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Exercises/Activities

David Grenardo

A Behind-The-Scenes Look at the Holloran Center that Provides Guidance to All Law Schools Implementing Professional Identity Formation

By: David A. Grenardo, Professor of Law and Associate Director of the Holloran Center for Ethical Leadership in the Professions, University of St. Thomas School of Law

Ever since I attended my first Holloran Center Workshop in 2016 and read the powerful materials provided by Neil Hamilton and Jerry Organ, I always wondered how those two operated the Holloran Center. What were they doing at their own law school to implement professional identity since they were the ones giving others ideas of how to do so? What were their personalities like given their considerable influence and impact in legal education?

After joining the University of St. Thomas School of Law and the Holloran Center as its Associate Director this past fall, I can finally answer these questions and share those answers with you. The answers provide an incredible amount of knowledge and wisdom that any law school can use to implement professional identity formation for its students.

Raw Self-Reflection

Professional identity entails continuous self-reflection that allows law students to develop into the professionals they can and want to become. Neil and Jerry strongly encourage this aspect of professional identity for students, and they demonstrate it themselves.

The University of St. Thomas School of Law requires that all 1Ls take three one-credit classes, Moral Reasoning for Lawyers (MRFL), Serving Clients Well, and Business Basics. The concept of professional identity is introduced and reinforced in these courses, particularly MRFL and Serving Clients Well. When St. Thomas Law first introduced some of these ideas, they were included in one three-credit course, Foundations of Justice (Foundations). The three-credit course format was not well received by students. Jerry spearheaded efforts to improve each part of the course, which included commissioning a focus group of students who previously took Foundations to learn what the class did well and not so well.  Those conversations resulted in splitting Foundations into two courses— MRFL (one credit) in the fall and Foundations of Justice (two credits) in the spring. Eventually, the two-credit Foundations of Justice course in the spring also was divided and renamed Serving Clients Well (SCW) and Business Basics (BB) to give students exposure to client-service competencies they will need to be successful in practice.

I am now part of this evolutionary process myself as we revisit the design/implementation of the BB course, which I will co-teach with Jerry. Despite being an accomplished and elite teaching professor and scholar, Jerry once again has invited students to share their concerns about the design and content of the course, which has generated some brutal honesty from the students. Jerry has taken the critique and reflected on his own execution and design of the class. We are presently redesigning the class to make it more effective and to engage students where they are.

I also have witnessed Jerry’s and Neil’s honest self-reflection in our weekly Holloran Center meetings where they admit something could have been done better or acknowledge something went well. The vulnerability and candor in which they approach their own self-reflection allow them to truly understand and see where improvements can be made and success has been achieved. This leads to my next observation – they exhibit a growth mindset.

We Will Continuously Try New Things, and When We Fail, Which is Good, We Will Make Them Better

I sometimes feel like I am in the middle of the “Meet the Robinsons” Disney movie when I am working with Neil and Jerry. In that movie, the great inventor, genius, and orphan Lewis goes into the future as a young boy and unknowingly meets his eventual family. As he attempts one of his inventions, it fails horrendously and his future family cheers and congratulates him, “You have failed! From failure we learn, from success. . . not so much.” With Neil and Jerry, there is a humble joy in them when they speak of attempts at implementing professional identity with little or no success. Each of them will say something like, “We tried, but it didn’t work the way we expected or not at all.” They make statements like these without remorse or regret; instead, they do so with humility, pride, and hope. They would probably not call their efforts failures, but instead would likely characterize their attempts as Thomas Edison did, “I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.”

They attempt new things knowing that they will not be perfect and actively seek out ways to improve what they have done.

The tinkering and re-jiggering of MRFL, SCW, and BB, led to the inclusion of Roadmap into SCW. Now SCW includes one-on-one coaching of students in January and February of the 1L year using the Roadmap in SCW.

Roadmap, for the uninitiated, is a book written by Neil Hamilton that guides a law student “to prepare and implement a successful plan for meaningful employment.” Neil won the prestigious E. Smythe Gambrell Professionalism Award from the ABA in 2015 based on the Roadmap and his efforts to improve professionalism in the legal profession. Neil is currently finishing up the third edition of the book to make it even more accessible and helpful to law students. The revised Roadmap will be ready for students to utilize this spring in SCW.

Over the last two decades, Jerry and Neil also have played a role in developing and implementing the classroom component associated with the law school’s distinctive Mentor Externship program in which all law students have a mentor for each of their three years in law school. A law student can change mentors during that time, but each law student is guaranteed a mentor throughout every year of law school. This program has also evolved and changed over time to better meet the needs of our students.  Presently, in the second year and third year, there is a classroom component with students earning one pass/fail credit in each year. The classroom component involves both small group conversations and also one-on-one coaching with each student three times over the course of the academic year. The Mentor Externship program includes a good deal of professional identity formation, such as self-reflections by the students based on the work they do and their experiences in the program. In addition, each student must develop a networking plan designed to support the individual student’s professional development as reflected in the student’s work with Roadmap.

Neil, through trial and error, even added coaches to his Professional Responsibility course. Now, his class not only teaches the basics of what law students need to understand and apply the rules of professional conduct, but it also explores aspects of professional identity formation as students learn from local practitioners.

Whatever Neil and Jerry do (or try to do), their focus is always on the students—learning about where the students are and searching for the most effective ways to help each student grow. Their thoughtful and creative approach entails a constant loop that involves trying something, seeking feedback, reflecting, improving the exercise, lesson, or class, and then repeating those steps.

Whole-Building Approach

Neil and Jerry have been working for several years towards a whole-building approach to professional identity. They preach it to other law schools, and they are living it out themselves. They have been working diligently to create a “one file” system that allows many departments of the law school to add feedback and notes on each student. The Roadmap coaches from SCW, Mentor Externship professors, the Office of Career & Professional Development (CPD), and Lawyering Skills (aka legal research and writing at some law schools) professors would each add their notes, thoughts, and work relating to professional identity formation into a file for each student so that when faculty or staff meet with students they could see the evolution of the student’s professional identity and the student’s professional development plans over the course of law school.

In particular, Jerry and Neil worked with our law library and IT experts to create a “one file” system that is scheduled to begin operation next semester, starting with the Roadmap and the Roadmap coach observations that will go into that file for each student. Jerry and Neil believe that we will be able to train the 2L and 3L Mentor Externship faculty on how to use the “one file” system by contributing their observations on professional identity formation learning outcomes into an efficient form for gathering insights after each of the six one-on-one meetings that occur throughout the 2L and 3L years. Additionally, notes from the one-on-one meetings with CPD staff will also be added to each student’s file. Neil and Jerry also plan on providing our required curriculum colleagues with some positive and reinforcing language on professional identity to cross-sell the value of these professional identity formation efforts to the students.

Planting Seeds

Jerry and Neil are always anticipating the needs of law students and law schools in the future. They look ahead to try to bridge the gap between what will be needed and what is currently offered. The Holloran Center’s next step will be hosting a symposium/workshop in the spring of 2023 in conjunction with casebook publishers focused on 1L and Professional Responsibility casebook authors (and possibly law professor adopters of those casebooks). It will be the first time the Holloran Center intentionally seeks out casebook authors and 1L/Professional Responsibility professors to convene in a single setting where they can learn, share, and generate ways to help law students develop their own professional identities within these required courses.

Neil and Jerry have done so much amazing work in the legal academy and professional identity formation in particular. I continue to learn from their fearlessness, humility, optimism, and apparent clairvoyance. Even though I was their twentieth choice to serve as Associate Director—I was actually their tenth—I feel honored and humbled to serve alongside them as they continue their phenomenal work.

Please email me at gren2380@stthomas.edu if you have any questions or comments about this post.

