July 2008 Nevada Lawyer

DEAN’S COLUMN

IMPROVING CIVIL LITIGATION THROUGH LEGAL EDUCATION

BY DEAN JOHN VALERY WHITE, BOYD SCHOOL OF LAW

Law schools are facing increasing pressure to prepare students for the rigors of practice. In the world of civil litigation, these pressures range from teaching litigation skills to encouraging civility and professional decorum, in addition to the already significant intellectual demands of substantive and procedural legal instruction.

In these pages, I have already discussed the business forces firms face, which affect how law schools must teach law students. When the modern law school emerged nearly a century ago, it emphasized the intellectual demands of practice over skills training – skills were presumed to be learned on the job.

Today’s graduates must know much more beyond the substantive law, more even than how to prepare and file documents. Law graduates today must be prepared to offer value to the firms employing them from the very beginning of their careers. This requires them to have a broad sense of their role as lawyers and of the business of legal practice, all while maintaining respect for their obligations to their community and acquiring the practical scholastic mastery that has made American law schools a model for the world to imitate. Impressing professional mores on a rapidly changing legal culture is crucial.

When I have spoken with non-lawyers over the past year, they are singularly focused on the perceived deficiencies in the profession: litigiousness, disconcerting lawyer behavior and the significant barriers to access to justice posed by expensive legal fees. We are an easy target (after all, most people seek lawyers when they have problems) and much of the criticism of lawyers is exaggerated or built around particularly prominent anecdotes.

In any case, it is crucial that we begin to address these challenges to the reputation of our profession. That effort begins in law schools with a combined focus on our professional mores and our obligations to our communities. Today we must produce competent, responsive, lawyers who possess integrity.