Students Debate Tuition, Technology at Law Schools

Resolutions brought before the Law Student Division Assembly during the ABA’s annual meeting in Atlanta in August reflected both traditional law student anxiety about skyrocketing tuition bills and new cutting-edge concerns about whether to use computers in administering the bar exam.

"According to the U.S. Department of Education, the average law school tuition jumped 72.5 percent between 1990 [and] 1997," reported Melanie Ann Kielb, a student at the University of Richmond T.C. Williams School of Law. With the endorsement of both the 4th and 6th Circuits, Kielb asked the assembly to adopt a measure that would urge law schools to provide students with cost and price information and publicize specific reasons for tuition increases.

The measure received strong support on the assembly floor. "Today, the average law student’s [debt] is $52,600 at graduation," Kielb wrote in her report. "Law students [need] more information to question unjust increases . . . and accurate, timely, and understandable information on costs, prices, and the different subsidies that benefit all students."

A second resolution called for the Law Student Division to explore the possibility of computer-administered state bar exams.

"Computerized bar exams are, without question, the future of exam taking. It really is just a matter of time," said resolution sponsor Michael Rothschild of Nova Southeastern University, Shepard Broad Law Center in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. "The ABA and many law schools, on their own initiative, have already made a pledge to encouraging the use of computers in schools and in the profession."

The measure encountered stiff resistance on the assembly floor and was defeated by a fair margin. Opponents emphasized concerns that different law schools vary in their use of computer technology during the three years students take class exams. They pointed out that while computer-driven exams might seem fair for students at schools that emphasize computer use, other schools continue to rely on more traditional methods of instruction and examination, and it wouldn’t be fair to administer two types of bar exams.

"I can’t say that I am happy about the outcome," said 5th Circuit governor John Michael Daley, a third-year student at the University of Miami School of Law and co-sponsor of the resolution. "We need to embrace technology or be replaced by those who will. Computers are not going away." •

 

Brandon Bigelow

Brandon Bigelow, a second-year student at Boston College Law School, is Student Lawyer’s student editor.