While drafting a "statement of teaching philosophy" is a standard process for job applicants in colleges of arts and sciences in the United States, it is somewhat more rare for a law school to ask for one. Fortunately, more law schools are requiring them of their entry-level
job applicants, forcing prospective law professors to think about what
they are doing, why they are doing it and how they propose to go about the teaching.
Perhaps a statement of teaching philosophy is more important for law professors than for professors in other fields because there is nothing in law school or in practice that
prepares you to become a law professor.
This is a subject on which I've been ruminating for over 25 years. From the time I first read
Duncan Kennedy's "Little Red Book" before attending law school, to my receipt of my most recent student evaluations, I have been asking myself whether legal education is helping students develop the skills, habits and ways of thinking about the world that will transform them into competent lawyers, honorable and engaged citizens and effective leaders. In
Legal Education and the Reproduction of Hierarchy, Kennedy argues that the lecture format, the use of the Socratic method, the examination process, and the way law school students are socialized undermine initiative, independent thinking, agency, and assertiveness and slot them in specific trajectories that have no purpose other than replicating the existing economic and social hierarchies. Having spent the last 30 years working in one capacity or another in the legal world, I have to conclude that he is correct in many respects.
Fortunately, the upheavals of the last 20 years in the legal profession and of the last five years in legal education have prompted a broader discourse about the goals and functions of legal education. This inquiry is bearing fruit in a variety of ways, but I think one of the more positive developments is the move to incorporate science-based research on learning, emotional and intellectual blocks to learning and effective and innovative teaching technologies. I have incorporated these developments into my own Statement of Teaching Philosophy:
Neuroscience research has
transformed our understanding of teaching, learning, and intellectual
development over the past 20 years. The central message from this research is straightforward:
"The one who does the work does the learning."
Drawing from this body of nationally recognized scholarship in education,
I have created courses that engage students as partners in the educational
enterprise. I structure the readings and assignments to build student confidence,
expand their capacity to manage uncertainty, promote persistence, and reward
effort and independent thought. I also try to make the courses fun; when
students enjoy class, they work harder and perform at a higher level.
For doctrinal courses, including
Income Tax, Partnership and Corporate Tax, Environmental Law and Property, I
divide the material into weekly modules to help students manage their workload
and expectations. First, after a short introduction to the material, I
introduce students to close reading and interpretation of the cases, statutes
and the regulations. I have developed statutory worksheets help students to
focus their attention, extract the main legal concepts, understand the
architecture of the law, and develop an outline of authorities. The worksheets
also facilitate group discussion about the incentive structures and policies
undergirding the law. Second, I require students to turn in weekly problem sets.
The problems give the students the opportunity to apply what they have learned
in a fact-rich, client-based context. Third, I test basic comprehension with multiple-choice
quizzes using TurningPoint or i-Clicker student response systems or the TWEN
Instapoll function. The software aggregates students’ responses in bar graph
format so that they can tell whether their answers are in alignment with those
of their peers. They provide an opportunity for peer-to-peer learning and allow
me to address any broader confusion. Fourth, I often give mid-semester
examinations so that the students gain important feedback about their performance.
I have sometimes provided skeleton outlines of the material to help students see
the broader picture; the outlines tend to even the playing field and reduce the
advantages associated with course notes that are transferred selectively
through social networks.
For Tax Policy, Climate Change and
the Law, and other seminar courses, my teaching has been strongly influenced by
my own coursework. Michael Sandel’s lectures on distributive justice at Harvard
initially inspired me to pursue a career in the law, to dedicate myself to pro
bono and nonprofit work, and to combine my experience in private practice with
my interests in social and environmental policy. During my LL.M. work at New
York University, Daniel Shaviro’s and Alan Auerbach’s Tax Policy Colloquium and
Lily Batchelder’s Tax and Social Policy course introduced me to economic
analysis. In my own courses, we examine incentives, public policy goals, and
legal and economic structures designed to alter those incentives or overcome
transaction costs to facilitate trade of entitlements. We discuss whether the
law is effective, whether policy-makers’ goals have been met, whether there are
significant spillover effects, and how legal structures might be modified to
better achieve those goals with lower social or budgetary costs. I also employ
some of the teaching methodologies I learned at Harvard and NYU, including
requiring students to lead class discussions individually and as a part of a
group effort, critique the assigned readings, and develop a research and
writing plan. I have also asked students to provide constructive feedback for
their peers’ drafts; students learn to improve their own work by critiquing the
work of others.
For
skills-based courses, such as real estate transactions, I would accompany the
readings with a simulated transaction in which the students draft, review and
edit client engagement letters, consider conflicts of interests, perform due
diligence investigations, draft, negotiate and edit real estate documents, and
close the transaction. For some courses, we may also discuss alternative deal
structures, and identify the benefits, costs and risks associated with each
option. My goal is to familiarize the students with the transactional process,
grant the students a solid foundational knowledge of the documents and the
economic and legal issues that may arise, and develop their skills to negotiate
and resolve those issues to their clients’ advantage.
Over the
past two years I have also been working closely with Professor Laurie Zimet’s AcademicSupport Program to improve student performance in first year classes and
prepare them for the bar examination. Following an in-depth training with
Professor Zimet, I have supported students in skill-building workshops and one-on-one
meetings focused on helping students identify their academic strengths and
weaknesses, build their skills and confidence, and explore their other concerns
that may have been interfering with learning.
Finally, I know from both my
in-class experiences, and from my work with pro bono attorneys and pro se
clients to expand access to justice in Georgia, that technology is a powerful tool
for engaging and empowering students. I have employed Blackboard, TWEN, Canvas,
audio, video, and student response systems to engage students and to accelerate
the learning process. Once my course responsibilities stabilize and I can
obtain access to user-friendly videotaping and editing software, I plan to use the “flipped” classroom methodology developed at West Point. In flipped classrooms, the students watch the introductory lecture prior to class, complete and online quiz and then use classroom time for problem solving, skills development work, and policy discussion.