December 1, 2022 by
Janet Stearns

Teaching “Reflection & Growth” Through Mindfulness

By: Janet Stearns, Dean of Students, University of Miami School of Law

In this past year, I enjoyed some significant opportunities to advocate, negotiate, and study the new ABA standards. I return often to the text and context of the Standards and interpretations and consider how this language is challenging us in our critical roles in law schools today. In review, the comment to Standard 303 guides us:

The development of professional identity should involve an intentional exploration of the values, guiding principles, and well-being practices considered foundational to successful legal practice. Because developing a professional identity requires reflection and growth over time, students should have frequent opportunities for such development during each year of law school and  in a variety of courses and co-curricular and professional development activities.(emphasis added).

How do we teach the foundational skills of ‘reflection and growth” as part of well-being practices in law school? One very significant contribution to answering this question is through the teaching of Mindfulness in law schools.

My colleague and friend Professor Scott Rogers has written a fabulous and important resource—The Mindful Law Student: A Mindfulness in Law Practice Guide. Scott serves as Lecturer in Law and Director of University of Miami School of Law’s Mindfulness in Law Program and Co-Director of the University of Miami’s Mindfulness Research and Practice Initiative. Scott is also a co-president of the national non-profit Mindfulness in Law Society. Scott has spent more than a decade collaborating on peer-reviewed neuroscience research assessing the efficacy of mindfulness training and shares a series of core practices that have been part of this research and are among those found in many well-respected mindfulness training programs. This Practice Guide was published in September by Edward Elgar publishing and is thus a very new tool in our toolbox for teaching mindfulness.

Overview: The Mindful Law Student

The Mindful Law Student is both profound and concise. The materials build upon Scott’s teaching at the University of Miami for the past 15 years. I have been blessed to have a “front row seat” and observe the evolution of Scott’s teaching from his first arrival at Miami Law. Having seen and heard many of his presentations over this time, I was tremendously impressed by Scott’s ability to pull together this complex body of work into such a focused and readable text.

The book is divided into three parts, each consisting of 5 chapters. The first part is called “Mindfulness Elements” and includes a discussion of Leadership, Attention, Relaxation, Awareness, and Mindfulness.  This material is foundational and elucidates the relevance of this topic to every aspect of our personal and professional lives. Part II is “Mindfulness and You” and features specific strategies relating to Solitude, Connection, Self-Care, Movement, and Practice. As Scott tells us:

The chapters in Part II can be read in any order, and you may find them to be useful interludes that complement the readings in Part I.

(I will admit that I read them “in order” the first time but see the opportunities to return to them in different orders, and that this would be welcoming to students.)

Part III, Mindfulness Integrations, raises our awareness of the ways that Mindfulness can affect our lawyering in the areas of Listening, Negotiation, Judgment, Creativity, and Freedom. This section included some very significant “aha” moments for me. For example, in Chapter 11 on Listening, Scott talks about the tendency of lawyers (and physicians) to interrupt their clients and patients. He then offers very specific guidance on how to transition to a mindful listener. Chapter 12 on Negotiation highlights the value of mindful attention to understand better our counterparties and moving beyond self-centered thinking to productive negotiation strategies. Returning to our main theme of professional identity, Part III makes clear the integral role of a mindfulness and reflective practice in performing key elements of our work as lawyers.

Some Special Gems in The Mindful Law Student

Each chapter skillfully integrates scholarship and key teachings on Mindfulness with elements that make this particularly accessible to law students. For one, Scott features seven fictional, diverse law students who face academic and professional challenges and find a pathway for Mindfulness to assist each of them. Each chapter also includes some insightful visualizations and images that capture main concepts. As a visual learner myself, I find these images particularly captivating. Scott is most adept with his key “metaphors”—a reader of the book will quickly understand the images of the flashlight (of attention), the snow globe (of life’s confusing moments), the lightbulb (for awareness), and the spirals (of over-reaction). These images return throughout the book.

Most chapters introduce readers to a different mindfulness practice that connects to that chapter’s subject matter.  A website for the book offers a series of 6-, 12-, and 18-minute versions of each practice, which students can also access via a free app. Scott provides access to practice scripts for those faculty who may wish to offer live guidance in class.

The text skillfully integrates the teachings of many great thinkers, from Rumi and Buddhist devotees to musicians like Herbie Hancock and Supertramp, from civil rights leaders like W. E. B. Du Bois to contemporary lawyers and judges who practice mindfulness.

The Mindful Law Student includes specific exercises and probing questions for meditation and self-reflection at the end of each chapter. Mindfulness requires practice and this is a practice guide. Each chapter also highlights key Trials and Takeaways, which are summaries of main concepts and areas for future work. Finally, each chapter has a concise but helpful list of references and resources for those who might want to dig deeper into any subject.

Chapter 14, “Creativity,” challenges the reader to connect with one’s creative soul through art and poetry. I felt the need to accept that challenge and take the “first step” on that “journey of a thousand miles.” The text discusses the Haiku structure, composed of three-line stanzas of 5, 7 and 5 syllables. I took the plunge, and so here I share my first mindful Haiku with you, inviting our readers to consider your own creative endeavors.

Haiku #1

Powerful Law profs

Changing the world mind by mind

Moment by moment

 

Guiding law students

Capable of breath, thoughts, dreams

The key: mindfulness

 

Reflective lawyers

Navigating this world with

Equanimity

 

Strategies for Using The Mindful Law Student

This Practice Guide can be integrated in a number of productive ways into the law school experience of teaching professional identity. Some options might include:

-A stand-alone course on Mindfulness. The fifteen chapters would be a successful outline of a weekly course dedicated to exploring the practice and applications of Mindfulness in the Law.

-The book, at just over 200 pages, could be on a recommended summer reading list for new law students, and then form the basis for well-being and orientation programming.

-The sections of the text that focus on listening, negotiation, judgment (and ethics), leadership, and creativity could be part of courses that focus on these particular skills, or included in law clinics, externships, or other experiential learning classes where these skills are taught.

As we explore new curricular options and models around professional identity in 1L and upper-level courses, consider whether The Mindful Law Student would be an appropriate addition to your curriculum.

For More Information:

Contact Elgar Publishing for a copy of The Mindful Law Student so that you can consider strategies for integrating this practice guide into your professional identity teaching.

www.themindfullawstudent.com

Other useful resources include:

Mindfulness in Law Society website:
https://www.mindfulnessinlawsociety.org/

UMindfulness at the University of Miami
https://umindfulness.as.miami.edu/

Mindfulness in Law Program at the University of Miami School of Law
https://www.law.miami.edu/academics/programs/mindfulness/index.html

Please feel free to reach out to me at jstearns@law.miami.edu if you have any questions or comments.

Janet Stearns is Dean of Students at the University of Miami School of Law and Chair of the ABA COLAP Law School Committee.

November 17, 2022 by
Barbara Glesner FInes

Three Shifts in Thinking for Professional Identity Formation

By: Barbara Glesner Fines, Dean and Rubey M. Hulen Professor of Law, UMKC School of Law

To help students through the professional identity formation process, and to fulfill the ABA accreditation standard, we as faculty members will need to shift our thinking about what it means to educate law students.  Three aspects of this process will require us to develop new competencies as educators.

Professional identity formation requires us to shift our stance from teacher to mentor/coach

The primary pedagogies for guiding students through the socialization process require faculty to engage students in reflection on their observations and experiences, and provide coaching and feedback on those reflections and the students’ plans for further development.  Conversation, as opposed to lecture or simulation, becomes the primary vehicle for this coaching and mentoring.  A far more personal and individualized approach to students is required to effectively guide students through formation.  This approach entails sharing control of learning with students rather than viewing our primary role as directing that learning.  We will not fully capture or guide the formation process unless we recognize that much of this process will be outside of our control; in fact, to be effective, it must be outside of our control.  To develop into self-directed lifelong learners (one central part of an attorney’s professional identity) students must be empowered to make choices about (1) finding opportunities for observation and experiences, (2) methods of reflection, and (3) seeking feedback on those experiences.

