News Blog

CLEA news blog: you can use your news aggregator to monitor the latest on the CLEA website.

  • 20 Dec 2018 11:42 AM | Lauren Bartlett

    The New Clinicians Conference 

    Saturday, May 4, 2019

    Golden Gate University School of Law 

    536 Mission Street

    San Francisco, CA 94105

    More information about the conference is forthcoming and registration will be  available on our website soon.

  • 17 Oct 2018 12:25 PM | Lauren Bartlett

    The call for proposals is now open for the seventh biennial conference on Applied Legal Storytelling. We are offering two deadlines for submitting proposals: January 21, 2019 (priority deadline) and March 11, 2019 (extended deadline).  

    About the Conference 

    The Applied Legal Storytelling Conference brings together academics, judges, and practitioners. The conference has previously convened in 2007 (London), 2009 (Portland), 2011 (Denver), 2013 (London), Seattle (2015), and Washington D.C. (2017). We are very excited to bring it back to the Mountain West (Boulder) in July 2019.

    Applied Legal Storytelling (AppLS) examines the use of stories—and of storytelling or narrative elements—in law practice, legal education, and the law. This definition is intentionally broad in order to allow people creativity in the way they think and present on the topic. Such topics may include: the ways in which fiction-writing techniques or narrative theory can inform legal storytelling; stories in the law, or law as stories; legal storytelling and metaphor; client story advocacy; legal storytelling and cognitive science; and ethical considerations in legal storytelling. 

    In an effort to continue the storytelling conversation for this seventh conference, and to welcome new attendees, we are providing resources for those interested in submitting a proposal and who wish to generate ideas or respond to others’. The first is a list of topics from past conferences, available at http://www.lwionline.org/sites/default/files/Topics%20and%20ideas%20from%20past%20AppLS%20conferences%20(1).pdf. The second is a link to a bibliography on AppLS, including articles that have emerged from previous storytelling conferences, available at http://www.alwd.org/wp-contentuploads20151108-rideout_article2015-pdf/. We are also happy to answer questions and offer you suggestions—if you are a newcomer and interested in becoming involved, please reach out.

    This conference will be hosted by the University of Colorado School of Law, University of Denver Sturm College of Law, and University of Wyoming School of Law, and coordinated by the Rocky Mountain Legal Writing Scholarship Group.  The conference is co-sponsored by the Clinical Legal Education Association.

  • 09 Oct 2018 1:28 PM | Lauren Bartlett

    The CLEA Externship Committee is delighted to share its much-anticipated Report:  Survey of Schools on Payment of Students for For-Credit Externships.

    The Report analyzes data generated by a March 2018 survey on how law schools responded to ABA Standards revisions that removed the prohibition on paid externships.  An impressive 151 law schools responded to the survey, but the Report notes the following caveat:  the minority of schools that are experimenting with payment only recently implemented such policies and have little experience to report at this time.  For that reason, CLEA plans to continue examining this issue in future data collection efforts.

    In conjunction with the survey, the CLEA Externship Committee conducted two webinars last May and June that shared preliminary survey results, and examined considerations and challenges in permitting and implementing paid externships.  Over 80 law schools participated in the webinars, and a version of it is available on the LexternWeb site.

    Many thanks to the CLEA Externship Committee members whose initiative, hard work, and brainpower brought this project to fruition:  D’lorah Hughes (Irvine), Kendall Kerew (Georgia State), Amy Sankaran (University of Michigan), and Alex Scherr (University of Georgia).

    If you have questions about the Report or suggestions for future data collection, please contact committee co-chairs:

  • 07 Sep 2018 1:13 PM | Lauren Bartlett

    The CLEA Elections Committee (D’lorah Hughes and Lindsay Harris) is soliciting nominations through October 1, 2018, of individuals to serve on the CLEA Board starting in January 2019. This year, there is a VP position and several Board positions open.  All positions require a three-year commitment.  I am attaching a memo prepared by the CLEA Elections Committee, which sets forth the activities and responsibilities of CLEA Board members in more detail.  Current CLEA members are invited to nominate themselves or other CLEA members as candidates for one of these open positions.  The committee also encourages "new clinicians" (defined as clinicians with fewer than 6 years of experience) to run for the CLEA Board.  Our Bylaws create a separate election process for candidates identified as "new clinicians," to ensure that the identified "new clinician" candidate who receives the greatest number of votes will be assured a place on the Board.

    The Committee strongly encourages CLEA members to nominate individuals from groups that are currently underrepresented within the leadership of various clinical institutions, including CLEA, the AALS Section on Clinical Legal Education, and the Clinical Law Review.  The nomination process is simple.  Nominate yourself or someone else by contacting the chair of the CLEA ElectionsCommittee, D’lorah Hughes, dhughes@law.uci.edu. If you are nominating yourself, please include a paragraph or two about why you are running and a link to your faculty profile, which will be included with the election materials to be sent later in the fall.  If you are nominating another CLEA member, there is no need to include such a paragraph; the name alone will suffice, and the Election Committee will contact the nominee for further information.  If you have less than six years of clinical teaching experience and wish to be identified as a "new clinician" candidate, or if you want to nominate a candidate for the "new clinician" category, please indicate that as well.

    Although the process of nomination is easy, our Bylaws set a strict deadline for receiving nominations.  All nominations must be received by October 1, 2018.  If you have questions about the CLEA Elections process, please feel free to contact me or D’lorah Hughes at dhughes@law.uci.edu.
  • 05 Dec 2017 12:36 PM | Jeff Baker (Administrator)

    CLEA will hold its board meeting and membership meeting on January 4, 2018, during the AALS Annual Meeting in San Diego. The board will meet at 5:00 p.m. (Pacific), and the membership will meet at 6:00 p.m. (Pacific). CLEA will join with other clinical and externship professors for dinner at a location to be determined after the meetings at 7:30 (Pacific).  

