My friend Rory Skaggs mentioned how interesting he finds it that so few law professors ever were (as he put it) actual lawyers. I am still collecting my thoughts on this matter, but wanted to open the topic up to general discussion. What role does this play in our legal education? -- RobLaser - 15 Feb 2010

Might it be a little tough to discuss this point intelligently after sixteen weeks of law school? Might you, indeed, be having a little trouble telling actual from not actual lawyers at this point? I think it is time to stop expecting to acquire commitment points by writing extensively about how to improve law school without having "actually" been through it. On the plus side, given the baseline you and your friend Rory and some other usual chatterers have laid down, you can get improvement points at this stage by writing even badly about substantive subjects.

The answer to your question is that what matters to you is the quality of your teachers' teaching, not the quality of their lawyering. What matters to the quality of their teaching is still obscure to you, as it is to most of your teachers. That's not important here: you're studying to be a lawyer, not an educational reformer. You might want to take up the task in hand.

I started this topic partly as a place to discuss what an "actual" lawyer was. Since I would claim many of our professors who have never worked at a firm or government post are nevertheless able to be considered "lawyers" by many of the conceptions of a lawyer that our readings have provided. The legal education portion was concerned with what effect their respective histories may have on what type of lawyers we are pushed into being by the current system, and how we should adjust our conceptions about our future moving forward because of it. I may have initialized the subject poorly. However, If this is not what the wiki is for I apologize and will move on to other topics.

Here is a link to a recent article on this topic. Oddly enough, the article's author also went to CLS. I do not agree with all the statements, particularly concerning the idea that interdisciplinary approaches are worthless, but it is an interesting article nonetheless.

http://blogs.wsj.com/law/2010/08/31/are-law-school-faculties-part-of-the-problem-with-legal-education

--Rob Laser