Professional identity formation requires us to shift our perception of where learning takes place

Law faculty spend a great deal of time focusing on the learning that occurs in the classroom and the clinic during the academic year.  However, students form their perceptions of what it means to be a lawyer from all aspects of their experiences during law school.  They learn about the role of professional peer relationships in their study groups, activities, and student organizations.  They learn about the relationships of attorneys to other professionals by observing the interactions between faculty and staff or between attorneys in the community and other professionals.  In so many other ways, professional formation takes place in the parts of the law school experience that have been characterized as the “hidden curriculum.”[1]  For faculty to effectively and intentionally guide students in their professional formation, we must recognize the opportunities for formative experiences that we otherwise think of as “outside” and “other.”  We can encourage students to seek these out and reflect on how these experiences have shaped their conception of themselves as attorneys.

Professional identity formation requires faculty to work together in building a meaningful program

The students’ experience-reflection-coaching cycle must occur over time and across activities.  As the ABA Interpretation 303-5 comments, “developing a professional identity requires reflection and growth over time . . .  in a variety of courses and co-curricular and professional development activities.”  Moreover, the process will necessarily be highly individualized, as each law student must not only develop themselves as professionals, but they must also integrate that identity into the many other identities that they carry.  Law faculty do not often approach their teaching (or research for that matter) as collaborations but as independent roles.[2]  Professional identity formation requires that we recognize that our work with individual students will be layered upon and integrated with the work of our colleagues.  That means we must work toward regular conversations and collaborations among the faculty about that work.  Rather than thinking about ourselves as individual faculty members guiding our group of students (one to many), we must work as a collective to build programs that guide each individual student on their separate journey (many to one).

Please email me at bglesnerfines@umkc.edu if you have any questions or comments about this post.

Barbara Glesner Fines is the Dean and Rubey M. Hulen Professor of Law at the University of Missouri-Kansas City School of Law.

[1] David M. Moss, The Hidden Curriculum of Legal Education: Toward a Holistic Model for Reform, 2013 J. Disp. Resol. 19, 22 (attributing the concept to sociologist Philip Jackson).

[2] Christine Cerniglia Brown, Professional Identity Formation: Working Backwards to Move the Profession Forward, 61 Loy. L. Rev. 313, 318 (2015) (stating that “thoughtful curricular design highlights core values essential to professional identity formation; however, such a design requires a substantial amount of planning and collaboration among colleagues who may have different viewpoints”).

 

November 15, 2022 by
Leah Teague

“The Difference Makers”: Professional Identity of Lawyers in America

By: Leah Witcher Jackson Teague, Professor of Law & Director of Business Law Programs, Baylor Law School

As law schools consider suitable approaches to professional identity formation, insight can be found in applicants’ personal statements. Many aspiring law students express a desire to “make a difference.” Students enter our law schools committed to using their time, talent, and efforts as lawyers to make a difference in the lives of clients or in their community or to have an impact that ripples throughout society. They want to solve problems for individuals who are less fortunate or to positively impact a larger group for the “greater good.” Law school personnel applaud those intentions for we know that lawyers are difference makers. It is part of our professional identity and our obligation to society. Shouldn’t law schools strive to equip and inspire law students to be difference makers?

The Preamble to the ABA Model Rules for Professional Conduct provides instruction about the role of lawyers in America: “A lawyer is a representative of clients, an officer of the legal system and a public citizen having special responsibility for the quality of justice.” Lawyers have a special obligation to society as keepers of the rule of law and protectors of individual freedoms and rights. And as clients and organizations look to us for representation, guidance, and leadership, lawyers have the opportunity to address important issues that impact not only our nation but also the future of the legal profession. A law student’s journey to becoming an honorable member of this profession should include attention to these important issues and the role of lawyers in helping to secure our nation’s system of governance.

At Baylor Law, professional development and informal leadership development have always been woven into the education and training of every Baylor Law student. From the emphasis on service during the first day of orientation through our nationally-renowned third-year Practice Court program, Baylor Law faculty strive to develop individuals who will be prepared for the challenges of the legal profession and equipped to serve effectively. As a result, we proudly watch Baylor Lawyers serve their clients effectively and lead within the profession and throughout their communities.

In 2014, we implemented two programs to be more intentional about preparing our students to enter the profession as competent and prepared professionals who are ready to serve and lead. Both programs have been recognized by the ABA with its prestigious E. Smythe Gambrell Professionalism Award. In 2018, our Practice Ready Professional Development Program received the Gambrell award. This past August, Baylor Law’s innovative Leadership Development Program was honored with the recognition.

In future posts we will provide more details about recent changes to our professional identity formation efforts, including the expansion of our Professional Development Program. Through our required Professional Development Program, students must attend 21 professional development training sessions (60 to 90 minutes each). Some are mandatory, but most are not, giving students options from a wide variety of subjects. We offer between 6 and 10 sessions each of our four academic terms per year to provide students with a selection of topics that are aligned with their career aspirations.

Our Leadership Development Program focuses on professional competencies and skills that better prepare students for the challenges that await them after graduation and that better equip them for the important roles they will assume as they enter our noble profession. The objectives of the Leadership Development Program are to encourage and assist law students to:

  1. Embrace their professional identity as they serve clients and society;
  2. Develop competencies and skills to succeed; and
  3. Boldly seek opportunities to make a difference in the profession, their communities, and the world.

We want to help them become their best self and reach their potential. Throughout their time at Baylor, we strive to introduce students to values-based professional development and leadership development concepts that provide the means to be more effective difference makers by helping them:

  • better understand their talents and shortcomings;
  • garner courage to make course corrections as appropriate;
  • improve their professional skills;
  • make decisions guided by ethics and values;
  • embrace failure as opportunities for growth;
  • value differences when working with others;
  • build stronger, productive working relationships with others;
  • think strategically and imagine possibilities;
  • prioritize wellness for themselves and others; and
  • seek to add value wherever they go.

Even before the new requirements in the amendments to ABA Standard 303(b) we sought to address the professional identity formation of our law students. The recent amendments provided an opportunity to consider further enhancements to our program. We look forward to sharing our progress with you in future posts.

Thanks to each of you for your good efforts! I know the work can be challenging and the progress dilatory, but I am so encouraged by all the consequential work occurring throughout legal education

For more information, please feel free to reach out to me at Leah_Teague@baylor.edu.

Leah Witcher Jackson Teague is the Professor of Law and Director of Business Law Programs at Baylor Law School.

November 10, 2022 by
David Grenardo

Creating an Upper-Level Course to Comply with the Revised ABA Standards

By: David A. Grenardo, Professor of Law and Associate Director of the Holloran Center for Ethical Leadership in the Professions, University of St. Thomas School of Law

The revised ABA standards mandate that law schools provide substantial opportunities for their law students to develop their professional identities. Prior to the revised standards, some schools had already created mandatory 1L classes that entail some type of professional identity formation. The Holloran Center’s website lists schools with their corresponding classes that include professional formation or professional development, and the Holloran Center continues to add syllabi for each of those classes. The classes range from 0 credits to 8 credits.

Before joining the University of St. Thomas School of Law, I created and taught an upper-level course that intentionally and explicitly introduced the concepts of professional identity and professional identity formation. The overwhelming response from the students who took the class was extremely positive.

After attending one of the Holloran Center’s workshops in 2016, I came back to my law school at the time (St. Mary’s University School of Law) on fire with a determination to create a course that introduced professional identity to students and allowed students to develop their professional identities. I drafted a course proposal and submitted it to the faculty committee, but the class failed to obtain a majority of the committee’s approval. The full faculty did not approve the proposed course.

