, providing logically sequenced instruction, full time experience, highly integrated student engagement with the practicing bar and great value all in a 2½ year experience with a 20% reduction in cost.”
Learn more about Elon Law’s groundbreaking model of legal education here.
Learn more about Elon Law Dean Luke Bierman here.