Professor of Law and Dean Emeritx Luke Bierman spoke with the flagship publication of the North Carolina Bar Association about his tenure as dean of Elon University's downtown Greensboro law school and the achievements of its students, graduates, faculty, and staff.
Elon Law Dean Emeritx Luke Bierman was featured in the February 2022 issue of North Carolina Lawyer Magazine where he shared reflections on the achievements of the law school community during his recently concluded deanship.
“Bierman Completes Groundbreaking Tenure As Dean of Elon University School of Law” included observations on Elon Law’s 2.5-year curriculum, the law school’s soaring bar passage and career placement rates, and legal education more broadly.
“There are really three core elements to the Elon Law program of legal education,” Bierman told the magazine. “One is the required residency-in-practice program that puts students in the shoes of a lawyer with a practice certificate. Then there’s the 2.5-year component, which is a value issue and makes it more affordable and opens it up to students who might otherwise not have thought about coming to law school. And then there is the logical progression of learning. We design every step the students take to be part of a progression of preparation for the bar exam and for practice and success.
“Those are the three core components that distinguish what we at Elon Law did, and we engaged in very candid, difficult conversations to accomplish this approach. We were upending 150 years of tradition. And the results speak for themselves.”
Bierman announced last spring his intent to conclude his service as dean at the end of the 2021 calendar year. He joined the Elon Law community in June 2014, succeeding the late Dean Emeritus George R. Johnson, Jr.
Before joining Elon Law, Bierman was associate dean for experiential education and distinguished professor of the practice of law at Northeastern University School of Law. He previously served as general counsel for the Office of the New York State Comptroller from 2007 to 2010, was executive director of the Institute for Emerging Issues at North Carolina State University, founded the Justice Center and directed the Judicial Division at the American Bar Association, and served as chief attorney for the Appellate Division, Third Department, of the New York Supreme Court in Albany where he also clerked for the court’s presiding justice and an associate justice.
Bierman’s legal scholarship focuses on judicial selection, justice system reform, state constitutional law and ethics.
A national search is now in progress as Elon University leaders search for the law school’s fourth dean. Interim Dean Alan Woodlief assumed leadership of the law school effective January 1.