Four years later, I had gained a more thorough understanding of professional identity formation and decided to design another professional identity formation course. In creating the class, I spoke with law students to hear what they thought would be useful and interesting. For instance, as St. Mary’s is a Catholic and Marianist law school, I wanted to incorporate some basic Catholic principles and concepts, such as the Catholic Social Teachings, and the origins of the Marianist Order, to help students discover how those concepts and information might be incorporated into their own approach to the law. The students thought that idea was good, but they strongly suggested that a survey of the major spiritual traditions would provide broader perspectives on how to approach life as an individual and a professional. As a result, I added an entire section to discuss the basic history and tenets of Judaism, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, Christianity, and secular spirituality. I also added a writing assignment in which students wrote about how two different faith traditions would approach a current legal issue. Adding this section resulted in three major effects:

1) students gained an appreciation of other spiritual traditions and examined how they could incorporate some of those traditions’ teachings into their own lives;

2) students learned about the vast similarities between the different faith traditions; and

3) learning about other types of spiritual traditions enhanced the students’ cross-cultural competency.

That writing assignment should also help students understand the different viewpoints that clients and team members may bring when they work with others. One student specifically mentioned that he had no idea how similar Islam and Catholicism are until he took this class, and he was disavowed of a number of negative stereotypes and misconceptions about Islam that were promulgated through movies he had seen.

The course description in the course proposal I submitted, which was approved by both the curriculum committee and later the faculty, stated the following:

Course Description:

This course enables law students to identify characteristics important to being good lawyers and characteristics employers of all kinds are looking for in graduating law students. Law students will also explore ethical and moral dilemmas through inter-faith discussions that will allow them to continue to develop their own moral compasses and professional identities. In particular, faculty and practitioners of different faith traditions and value systems (e.g., Catholic, Jewish, Buddhism, Muslim, atheism, etc.) will work through ethical and moral situations faced by lawyers and share how their particular faith or value-system affects their decision-making. Students will also examine how their own faith traditions, as well as the Catholic and Marianist traditions, apply to their own practice of law and to current legal issues today, such as women’s rights, LGBTQ+ issues, environmental justice, the death penalty, immigrant justice, racial injustice, and social justice. Finally, the class will encourage students to see the practice of law as a calling and their vocation, which will help in their search for meaningful employment that allows them to make a living, serve others, and find joy.

The grades were based entirely on papers regarding, among other things, reflections on what type of lawyers they wanted to be, how they would fulfill all of their vocations (e.g., as lawyer, spouse, sibling, daughter/son, friend) as professionals, and how they changed in law school for better and/or for worse. Several additional writing assignments, including drafting a eulogy for themselves (an exercise I borrowed from Neil Hamilton’s Ethical Leadership in Organizations class) and interviewing a lawyer about one of their dream jobs, are described in the edited syllabus for this class (see below).

I also invited a number of graduates to speak to the class. The guest speakers included a judge and lawyers who practiced in a variety of areas, such as Big Law and solo practitioners. After a couple of guest speakers talked about finishing near or at the top of the class, the class requested a speaker who did not finish near the top of the class yet enjoyed a successful legal career. I obliged, and the students truly appreciated that speaker and all of the speakers they heard.

The last day of class we went on a retreat off campus at Tecaboca, a retreat facility just outside of the city of San Antonio. During the four-hour retreat, we talked about the class, and I also gave them time to reflect on their own, with others, and ultimately write a letter to their future self in five years. We enjoyed lunch together as well. Some of the students said it was their most meaningful and memorable experience of law school. It was a moving and powerful experience for me, too, as I felt connected to these students and their professional identity development.

A common theme in the students’ reaction to the class was that the class should be mandatory for all students (although the experience/dynamic would be different if the class was required rather than elective). The law students expressed their appreciation and gratitude for the opportunity to engage in self-reflection and to explore what areas of law they would most enjoy and what would bring them joy during and after their legal careers.

Below is an edited syllabus of the class that does not include university and class policy language regarding attendance, laptops, accommodations, etc. The edited syllabus below is also attached here.

Should you have any questions or comments about the course, please email me at gren2380@stthomas.edu.

David Grenardo is a Professor of Law and Associate Director of the Holloran Center for Ethical Leadership in the Professions at the University of St. Thomas School of Law.

FOUNDATIONS OF LAWYERING SYLLABUS

LW7613 COURSE GOALS:

By the end of the course you will:

  1. Understand that the legal profession is a vocation, identify your gifts and talents, and analyze the places where you likely fit into the legal profession based on your own talents and passion.
  2. Understand the characteristics and traits that make up an excellent law student and lawyer, and analyze how you can improve in those areas.
  3. Identify the ethical and moral dilemmas that you may face as a lawyer, and continue to develop your own moral compasses by analyzing how you would respond to those dilemmas.
  4. Identify the key aspects of the Marianist origin and traditions, as well as your own faith tradition, and analyze how you can incorporate aspects of the Marianist origin and traditions and your own faith tradition into your life and career.
  5. Understand the Catholic and Marianist traditions, particularly the Catholic Intellectual Tradition and Catholic Social Teachings, and apply those traditions and other faith traditions to your practice of law and to a current legal issue today such as women’s rights, LGBTQIA+ issues, environmental justice, the death penalty, immigrant justice, racial injustice, and social justice.

COURSE STRUCTURE:

The required text for this class is The Formation of Professional Identity: The Path From Student to Lawyer by Patrick Emery Longan, Daisy Hurst Floyd, and Timothy W. Floyd. Moreover, there will be classroom handouts and materials (many are listed below in the Assignments section) made available on Canvas that will supplement the source material.

READING ASSIGNMENTS AND PREPARATION:

Assignments

Unit I: Vocation and Professional Identity Formation

Class: Vocation
Readings: Susan J. Stabile, The Practice of Law as Response to God’s Call, 32 Seattle U. L. Rev. 389 (2009);
Pages 365-371, 391-395, and 400-403 from Jerry Organ, From Those to Whom Much Has Been Given, Much Is Expected: Vocation, Catholic Social Teaching, and the Culture of a Catholic Law School, 1 J. Cath. Soc. Thought 361 (2004)

Class: Exploring Vocation and Exemplary Law Student and Lawyer Characteristics
Reading: Neil Hamilton, Connecting Prospective Law Students’ Goals To The Competencies That Clients And Legal Employers Need To Achieve More Competent Graduates And Stronger Applicant Pools And Employment Outcomes, 9 St. Mary’s J. Legal Mal. & Ethics 260 (2019)

Class: Exploring Vocation and Exemplary Law Student and Lawyer Characteristics Continued
Readings: Lawrence S. Krieger & Kennon M. Sheldon, What Makes Lawyers Happy? A Data–Driven Prescription to Redefine Professional Success, 83 Geo. Wash. L. Rev. 554 (2015);
14 Questions from Neil W. Hamilton’s Roadmap: The Law Student’s Guide to Meaningful Employment, 2d ed., American Bar Association, 2018

Class: Professional Identity Formation, Introduction and Overview, Motivation
Reading: Excerpts from The Formation of Professional Identity: The Path from Student to Lawyer by Patrick Emery Longan, Daisy Hurst Floyd, and Timothy W. Floyd, 2020

Class: Professional Identity Formation, Competence, Fidelity to the Client
Reading: Excerpts from The Formation of Professional Identity: The Path from Student to Lawyer by Patrick Emery Longan, Daisy Hurst Floyd, and Timothy W. Floyd, 2020

Class: Professional Identity Formation, Fidelity to the Law, Public Spiritedness
Reading: Excerpts from The Formation of Professional Identity: The Path from Student to Lawyer by Patrick Emery Longan, Daisy Hurst Floyd, and Timothy W. Floyd, 2020

Class: Professional Identity Formation, Civility, Practical Wisdom, Future of Legal Profession
Reading: Excerpts from The Formation of Professional Identity: The Path from Student to Lawyer by Patrick Emery Longan, Daisy Hurst Floyd, and Timothy W. Floyd, 2020

Class: Interview with a Practicing Lawyer
Assignment: outside of class students will interview a lawyer or individual who has one of the law student’s dream jobs

