ACCREDITATION FUNCTION

Target resources to areas requiring the most oversight and reduce financial burdens on law schools (I-A)

• Provisional school application process and monitoring (I-A1)
• Frequency of certain routine site evaluation visits (I-A2, I-A4)
• Site team preparation and support (I-A3, I-A4))
• Fee restructuring (I-A5)

Update and revise Standards and Interpretations (I-B)

• New areas (I-B1)
  • Distance and technology-based education
  • Weekend and part-time programs
  • Globalization
  • Branch and satellite campuses
  • Admission test
• Existing areas
  • Systematic review (I-B1, I-B4))
• Predictable, announced schedule (I-B2)

Expand pool of accreditation project volunteers (I-C)

• Diversity
• New blood

LEGAL EDUCATION, THE PROFESSION, AND LEARNED SOCIETY FUNCTIONS

Strengthen and institutionalize relationships with other constituents through joint meetings, conferences, outreach programs, and regular communications (IIA)

• Conference of Chief Justices (II-A1)
• University Presidents and Provosts (II-A2, II-A3)
• ABA and state bar leaders (II-A5)
• National Conference of Bar Examiners (II-C)
• Legal educators in other countries (II-D)
• Law school faculty and adjuncts (II-F)

Engage in dialogues with the organized bar on future trends in the law to better prepare graduates for actual practice (II-B)

• Multijurisdictional Practice
• Multidisciplinary Practice
• Law school financing

Spend more time on bar admissions activities (II-C)

• Effectiveness of admissions process
• Fairness of procedures
• Diversity issues
• Education and information sharing

Foster continuing, cooperative relationships with sibling organizations to achieve common goals (II-G)

• Association of American Law Schools
• Law School Admission Council
• National Association of Law Placement
• Others

Encourage international cooperation efforts (II-C)

• Emerging democracies
• Curriculum and standards

SERVICE FUNCTIONS

Increase accessibility and electronic capabilities of Annual Questionnaire, publications, statistics, and other data gathering or circulation vehicles to benefit law schools and students (III-A, III-G)

• More data for unapproved schools (III-B)
• Prospective law student information (III-C)
• Clearinghouse function (III-D)

Continue conferences, workshops, and training programs for deans, other administrators, and on specified topics and evaluate for: (III-E)

• Usefulness and relevance
• Frequency
• Additional ideas

Collaborate on governmental initiatives for the betterment of legal education or law student interests, such as debt burdens (III-F)

ADMINISTRATIVE FUNCTIONS

Review and update Section Committee structure as needed (IV-A)
Review staff structure for maximum efficiency (IV-B)
Plan for next five years of funding Section activities (IV-C)
Continue to streamline Council agendas to permit policy discussions (IV-D)

 

SECTION OF LEGAL EDUCATION AND ADMISSIONS TO THE BAR
STRATEGIC OBJECTIVES 2001-05
(Adopted by the Council of the Section, June 2001)

I. Accreditation Project

A. Consider ways in which the oversight and consumer protection functions of the accreditation process can be undertaken more efficiently, with less burden on schools while maintaining an effective regulatory process. One major objective should be to focus the effort of the Accreditation Committee even more carefully on issues of core importance to quality legal education and to target accreditation review resources more directly on matters that require the most careful oversight.

1. Review the process for monitoring provisional schools with the object of reducing the frequency of full site evaluations, so that schools can devote more effort to improving their programs and less to preparing for site visits, while still providing the Accreditation Committee the ability to exercise effective oversight.
2. Review the Criteria for Approval of Foreign Programs with the object of reducing the frequency of site evaluations and making other changes that, while maintaining effective oversight, reduce the extent to which the Criteria may provide disincentives to useful collaborations between law schools in the United States and other countries.
3. Employ staff resources to provide greater assistance to site team chairs in preparing for site evaluations, and to review site evaluation reports for completeness and accuracy before those reports are sent to the school or the Accreditation Committee.
4. Consider whether revisions to the site evaluation process for fully approved schools can be made that would improve the effectiveness of oversight while reducing the burdens on schools of the evaluation process. Issues that might be considered include: How frequently should site evaluations of fully approved schools be undertaken? Should some site evaluations be limited site evaluations (with a smaller visiting team and more limited purposes) and some full site evaluations similar to the current model? (For example, some accrediting agencies undertake full site evaluations every ten years, with a more limited site visit in the middle of the ten-year period.) Should staff members more frequently go on site visits and, if so, what should be the role of such staff members?
5. Consider how to secure adequate and consistent financial support for the Accreditation Project. For example, should the law school contribution to the financing of the Project be changed -- at least for fully approved law schools -- from the present reliance on fees for site evaluations to a fixed annual fee paid by all fully approved schools? How should the law school contribution toward the financing of the evaluation of foreign programs be structured?

B. Continue regular review of the Standards and Interpretations to ensure that they focus on matters that are core to quality legal education or central to a major consumer protection need. Expand the efforts to obtain input on standards issues from the various stakeholders in legal education.

