Category: Clinical Legal Education
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Sarah Buhler, Sarah Marsden & Gemma Smyth, Clinical Law: Practice, Theory, and Social Justice Advocacy
This book addresses the many different features of practice in clinical contexts and helps students reflect critically on their experiences. Students learn from many sources including clients, supervisors, communities, and classrooms in clinical programs. Supervisors are employed by legal clinics, usually lawyers, under whose license student’s practice. Supervisors can provide students with connections between theory,…
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Robert L Jones Jr, Gerard F Glynn & John J Francis, “When Things Go Wrong in the Clinic: How to Prevent and Respond to Serious Student Misconduct”
This article provides clinical professors with information and an analytical framework to deal thoughtfully with situations of student misconduct in clinical settings. A survey of clinical professors found that most incidents of student misconduct fell into one of three categories: egregious neglect of case responsibilities, dishonest or deliberate misuse of a student practice license (including…
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Nancy M Maurer & Robert F Seibel, “Addressing Problems of Power and Supervision in Field Placements”
This article examines the power dynamics that exist in the supervision of law students in legal clinics. The authors explore the potential consequences of failing to address the issues arising from those dynamics, including ethical ramifications, termination of the program, or possible worksite sexual harassment. This paper suggests that supervision is the primary vehicle for…
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Margaret Moore Jackson & Daniel M Schaffzin, “Preaching to the Trier: Why Judicial Understanding of Law School Clinics is Essential to Continued Progress in Legal Education”
This article examines the judicial misconceptions held with respect to student legal clinics and student attorneys. It explores how clinicians should inform judicial decision-makers about clinical legal education methods and objectives. Law clinics should be proactive in educating the judiciary about the historical evolution, goals, and distinctive attributes of clinical pedagogy. A failure to do…
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Margaret Castles, “Marriage of Convenience or a Match Made in Heaven? A Collaboration between a Law School Clinic and a Commercial Law Firm”
This article explores the “reverse externship[s]” where private solicitors attend clinics to assist with the supervision of students within the Australian law school context. Standard legal clinics require supervision, which often manifests in a ratio of 8:1, making supervision more costly than lecturers. The costs associated with legal clinics is a major issue within legal…
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Adrian Evans et al, Australian Clinical Legal Education
Of particular interest in this book is the chapter “The Importance of Effective Supervision”. This chapter considers the changing dynamics of supervision in law firms and the key supervision issues facing clinical programs. It focuses on important supervision dimensions, which include: enhancing quality, accuracy, and timeliness of tasks; mentoring junior staff; fostering awareness of ethical…
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YA Vawda, “Learning from experience: the art and science of clinical law”
This article examines the legal clinic system in South Africa. This article sets out a model for clinical supervision which attempts to combine close supervision with a highly interactive and participatory approach. This model requires that students are present at the clinic for an entire day during intake of clients. A typical intake day would…
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Susan L Brooks, “Using Therapeutic Jurisprudence to Build Effective Relationships with Students, Clients and Communities”
This article suggests that clinicians should adopt a therapeutic jurisprudence approach. There are several key principles integral to therapeutic jurisprudence that clinicians in legal clinics should utilize. These principles include: modelling (i.e., how communication impacts students and how supervisors’ interactions may lead students to mirror what they observed); boundaries and limit-setting; transference and counter-transference, the…
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Susan Bryant, Elliott Milstein & Ann Shalleck, Transforming the Education of Lawyers: The Theory and Practice of Clinical Pedagogy
This book examines how students are taught during their clinic experiences. In chapter 9, the authors set out a three-part supervision theory. The three-part supervision theory contains connected developmental processes that: teach students to be lawyers in their representation of clients; provide a structured method for viewing developments in client representation and in learning; and…