Unit II: Learning From the Wisdom Traditions

Class: Jewish Spirituality
Reading: Spirituality: A Guide for the Perplexed by Philip Sheldrake

Class: Christian Spirituality

Reading: Spirituality: A Guide for the Perplexed by Philip Sheldrake

Class: Muslim Spirituality
Reading: Spirituality: A Guide for the Perplexed by Philip Sheldrake

Class: Hindu Spirituality

Reading: Spirituality: A Guide for the Perplexed by Philip Sheldrake

Class: Buddhist Spirituality
Reading: Spirituality: A Guide for the Perplexed by Philip Sheldrake

Class: Secular Spirituality
Reading: Spirituality: A Guide for the Perplexed by Philip Sheldrake

Unit III: Catholic & Marianist Traditions

Class: Introduction to the Catholic Intellectual Tradition
Readings: The Catholic Intellectual Tradition: Core Principles for the College or University, Association of Catholic Colleges and Universities, 2017;

The Catholic Intellectual Tradition: A Conversation at Boston College, 2010;

Pages 403-412 from John M. Breen, Justice and Legal Education: A Critique, 36 Loy. U. Chi. L.J. 383 (2005)

Class: Catholic Social Teaching
Reading: Pages 113-165 from SJ Thomas Massaro, Living Justice: Catholic Social Teaching in Action, 2000

Class: Introduction to the Marianist Tradition
Reading: Excerpts from John Habjan, S.M., Society of Mary: Marianists, Catholic Education: A Journal of Inquiry and Practice, Vol. 11, No. 2, December 2007, 198-217, University of Notre Dame

Class: Marianists and Higher Education
Reading: Characteristics of Marianist Universities, Association of Marianist Universities, Chaminade University, St. Mary’s University, University of Dayton, 2019;

Reading: David A. Grenardo, Marianist Law Schools: Demonstrating the Courage to be Catholic, 60 J. Cath. Legal Stud. (2022 Forthcoming)

Class: Retreat
Reading: Excerpts from William L. Droel, The Spirituality of Work: Lawyers, 1989

GRADES:

Final grades will be based on the completion of journal entries (70%), a short paper regarding a current legal topic analyzed through faith tradition (15%), and a eulogy (15%). Grades can also be increased or decreased as set forth above.

Journal Entries (70%):

Students are required to submit journal entries throughout the semester as requested by the professor. I will give you ample time to submit each entry. These journal entries will be treated confidentially.

Purpose. Journal entries are neither research assignments nor reports on the reading or what speakers said. They are designed to help each student reflect upon and integrate assigned readings and class discussions on a topic with her or his own faith and ethics. The impact of the presentation, readings, and discussions on the student’s pre-class view of the topic is important.

Content. Throughout the semester, the student will be responsible for journal entries that answer specific questions relating to the assigned readings, speaker presentations, and class discussions. Be sure to mention at least some of the readings in your journal entries.

One of the journal entries will be based on an interview you set up and conduct with an attorney or individual who currently has one of your dream jobs. Your journal entry will answer the following questions: How they reached their current position? What advice do they have for you to do the same? What is your plan to reach that position? The interview, which you must arrange and schedule, will take the place of a class period.

Grading. Journal entries must be between 600 and 750 words, typed and double spaced. Indicate word count on each journal entry. Even if you are absent for a class covering a particular journal topic, you still must submit a journal entry for that topic.

Short Paper Using Faith Traditions (15%):

This paper will include analysis of a current legal topic through the lens of multiple (2 or more) faith traditions. You must examine a current legal topic and analyze how it would be resolved through the lens of two or more faith traditions. Areas where current legal topics can be found are listed below, but this list is certainly not exhaustive.

  1. Social Justice
  2. Women and Justice
  3. Economic Justice
  4. Racial Justice
  5. Environmental Justice
  6. Orientation and Justice
  7. “Consistent Life Ethic” Issues: Abortion, War, Death Penalty, Euthanasia

The paper must be between 750 and 1,000 words, typed and double spaced. This paper is due April 28th.

Eulogy Assignment (15%):

Purpose. Stephen Covey, author of 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, advises each of us “to begin with the end in mind.” One method of doing so is to think through what you hope your eulogy might be. I hope you do not see this exercise as morbid. For a spiritual person, thinking about dying is simply thinking about what we must transcend with God’s help. If the eulogy exercise is too difficult for you, see the alternative below under Content.

Content. First, reflect on the eulogies you have heard in your lifetime. Which ones had the most profound impact on you? Why? Then ask yourself, “What I most want people to remember about me is _____. “ Or “At the end of my life, what I would like to know about myself is ________.” Next, does your eulogy reflect your values and principles? Is it clear to what you have given your heart in life?

If the eulogy exercise is too difficult for you, you can do this exercise by thinking about your life as a book, and you are writing chapters as you live your life. What is the theme of your book?  What is the theme of the particular chapter you are living now? Write down the likely topics of the chapters you see ahead of you.

Also, speak with at least two people to discuss this assignment. One of them should be over 60 and retired. Ask them about their life in terms of how they would have answered the question above at your stage in life, and how they answer the question now at their stage of life. Have they changed their minds about what the “end” of their life should be? How do they describe “to what have I given my heart?” What is their legacy? What advice do they have about your legacy? You must include some reflection on what you find out from these interviews in your written eulogy.

Grading. The eulogy must be between 750 and 1,000 words, typed and double spaced. It will be treated confidentially. You will receive full credit for completing the assignment as stated above. Unsatisfactory work must be revised and resubmitted until it is acceptable to the professor. Indicate word count on the eulogy.

The Eulogy is also due April 28th.

November 8, 2022 by
David Grenardo

Required Reading: Imposter Syndrome in the Legal Profession and an Exercise for Law Students

By: David A. Grenardo, Professor of Law and Associate Director of the Holloran Center for Ethical Leadership in the Professions, University of St. Thomas School of Law

Professional identity formation, which involves teaching law students to recognize their responsibility to others, particularly clients, and encouraging students to develop the professional competencies of a practicing lawyer, has gained considerable prominence in the legal academy. The ABA revised its standards to require that all law schools provide substantial opportunities for law students to develop their professional identity.

Professional identity formation relies on students to identify the professional competencies they excel in currently and the competencies in which they need to improve, and they must work to develop those competencies. Part of that process requires an accurate self-understanding of who law students are. The imposter syndrome serves as a sinister force that threatens a law student’s ability to develop her professional identity and to succeed as a lawyer. The pervasiveness and negative effects of the imposter syndrome warrant that as law schools incorporate professional identity formation into their curriculum, they should address imposter syndrome with their students.

The University of Dayton Law Review recently published an article on imposter syndrome. Part I of the article briefly discusses professional identity and how it requires self-reflection and self-awareness. Part II explains imposter syndrome in general, and Part III examines imposter syndrome and its prevalence in the legal profession. Part IV provides practical, tangible ways for law schools, professors, and law students to tackle imposter syndrome. The article concludes that law schools should help law students facing imposter syndrome overcome it.

That fourteen-page article on imposter syndrome became part of the required readings for all 1Ls in a class I teach at the University of St. Thomas School of Law called Moral Reasoning for Lawyers, which introduces students to the concept of professional identity formation. The class is taught the week prior to the beginning of the fall semester for all law students.

Not only can law schools include this article in classes regarding professional identity formation, but they can also incorporate the article into any class. I did an exercise in my Contracts and Business Associations classes last year with the article. I posted the article on Canvas under Discussions with the following prompt:

“Please read the attached short law review article on the issue of imposter syndrome in law school and the legal profession.

Discuss any aspect of the article that stood out to you.

Click the reply button below to begin your post and also reply to at least two other posts.”

