In America’s constitutional democracy, lawyers are both preservationists and disruptors. To be, or not to be?
That is not the question for law schools.
They too should preserve and disrupt. The academic custodians of the past who transmit what is known and properly done also can be innovators. They are not and should not be “enemies of the future.”
That phrase was used by Senior Tutor Professor Nicholas Cole during a dinner celebrating the 400th anniversary of Pembroke College amid the spires of Oxford University, an iconic center of scholarship and teaching now in its ninth century as a hotbed of collaborative cross disciplinary creativity.
Cole spoke after a brilliant lecture by my American Rhodes Scholar classmate Walter Isaacson about the curiosity, imagination and drive of history’s greatest innovators.
As Thomas Jefferson wrote in 1816:
“I am not an advocate for frequent changes in laws and constitutions, but laws and institutions must go hand in hand with the progress of the human mind. As that becomes more developed, more enlightened, as new discoveries are made, new truths discovered and manners and opinions change, with the change of circumstances, institutions must advance also to keep pace with the times.”
And then comes my favorite part: “We might as well require a man to wear still the coat which fitted him when a boy as civilized society to remain ever under the regimen of their barbarous ancestors.”
Even so, lawyers and legal educators are notoriously “late adaptors,” perhaps more so than any other learned profession.
There are many good reasons why this is so. Among other things, those schooled in law give credence to evidence. Lawyers value the probative value of give-and-take arguments. Such fact-finding can take time to build a convincing case for change.
Lawyers are comfortable with precedents and cautious about departing from generally established principles and practices which can be upsetting, costly and have unintended consequences.
That can be especially so for those who may have relied on the principle of stare decisis (stand by the decision), as well as those who lack the ability or the means to adjust to new circumstances.
The status quo also is anchored by other less compelling factors. Conventional wisdom about what was once and still tried-and-true is a stubborn thing, no matter how outdated or unsubstantiated.
Not too long ago at an international legal conference on the future of law in the digital age, a prominent British barrister who teaches trial practice proudly flaunted his Luddism saying, “I do not use new technology, I do not understand it, but I know it is no good for either teaching or doing what I do.”
That sentiment, though not rare, increasingly is an outlier in the profession which steadily is acquiring a more inventive and entrepreneurial ethos.
Legal educators open to prudent data driven innovation in pursuit of excellence are wise to be skeptical about the pedagogical “fad du jour.”
In academic institutions, transitions to new programs can be challenging to fund within existing budgets and given common internal concerns that funds spent on new projects would be better spent on the existing curriculum.
The mission critical obligation to students, which we wholeheartedly embrace at Jacksonville University College of Law, to color within the lines and teach the fundamentals of law is paradoxically innovative if you strive to do so in the best possible ways.
We also are eager, even restless, to demonstrate what I call our “Jacksonville Pollock” style of creativity, discovering and using better ways to equip students with the knowledge, skills, professional values and lifelong learning tools they need to succeed.
They must be ready to address unmet needs, attack and mitigate entrenched inequities, adapt to future developments and tackle challenges that are not yet imagined much less known.
This path clearing work must be done while adhering to strict regulatory requirements.
Even the traditional academic calendar can complicate experimentation and transitions to new programs.
Because of the endless episodic loop of the academic calendar, with its continuous cycle of new school years, restarting the clock immediately after each year-end, academic institutions cannot be put in dry dock to scrape off barnacles and retrofit.
Instead, they must try to improve while operationally underway and navigate the competitive and uncertain markets in which they operate.
However, in an age of accelerating disruptive change, innovative legal education is imperative, not an oxymoron.
Lawyers and legal educators should and must push themselves to consider improvements that need to be made.
Business as usual and rigid resistance to adapting to new technological, economic, political, climactic and other societal circumstances is not a viable option. Neither is an indecisive “ready, aim, study” approach. These are formulas for failure.
As Cole observed, “A core purpose of universities is to not only transmit the sum of human knowledge but to expand it.”
Further, he notes that unlike the short-lived companies of the private sector which last in most cases less than 20 years, a well-constructed self-governing academic community can, with the right support from outside its walls, last much longer and make profound contributions to the public.
Thank you, Jacksonville, for the promising future your extraordinary support and encouragement enables.
Law schools across the U.S. are innovating in many ways including distancing management decisions from the increasingly less influential U.S. News & World Report rankings.
They are responding to demands for better practical training while satisfying students’ interests in not waiting for graduation to make an impact on significant public issues.
Law schools are rapidly beginning to make good use of virtual reality and AI. More attention is paid about how to prepare students for advising and representing clients in a world of incomplete, imperfect information.
For more than a decade, law schools have been working to understand and promote more effective leadership by lawyers.
For example, the most popular course in the history of Georgetown University Law Center with more than 300 students enrolled is “Lawyers as Leaders.” This course, taught by Dean Bill Treanor, is offered online and engages students in discussions about how lawyers can lead progress on the issues of our day.
The years ahead should be exciting for legal education. That is likely because of the ascendant recognition of the fundamental role of law and lawyers in our lives, and because of the already ongoing revitalization and reinvention of how law is practiced, taught and learned.
Innovations which are well underway in most law schools will generate productive and meaningful beginnings for aspiring attorneys, and even greater long-term benefits to the people who they will serve.