Curriculum Reform in Context, 1870-2008: Understanding and Overcoming the Limitations of Contemporary Legal Education
Author(s)
Langer, William AKeywords
JurisprudenceLegal Education
Legal Realism
Professional Responsibility
Case Method
Professional Ethics
Curriculum Reform
Legal History
Legal Profession
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Curriculum Reform in Context, 1870-2008: Understanding and Overcoming the Limitations of Contemporary Legal EducationWilliam LangerIn 2006, the law schools at Harvard and Stanford announced plans to implement innovative reforms to their traditional legal curricula. While the two law schools' reform programs are quite different from one another, they both proceed on the premise that legal education has not kept pace with the changes that have taken place in the law, the legal profession, and the global economy over the last several decades, and that the traditional form of legal education, centered around the "case method," has long been due for an update.This article places the curriculum reforms currently in the implementation phase at Harvard and Stanford, as well as the reforms implemented at Georgetown during the 1990s, within the context of the criticisms and calls for reform that have been voiced from within legal academia over the last century. It does so as part of an effort to understand why and in what areas contemporary legal education is in need of improvement, and to compare and contrast how the recent reforms at Harvard, Stanford and Georgetown have addressed these concerns.The article begins by outlining the tasks of legal education, as well as some of the scholarship regarding the problems with the law school and with the legal profession that indicate a need to improve legal education. After laying out these "symptoms," this article then discusses much of the scholarship regarding the root causes of the problems with legal education and the legal profession, beginning with the work of Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. and the Legal Realists, and continuing through to recent years. This discussion highlights not only the ways in which legal education has become outdated in recent years, but also the ways in which it has been inadequate since 1870 - the time that the "case method" was first instituted - due to the limitations of an education overly focused on legal casebook-based instruction.After exploring the various limitations to contemporary legal education, both in specific areas of technical and practical competency, as well as general areas of professional and personal self-development, this paper examines the reforms at Harvard, Stanford and Georgetown, and discusses the different ways in which each reform program addresses these issues.Date
2008-09-07Type
textIdentifier
oai:works.bepress.com:william_langer-1000http://works.bepress.com/william_langer/1
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