When I created the Discussion in Canvas, I checked the following boxes:

Canvas Selection Options for Discussions


One of the ways to help law students surmount imposter syndrome is to share their feelings about it with others, and I was blown away by the honesty, sincerity, and empathy that students demonstrated with the exercise when they shared their experiences and feelings with each other about imposter syndrome.

Since students could not see any posts before they published their first post, students who admitted they suffered from imposter syndrome in their initial post (which constituted an overwhelming majority of the students) often expressed relief, comradery, and bewilderment when they were able to read and post about how many of their classmates similarly revealed their own struggles with imposter syndrome.

The discussion consisted exclusively of understanding and encouraging posts. I recognize that the students knew I would be reading their posts, but the genuinely caring posts to and about each other went beyond my hopeful expectations for the exercise. Perhaps law students are more comfortable with sharing their feelings in e-discussions these days. Whatever the reason for the wonderful and community-building discussion, it served as a powerful exercise for the students.

Whether you decide to integrate imposter syndrome into the curriculum through a class (professional identity formation or otherwise), student and/or professor panels, or some other measure, all law schools should raise this issue to help law students conquer imposter syndrome.

Should you have any questions or comments about this post, please email me at gren2380@stthomas.edu.

David Grenardo is a Professor of Law and Associate Director of the Holloran Center for Ethical Leadership in the Professions at the University of St. Thomas School of Law.

November 3, 2022 by
Jordan Furlong

Competence Starter Kit

By: Jordan Furlong, Canadian Legal Sector Analyst, Forecaster, Speaker, and Consultant

In a previous post, I discussed how the Law Society of British Columbia (the regulator of lawyers and legal services in the province of B.C.) asked me to suggest reforms to its lawyer licensing system. In my 82-page report submitted in May 2022, I recommended that B.C. create a competence framework for entry-level fitness to practice law and design a competence-based licensing system based on that framework. In September 2022, the Law Society accepted that recommendation.

In my report, I was reluctant to give the Law Society my opinion on the proper constituent elements of entry-level competence in their province. That decision has to be made by experts with much more experience and proficiency than me, in consultation with a very wide group of stakeholders.

But I was invited to consider that there would be value in suggesting a sort of “starter kit” of competencies in a suggested framework, in order to guide the earliest stages of the consultation process and give the directors a sense of what such a framework might look like. After extensive research and reflection, I came up with the following:

  1. Knowledge of the Law
    • Administrative law and procedure
    • Business and corporate law and procedure
    • Civil litigation, procedure, and remedies
    • Contract law and drafting
    • Constitutional law
    • Criminal law, procedure, and sentencing
    • Evidence
    • Family law and procedure
    • Legislative, regulatory, and judicial systems
    • Property and tenancy law and procedure
    • Torts
    • Wills, estates, and trust law and procedure
  1. Understanding of a Lawyer’s Professional Responsibilities
    • Client confidentiality
    • Client trust accounts
    • Conflicts of interest
    • Fiduciary duties
    • Select other aspects of the Code of Professional Conduct
  1. The Skills of a Lawyer
    • Gather relevant facts through interviews and research
    • Carry out legal research
    • Conduct due diligence
    • Draft essential legal documents
    • Solve problems using legal knowledge and analysis
    • Help negotiate solutions and resolve disputes
    • Advocate for a client’s position
    • Provide legal advice to clients
    • Use law practice technology
    • Fulfill the basic business and professional requirements of a private law practice
  1. The Skills of a Professional
    • Establish, maintain, and conclude a client relationship
    • Establish and maintain respectful and collaborative relationships with colleagues and others
    • Communicate accurately and concisely, verbally and in writing, to different audiences
    • Understand and use information management systems effectively
    • Understand and use financial management systems effectively
    • Manage projects and responsibilities to ensure they are completed efficiently, on time, and to an appropriate professional standard
    • Organize one’s time and activities to ensure the prompt and successful fulfilment of one’s obligations.

This starter kit can serve as a useful tool for regulators in Canada and, hopefully, the United States, as well as law schools across the continents, in determining what competencies every first-year lawyer should possess.

For an example of what a competence framework for lawyer development and licensing might look like, check out the Building a Better Bar project at the Institute for the Advancement of the American Legal System, and of course, the Roadmap for Employment at the University of St. Thomas School of Law. Also, Professors Neil Hamilton and Jerry Organ have done extensive and fantastic work on professional competence development and professional identity formation.

If you have any questions or comments about this post, then please email me at jordan@law21.ca.

Jordan Furlong is a Canadian Legal Sector Analyst, Forecaster, Speaker, and Consultant.

October 27, 2022 by
Jordan Furlong

Coming Soon: A Competence-Based Approach to Law Licensure

By: Jordan Furlong, Canadian Legal Sector Analyst, Forecaster, Speaker, and Consultant

Nobody is happy with the bar exam, and nobody should be. Licensure candidates who borrow and spend heavily and study for years to earn a law degree have to hit the books again, immediately after graduation, to prepare for a much tougher set of legal knowledge tests whose results actually matter.

Scarcely more than two-thirds of all candidates pass the bar exam, with failure rates especially high among repeat test-takers and members of racialized communities. And nobody has ever established a link between bar exam passage and competence to practice law.

Even the organization that sets the bar exam admits the current version needs to be improved, although the NCBE doesn’t intend to introduce a revamped version until 2026. And if you’re not aware of the serious issues with how the bar exam is executed in practice, go to Twitter and search for the hashtag #barpocalypse. Prepare to be appalled.

The whole situation needs improvement, and every day more people find themselves asking, “Is this really the best we can do? Isn’t there any other way to determine if a person is competent to be admitted to practice law?” As a matter of fact, there is — and a recent development in Canada, to which I’ve contributed, might have brought us a little closer to that better way becoming reality in the United States. That better way, competence-based licensure, represents the future of bar admission.

In our current system, a candidate acquires knowledge-based credentials from a third party (a law school and a board of bar examiners), and regulators accept those credentials as a proxy for readiness to practice law. Nobody directly assesses whether the candidate is actually competent to practice law, in terms of their knowledge, skills, attributes, and experiences. As a result, successful candidates enter the profession plagued by impostor syndrome, while unsuccessful candidates are left to wonder why they fell short.

In a competence-based law licensing system, by contrast, the regulator identifies the precise knowledge, skills, attributes, and experiences that a candidate must possess in order to be minimally competent to practice law, and it creates an accessible process through which candidates can prove to the regulator that they possess those competencies.

In a competence-based licensure system, everyone knows what’s required of a new lawyer, and anyone can acquire and demonstrate possession of those attributes. It’s a far more equitable, rational, defensible, and transparent licensing system. And it’s already been proven to work.

The Solicitors’ Regulation Authority of England & Wales was the first regulator to introduce a competence-based licensing system a few years ago. The SRA, following a lengthy and comprehensive period of study and consultation, identified the essential knowledge and the core competencies of a “Day One” solicitor, as well as the level of proficiency required of each competency at the point of professional entry.

These “competence statements” from the professional regulator then formed the basis of two challenging sets of entrance exams (one for knowledge, the other for practice skills). Combined with a two-year apprenticeship requirement, they replaced all previous requirements for entry to the solicitor profession in England and Wales.

Perhaps the most important aspect of the SRA’s switch to a competence-based systems is this: a law degree is no longer required in order to become a lawyer. The SRA reasoned that if a candidate could pass its difficult entrance exams, that candidate clearly possessed the legal knowledge and skills to be a lawyer.

Crucially, the SRA does not care how a candidate acquires that knowledge and skill. Unlike regulators in the United States, it does not require a licensure candidate to acquire two very similar sets of knowledge credentials. It only cares that the candidate can demonstrate to the regulator possession of the core competencies of entry-point practice. The regulator encourages candidates to acquire that ability in any number of ways.

