I have been on a blog holiday of sorts recently--taking time from blogging and other pursuits to grade a mountain of exams. And no, this is not a picture of my foot. Or my computer.
I am finally nearing the end of grading, though, so hopefully I will be back in the blog saddle very soon. Thanks for reading, and stay tuned.
9 comments:
I heard a rumor that the grades for your Contracts class would be up tomorrow...can you confirm or deny?
Speaking of grading, here's an interesting post on the toxicity of law school
http://insidehighered.com/news/2007/01/04/lawschool
Another interesting article on legal ed
More Moral and Practical Law Schools
Law schools need to do a better job integrating the teaching of legal doctrine with a much stronger focus on helping students develop practical “lawyering” skills and understandings of ethical and moral considerations, according to a new study from the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching.
“The gap between learning to think like a lawyer and being capable of acting like a lawyer, both clinically and morally, is, if anything, greater than it’s ever been before,” said Lee S. Shulman, president of the foundation, which released “Educating Lawyers: Preparation for the Profession of Law,” one of a series of Carnegie reports on professional education, on Thursday.
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The original story and user comments can be viewed online at http://insidehighered.com/news/2007/01/05/carnegie.
Law school professors really overrate themselves. At the end of the day, they are nothing more than liberal arts professors who just spend their lives writing law review articles that nobody reads and who develop "theories" that are rarely if ever, used in real world practice.
Do you honeslty feel like your teaching leads to any PRACTICAL outcome?
Someone sounds a little like he or she is a bit disappointed in his or her grades...
To the previous anonymous poster who overrates himself by thinking anyone cares what he has to say: I had this professor for administrative law this semester and having worked in an agency before coming to law school I can tell you that his teaching will lead to a very practical outcome. As I plan to enter a practice that will involve working with several regulatory agencies, I can tell you that I took much away from the class that will be put to use one day.
And although many will tell you that you do not use anything you learn in law school when you get into practice, while much of what you learn will be forgotten, I can assure you that my first year professors provided valuable information that was used in my first year of clerking and that I am sure will be used in the future.
I am not overrating myself. However, over the years, I have come to realize that the smartest people in the world go into field like medicine and engineering, not law.
I have a lot of respect for academics in the hard sciences. These people do ground breaking research that often has a significant impact on people's lives. They find cures for cancer, they invent fantasitic technological breakthrough's, etc, etc.
Law school professors do not engage in the same kind of real world research. Usually, their research is focused on some esoteric subject that winds up in a law review article that 99% of the population will either never read or will never hear about.
Law school should really only take one year. The second year should be devoted entirely to a practicum and the third year should be entirely eliminated. My point is that law school as an institution, has largely been overrated in order for schools to get more money out of their students. It is not medical school and the professors are not doctors.
The professor was right, you generalize entirely too much. First, I'm not sure why you think law professors claim to be doctors. Secondly, you are right that law school is not medical school. That is why it takes 3 years instead of 7 to 10 (when you consider residency). Third, not every doctor and engineer represent the brightest of the bright (I know plenty that don't qualify). Nor are they all saints. Lastly, of course medical research is more groundbreaking, the majority of the public is impacted by health care research. I doubt 5% of the public care what the holding in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld stood for. That does not mean there shouldn't be an outlet for researching and writing on such topics.
I don't want to turn the good professor's blog into a chest-thumping contest, I just don't see how you can make the generalizations that you do. Try taking the bar exam after one year of law school and tell me how it turns out. I think it's time for us to quit this pointless banter because I doubt you've convinced anyone but yourself that you are right (which you aren't).
Had I taken Barbri after my first year of law school, I would have been able to pass the bar.
You will realize this when you get ready to take the bar (I'm assuming that based on your answer, you are still a student)
I'm telling you...those last two years of law school are useless. It's just a way for schools to make more money.
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