    Thomas Jefferson School of Law is graciously hosting the meetings at 1155 Island Ave, San Diego, CA 92101. 

    CLEA will provide call-in information later for those unable to attend in person. 

    Please RSVP here by December 18 for the board meeting, membership meeting, and dinner, even if you need to call in for the meetings: 

    https://goo.gl/forms/FsYZuAP1GkbgZDZs2


  • 26 Jan 2017 3:28 PM | Laura McNally-Levine

    The CLEA Board would like to ask for your help on a critical ABA advocacy issue. This fall, the ABA Council on Legal Education passed a dramatic revision to Standard 316, requiring every accredited law school to demonstrate that 75% of each graduating class that sat for the bar passed within two years of graduation. The Council passed the new standard, however, with no evaluation of the impact of this change, including the unintended consequences on schools in states with low bar pass rates, student admissions decisions, law school curricular design. In fact, the Council passed the proposed Standard 316 hastily, after less than an hour’s discussion, with virtually no consideration of the mounting opposition to the standard.

    You can help CLEA join the growing concerted effort to make sure that the House of Delegates does not simply rubberstamp Resolution 110B. Current examples of this effort include the attached letter from a group of prominent law school deans and a letter from the State Bar President of Michigan urging the House to send the resolution back for further investigation.

    The new Standard 316 is scheduled to be voted on by the ABA House of Delegates on February 6th at the ABA Miami Midyear Meeting as Resolution 110B. We ask that you contact your state representatives who serve on the House of Delegates and request that they send the proposed standard back to the Council for further consideration and additional study.

    To facilitate your communication with your state ABA Delegates, we are providing you with (1) background information on the revised Standard 316 in Resolution 110B and (2) a sample email for you to use to contact your representatives.

    Background on the revised Standard 316

    Under the new Standard 316, law schools would have to demonstrate that 75% of each graduating class who sat for the bar passed it within two years of graduation.

    In a comment submitted in July 2016, CLEA opposed this new standard arguing that the proposed change may have unintended and possibly quite damaging consequences on law school curricular design and the diversity of the legal profession. CLEA urged that the Council defer action on the standard to (1) conduct an evidence-based inquiry into the immediate impact of proposed Standard 316 on schools in states with low bar pass rates and on the diversity of law schools; and (2) consider more systemically whether the bar examination, as the exclusive means of assessing readiness to practice law, is too limited in the proficiencies it assesses for entry into the legal profession.

    CLEA was not alone in its opposition. More than a dozen comments were submitted in opposition, including comments from a group of twenty concerned law schools, SALT, the Historically Black Law Schools and Colleges Deans, and The Congressional Black Caucus. During the public hearing on the new standard, the only testimony presented was in opposition to the new standard. A complete list of comments submitted in opposition can be found here: http://www.americanbar.org/groups/legal_education/resources/notice_and_comment/notice_comment_archive.html. The full hearing transcript of public testimony about the revised Standard 316 can be found here:

    http://www.americanbar.org/content/dam/aba/administrative/legal_education_and_admissions_to_the_bar/council_reports_and_resolutions/comments/20160806_hearing_transcript.authcheckdam.pdf.

    After the Council passed its resolution, the California bar results were released. The overall pass rate for first-time takers from ABA accredited law schools was 62%. Only five of the 21 ABA accredited law schools in California had a pass rate above 75%.

    For your reference here are: (1) the revised Standard 316, (2) CLEA’s full comment opposing passage of the new standard, and (3) letters of opposition filed most recently by a collective of law school deans and the Michigan Bar Association President. The comments and public testimony present a range of arguments for why the ABA Council on Legal Education should not have passed the new Standard 316.

    Proposed Email

    Below is a draft email that you can use to present CLEA’s position:

    Dear ABA Delegate:

    I write to ask you to reject Resolution 110B, a revision of Standard 316 that dramatically changes the bar passage standard required for law school accreditation. I ask that you send Resolution 110B back to the Council on Legal Education for further study and consideration.

    Standard 316 is dense, complex, and inadequate. It needs to be revised. But in passing this new Standard 316, the Council has not adequately studied the impact of this change, including the unintended consequences on schools in states with low bar pass rates, student admissions decisions, law school curricular design, and the diversity of the legal profession. In fact, the Council passed the proposed Standard 316 hastily, after less than an hour’s discussion, with virtually no consideration of the dozens of written comments and public testimony that opposed its passage.

    I urge that the delegates of INSERT YOUR STATE HERE unanimously reject Resolution 110B and send it back to Council so that a careful, reliable, and comprehensive study of its impact can be conducted.

    Sincerely,

    SIGN NAME HERE

    How to find your state’s delegates

    Most state representatives for the ABA House of Delegates can be found on your state bar website. You can also simply use a search engine and type in your state name and “ABA House of Delegates.” We have found many state delegations using this very basic method. If you are a member of the ABA, there is a delegate directory link on the main ABA website that is accessible to you.

    We believe that if we mobilize CLEA members on issues that are critical to our mission, we can collectively make a difference. We would like you to contact your delegates by January 31st before the meeting begins on February 1. Thank you for taking the time to write to your delegates!

    Benjie Louis and Beth Schwartz

    CLEA Co-Presidents


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