Competence-based licensure has also emerged as part of the bar admission system in parts of Canada over the past few years. Four Canadian provinces use an entirely skills-based bar admission course called the Practice Readiness Education Program (PREP), which is based on an innovative skills-oriented competence framework. And just last year, the province of New Brunswick introduced a detailed competency profile to accompany its new bar admission program.

This was the context in which the Law Society of British Columbia (the regulator of lawyers and legal services in the province of B.C.) asked me last year to suggest reforms to its own lawyer licensing system. The Law Society of B.C. was familiar with my 2020 report and recommendations to the neighboring Law Society of Alberta, “Lawyer Licensing and Competence in Alberta,” which touched on several similar topics. My 82-page report, submitted in May 2022, recommended that B.C. create a competence framework for entry-level fitness to practice law and design a competence-based licensing system based on that framework. In September, the Law Society accepted that recommendation.

The system I recommended for B.C. most closely resembles the SRA’s approach in England & Wales. I suggested that the Law Society engage in extensive consultations with myriad stakeholders in the legal sector — not just lawyers — to determine the essential knowledge, skills, attributes, and experiences that reflect what a member of the public had a right to expect from a lawyer on their first day in practice.

But I also warned against making that competence framework a “wish list” of ideal lawyer attributes, specifying hundreds of different competencies that candidates must acquire and proficiently demonstrate for licensure. “Day One” competence, while it must meet minimum standards, should not be any higher than that; otherwise, you’re just creating (another) barrier to professional entry. In a separate and upcoming post, I will share my suggested “starter kit” of competencies that new lawyers should posses.

Beyond that core recommendation, I made several other non-binding suggestions to the Law Society, including the hot-button idea of dropping the law degree requirement, introducing new instruction in professional responsibility and professional awareness, and making major reforms to the “supervised practice” requirement that all Canadian law licensure candidates must fulfill before bar admission. The Law Society of B.C. has left decisions on all these points to a specially appointed task force.

It will still be several years before the first cohort of lawyers licensed through a competence-based system enters the British Columbia legal profession. Designing a competence framework for lawyers is a major undertaking, all the more challenging given the rapid shifts in our profession and society. Building a licensing process around that framework is another huge job. This is going to take a while.

But it should also change, for the better, the process by which people in B.C. become lawyers. By abandoning an archaic and opaque credentials-based system, and embracing a modern and transparent competence-based system, the Law Society of B.C.  will increase public and professional confidence in the ability of lawyers to do their jobs from Day One. It will bring lawyer licensing into line with other professions’ admission systems and go a long way towards defeating “impostor syndrome” among new lawyers.

My sincere hope is that my report dovetails with the existing and burgeoning efforts in other jurisdictions (especially Oregon), so that our profession will one day boast a lawyer licensing system based not on a series of inadequate and exclusionary proxies, but on demonstrated competence to practice law. The public in general, and our clients in particular, deserve at least that much from our profession.

Should you have any question or comments about this post, please feel free to contact me at jordan@law21.ca.

Jordan Furlong is a Canadian Legal Sector Analyst, Forecaster, Speaker, and Consultant.

  

 

October 25, 2022 by
Eric Goldman, Laura Norris

Successful Outcomes from Santa Clara Law’s Tech Edge JD Experiment

By: Laura Norris, Associate Dean for Academic Affairs, Associate Clinical Professor, Director of the Tech Edge J.D., Co-Director of the High Tech Law Institute,
Santa Clara University School of Law

Eric Goldman, Associate Dean of Research, Professor of Law, Co-Director of the High Tech Law Institute, Santa Clara University School of Law

In 2018, Santa Clara Law launched an important new program called the Tech Edge JD (TEJD). It is a certificate for JD students with several design features centered around skill-building and professional identity formation. TEJD requires students to complete a series of milestones to give them the experiences employers expect Silicon Valley professionals to have. TEJD students get support from a faculty/staff advisor, two practitioner mentors, and the entire TEJD community.

TEJD has achieved some remarkable outcomes in its first four years. This blog post highlights three: improved admissions yield while increasing incoming LSAT score, increased racial diversity, and improved employment outcomes.

Incoming students apply to TEJD at the same time they apply to law school. Admission is discretionary based on supplemental essays and a video interview. LSAT/GPA isn’t part of the TEJD admissions criteria, but TEJD cohorts nevertheless have higher LSATs than their overall Santa Clara Law classes.

Despite the higher LSAT scores of incoming TEJD students, their yield has been 11-29% higher than the school’s overall admissions yield. This indicates that TEJD helps the law school compete for students with more choices.

Santa Clara Law is already a racially diverse law school, but TEJD has outperformed the law school’s racial diversity rates. This enhanced diversity may reflect the downplaying of LSAT/GPA in TEJD admissions decisions.

Though TEJD requires students to spend substantial time on activities outside the classroom to complete their milestones, this has not come at the expense of academic achievement. TEJD students have higher law school GPAs than the overall class, even on an LSAC-adjusted basis.

TEJD students have also had improved employment outcomes. The first cohort (graduating class of 2021) had 100% employment their 1L summer (most paid, some externships). That cohort had 80% employment on graduation (+40% compared to overall Santa Clara Law grads) and 100% employment 10 months later (+18%).

We think TEJD represents an important innovation in legal education with many potential lessons for the legal education industry. Our paper, “How Santa Clara Law’s “Tech Edge JD” Program Improves the School’s Admissions Yield, Diversity, & Employment Outcomes,” spills all of the details, including how the TEJD program is designed and what we think worked and what didn’t. The article also does the following: identifies what we think are the keys to TEJD’s success; discusses students’ self-identification during the application process, the pre-orientation TEJD orientation, and students’ professional identity formation early in their law school careers; and describes the extensive advisor/mentor support. The features of TEJD can be easily adopted by other schools, with or without replicating TEJD.

Should you have any questions about the TEJD program or if you would like to discuss how your school can adopt the program (or aspects of it), then please contact Dean Goldman at egoldman@gmail.com or Dean Norris at lnorris@scu.edu.

Laura Norris is the Associate Dean for Academic Affairs, Associate Clinical Professor, Director of the Tech Edge J.D., and Co-Director of the High Tech Law Institute at Santa Clara University School of Law.

Eric Goldman is the Associate Dean of Research, Professor of Law, and Co-Director of the High Tech Law Institute at Santa Clara University School of Law

October 18, 2022 by
Sarah Beznoska

Professional Identity Formation and First-Generation Law Students

By: Sarah Dylag Beznoska, Assistant Dean for Student and Career Services,
Cleveland-Marshall College of Law, Cleveland State University

It comes as no surprise to those of us who work with law students on first destinations and career paths that when the National Association for Law Placement (NALP) studied national employment statistics for the graduating class of 2020, it found that whether or not you are a first-generation law student impacts your career outcomes in the law.

NALP reported: “Overall, Class of 2020 continuing-generation JD students (graduates who have at least one parent or guardian with a JD degree) and continuing-generation college students (graduates who have at least one parent or guardian with a bachelor’s degree or higher, but whose parents/guardians all lack a JD degree) had a higher employment rate and were more likely to be employed in a bar passage required/anticipated job than their first-generation college student peers.”

The Law Student Survey of Student Engagement (LSSSE) also consistently highlights important disparities related to first-generation law students. From LSSSE, we know that first-generation law students bear more law school debt and face significant stressors related to debt. We know that “the amount of time that first-generation law students [spend] with peers and faculty outside of class [is] significantly less than non-first-generation law students.” LSSSE data has shown that first-generation students also participate in co-curricular opportunities at a lower rate that non-first-generation students, spend more time studying, and spend more time working to support themselves.

This data should be important to everyone in the legal industry, especially as we talk about diversifying our workplaces and our leadership. It is particularly important to me as someone who works in career services at an urban law school that serves a significant population of first-generation college and law students. To provide the best student and career services to our students, we are continually assessing our work through the viewpoint of first-generation students and making adjustments to provide better support.