1. During 2001 – 03, the Standards Review Committee should focus its work on specific areas of the standards where there appear to be the need for significant revisions. One major area that the Committee should consider is the regulations concerning Distance Education and technology-based education. Among other issues that should receive particular consideration are the regulation of weekend and part-time programs, and the rules related to satellite and branch campuses. The Council and the Standards Review Committee should also monitor closely developments related to the use of the Law School Admission Test in the law school admissions process.
2. There should be an annual memo each spring from the Consultant (on behalf of the Chair of the Council and the Chair of the Standards Review Committee) to those interested in legal education indicating some of the issues that the SRC plans to consider in the following academic year and soliciting suggestions for other issues that stakeholders believe should be considered during the next two years. The Accreditation Committee should be invited to offer its suggestions as to standards that should be reviewed prior to the formulation of the SRC agenda for the year.
3. The current process for obtaining comment on specific proposed revisions in the Standards, Interpretations and Rules of Procedure should be continued.
4. During 2003-05, the Standards Review Committee should undertake a comprehensive review of all the standards, in order to complete that review before the Council is again considered for re-recognition by the Department of Education in the fall of 2005.

C. Continue to expand and diversify the pool of volunteers who participate in all aspects of the Accreditation Project.

II. Legal Education, Legal Profession and Learned Society Functions

A. Develop better communications with state courts of highest jurisdiction (and particularly chief justices); presidents and provosts; bar admission authorities; and law school faculty about accreditation issues and matters affecting legal education and the legal profession.

1. Hold a joint workshop with deans and the Conference of Chief Justices, January 2002.
2. Undertake another Presidents/Deans/Provosts Conference (probably in 2002-03).
3. Prepare an annual written report from the Consultant and the Chair to chief justices, presidents & provosts, and bar admission authorities on major law school accreditation issues (beginning August, 2001).
4. Develop a closer working relationship with the National Conference of Bar Examiners, the Council of Bar Admission Administrators, and bar admission authorities in general.
5. Improve communication and collaboration with ABA leadership, other entities within the ABA, and state bar leaders.

B. Continue the recent pattern of having the Council comment on behalf of legal education on major issues related to the legal profession (such as MDP, MJP and the Ethics 2000 report).

C. Work closely with bar admission authorities to help ensure that the bar admission process is as effective as possible in assuring the competence and good character of those admitted to practice, and to ensure that law schools have the information that they need in order to assist their students and graduates effectively in preparing for bar examinations.

D. Continue and expand the efforts to assist law schools in the United States react to the increasing globalization of the practice of law and the increasing internationalization of the legal education experience.

E. Continue and expand the efforts to assist law schools and the legal profession in other countries develop their programs of legal education.

F. Expand efforts for direct communication with and outreach to law school faculty, including adjunct faculty.

G. Continue and enhance collaborative efforts with other organizations interested in legal education (including the Association of American Law Schools, the Law School Admission Council and the National Association for Law Placement) to achieve common goals.

III. Service Functions

A. Undertake periodic reviews of the Annual Questionnaire, the Site Evaluation Questionnaire, and other questionnaires in order to ensure that all of the information necessary for accreditation and consumer information functions is being collected and disseminated, and to ensure that unnecessary information is not being requested of schools. Consider how to enable schools to search some or all of the questionnaire data electronically, and how the Consultant’s Office can provide useful statistical and other analyses of the data for the benefit of schools, the Council and Section committees.

B. Consider whether it may be possible to provide non-approved schools with more extensive data on approved schools than is presently available in the 509 publication, and develop additional materials to inform and assist schools that are interested in seeking ABA approval.

C. Continue to expand the information available to prospective law students and others interested in legal education through the joint 509 publication with LSAC and through electronic publication of some of the data contained in that publication.

D. Consider whether and to what extent the Consultant’s Office can fulfill a clearinghouse function, at least by identifying individuals at different schools who have expertise in specific areas and are willing to share that expertise with other law schools.

E. Continue the conferences and workshops that have proven successful on an annual or bi-annual basis (e.g., Deans, New Deans and Associate Deans workshops; Development Conference), consider what other regularly sponsored conferences or workshops should be continued and with what frequency (e.g, Bricks & Bytes; Technology), and determine if there are additional conferences or workshops that would be useful to offer.

F. Identify specific major issues on which the Section should make a major government relations effort on behalf of law schools, and seek to work collaboratively on these issues with other legal education and higher education organizations. [e.g., loan forgiveness for law graduates going into relatively low-salaried public service or public interest employment.]

G. Continue to enhance the Section’s print and electronic publications (including the website) in order to make them more effective vehicles for disseminating information and facilitating dialogue concerning activities of the Section and developments related to areas of potential interest to Section members.

IV. Administration and Support Functions

A. Review the Council’s committee structure, determine whether some committees should be eliminated or combined, identify whether any new committees should be created, develop more specific expectations for the committees that continue, and develop better ways to support the committees that continue.

B. Review the present staff structure of the Consultant’s Office to ensure that the Office is staffed in a manner to enable it to fulfill its functions effectively and in a timely manner.

C. Review the financial resources of the Section and identify how to obtain over the next five years the resources necessary to support the activities that have been identified as priorities.

D. Continue to streamline Council agendas so that there is more time for Council to discuss topics of broad and long-term significance.