This assessment can be done for professional identity formation (PIF) too. Understanding and accounting for the unique experiences noted above is critical to developing any comprehensive PIF plan. On the positive side of things, schools can leverage PIF to build belonging for first-generation students. At the same time, being mindful about the time constraints sometimes faced by first-generation students might inform the methods a school chooses for offering PIF opportunities.

First-Generation Students and Law School Culture: Professional Identity to Build Belonging

Belonging matters to law student success, and most especially to first-generation law students. The unique culture of law school and the legal industry can be a challenging adjustment even when someone has lawyers in their family. Without knowing any lawyers or having people already in their network to ask for help, first-generation law students can feel like outsiders from day one. (For some insights on the first-gen experience see: https://abaforlawstudents.com/2021/08/25/first-generation-law-student-challenges/ and https://abaforlawstudents.com/2020/01/01/how-to-thrive-as-a-first-generation-law-student/).

For this reason, I have sometimes been skeptical of the premise of professional identity formation that focuses on students moving from an “outsider” in the profession to an “insider” in the profession. As someone who was a first-generation law student myself (although I was not the first in my family to attend college), I know very personally that not having lawyers in my family or lawyers in my network impacted my law school experience in a negative way. From day one of law school, I internalized deeply that I did not belong and, although my law school trained me well on the doctrinal skills, I never once came to a place there where I felt like an “insider.”

It is because of this personal experience, however, and because of the commitment I have to making sure that first-generation students at the law school where I work never feel this same way, that – as much as I can be skeptical about the terminology of PIF – I think PIF can be leveraged to build more belonging. There are a variety of ways a school might use PIF to increase belonging. For example:

  • Self-Assessment and Industry-Focused Panels: having students complete self-assessment exercises allows them to identify strengths and values that they bring with them to the profession. Taking it a step further, once schools provide an opportunity for students to identify their strengths and values, schools can offer diverse panels of attorneys to demonstrate the varying skillsets that can make someone successful. Providing students with opportunities to know their own strengths and then to see those things in successful practitioners can help them to feel like there is a place in the law for them and who they are matters.
  • Mentoring: providing thoughtful mentoring opportunities allows students to feel less alone in their journey through law school. Schools can engage alumni, peers, faculty, and staff in formal and informal mentoring programs with students, giving them a broad set of people to whom they can turn for support. Consider, also, having faculty, staff, or alumni identify themselves to students as first-generation students, so that your first-generation cohort has examples of first-generation success stories.
  • Student Organizations: schools can support student leaders to create a robust community of student engagement and a space where students can connect with each other and feel less alone. Connecting student organizations to a school’s alumni network can be helpful and assisting student organizations with career-related programs can give students more opportunities to understand the variety of paths in the law.

These three things have worked for us as a starting point to increase belonging at Cleveland-Marshall College of Law. We start at day one when we dedicate a portion of our Orientation to professional identity. This Orientation program covers the essential eligibility requirements for the practice of law in Ohio and the 26 Lawyering Effectiveness Factors. More importantly, it includes diverse panel speakers who reflect on what these things mean in their practice, along with when and where they developed these skills.

We also require incoming law students to complete the Law Fit assessment, and we use those assessments with them in their meetings with career advisors. In addition, together with my team in Student and Career Services, we have built a one-on-one alumni mentor program and a one-on-one peer mentor program for every first-year student who enrolls with us. Later this Fall, we will offer a Storytelling event to our student body, in partnership with our First-Generation Law Student Association, focusing on things like times when we and they have felt imposter syndrome and why one’s personal story matters.

First-Generation Students and Time: Creating Meaningful Space for Students to Reflect

One of the foundational concepts behind PIF is reflective thinking and opportunities for reflective exercises to help students understand their values, the values of the profession, and the competencies required to be a successful lawyer. Reflection, in turn, requires time and space that are carved out to allow specifically for it. Time is a valuable resource for all students, but especially for first-generation law students. Therefore, PIF plans must be mindful of these time constraints.

There are a lot of reasons why first-generation students might not have time for PIF. For example, if they are working significant hours outside of the law school in legal or especially in non-legal jobs to support themselves, if they face family or personal expectations or obligations (especially from family members or personal connections who are unfamiliar with the legal industry), if they are trying to plan the logistics of taking two months off (unpaid and without benefits) after graduation to study for the bar exam, or if they are de-railed by a financial, health, or other crisis without social capital or resources to support them. In the optional space of Student and Career Services, when we support students with challenges like these, there is sometimes precious little time or energy available to ask students to reflect on how a chosen work or academic experience contributes to their professional identity.

Worse, when I see my first-generation students struggling with time, I worry that PIF will feel to them like optional engagement that is only possible for those law students who are supported by deep family resources or who are not struggling with other life priorities. I also worry whether they will trust me if I ask them to add to their already overflowing plates the additional work required by PIF. Notably, I believe these students are frequently already very self-directed learners, but they are people with clear and important demands on their time that often do not leave room for any optional piece of the law school curriculum.

For this reason – to bring all students along in PIF – schools must be creative about how and when to include PIF in the law school experience, and be respectful of the time constraints students might face, depending on their circumstances.

  • Bring PIF to Students: one option, of course, is to build into the existing curriculum opportunities for reflection and discussions about professional identity. But, if that won’t work for your school/classroom, schools might consider inviting the career services team to stop by before or after classes to provide handouts or resources that are aligned with related career paths. Schools can emphasize the importance of related programming that is happening outside of the classroom and encourage students to make strategic decisions about which to attend. Schools can include in other required spaces – Orientation, graduation-required courses, student leader trainings – information about building lawyering skills. Schools can encourage students to work with academic advisors, staff, or alumni to create a plan that works for them, and schools can help those advisors, staff, and alumni to have the PIF information they need to be impactful.
  • Create a PIF-focused Course: changing the curriculum to include a new course is another option, and one that may or may not be a fit for a school. For better or worse, however, we know that in a world impacted by COVID, general student engagement in optional parts of the law school experience is significantly decreased. Add to that the time constraints we know our first-generation students face and we simply cannot wait for students to come to us. As I’ve learned from my colleagues in the undergraduate space, we are responsible for finding ways to go to them. One way to go to them is to create a credit-bearing course that will reward students for doing PIF work while creating a meaningful space for first-generation and other time-strapped students to include the work among their other priorities.

At Cleveland-Marshall College of Law, Students and Career Services has seen some movement with bringing PIF to students. For example, my department no longer expects that attendance will be robust at optional career related programs. Instead, we collaborate with student organizations on panel presentations and visit their student organization meetings to connect. We bring handouts and resources to student-run events, instead of requiring them to come to us for the information. We try to model the behavior we are seeking from students by showing up to the programs and panels that they have organized rather than simply demanding they show up at ours. We also leverage our alumni and peer mentor programs to provide resources to students. It is clear to us that peer-to-peer advising among students is at an all-time high, and rather than discourage or limit this connection, we provide information and resources to support it.

Perhaps most importantly, we try to ask students for input on what kinds of activities will help them most when it comes to lawyering skills. Without exception, they prefer activities that require engagement from them, opportunities to become involved in the community through pro bono work, and learning experiences where they connect with others. As a result, we are adjusting our traditional Student and Career Services programming to offer more of these kinds of experiences, and fewer lectures/presentations, while also incorporating reflective coaching questions into our everyday conversations with students.

Conclusion

Supporting first-generation law students to succeed is a critical component of increasing diversity in the legal industry. When PIF is offered thoughtfully and in a way that is mindful of time as a resource, it can be a place where schools can provide that support, not just through efforts focused on belonging, but also efforts focused on financial wellness, building support networks, introductions to professional norms, and academic planning.

If you have any questions or comments about this post, then please feel free to contact me at s.beznoska@csuohio.edu.

Sarah Dylag Beznoska is the Assistant Dean for Student and Career Services at Cleveland-Marshall College of Law at Cleveland State University.

October 13, 2022 by