Last week I announced law school statistical profiles available for paid subscribers. I opened with Harvard.
I’ve submitted a comment to the ABA Council in support of its proposed repeal of Standard 303(c). It largely tracks my earlier coverage here. You can read comments in support and in opposition here.
Karen Sloan at Reuters, “Debate over ABA law school accreditation intensifies as states push changes.”
With three states sidelining the American Bar Association in lawyer licensing over the past year and more poised to follow, ABA defenders on Monday warned that ending reliance on the organization’s law school oversight will hurt students, graduates, law schools and states by forcing them to navigate a national patchwork of attorney admission rules and driving up accreditation costs.
ABA accreditation is both efficient and fair to students, said Association of American Law Schools Executive Director Kellye Testy during a three-hour online discussion convened by the Houston Bar Association. Law schools benefit from a single set of rules and one entity monitoring compliance while students are assured a quality legal education, Testy said. Several speakers said graduates of non-ABA accredited law schools pass the bar exam at significantly lower rates.
I normally don’t share interim dean announcements as sufficiently newsworthy, but I’ll share this one from the Miami Herald: “Top Trump attorney Daniel Epstein named interim dean at FIU law school.” The University of Florida has long had an interim dean, and Florida State University has begun a dean search, so many of Florida’s best public law schools are all in leadership transition.
Fort Worth Report, “Texas A&M Law rose fast. Now its dean wants to reshape downtown Fort Worth.”
Eight years later, a new A&M building is rising in downtown Fort Worth — and it will serve more than law students. The Law and Education Building is set to welcome classes this fall, anchoring the first phase of a larger downtown vision that city leaders and university officials say could reshape the southeast edge of downtown.
For Ahdieh, chief operating officer of Texas A&M-Fort Worth, the building is both a milestone and a test. It reflects A&M Law’s rise from regional program to national competitor — and an attempt to extend his success formula beyond the law school.
“It’s not a modest vision, but it’s not a pie-in-the-sky vision either,” Ahdieh said. “We have all the ingredients. It’s just a question of whether we can either choose to capitalize on them or not.”
Louisiana Illuminator, “North Louisiana law school proposal puts university leader at odds with Landry, lawmakers.”
State Sen. Alan Seabaugh takes credit for ousting Northwestern State University’s president in 2024 and, with the backing of Gov. Jeff Landry, replacing him with former Louisiana Supreme Court Justice Jimmy Genovese.
Two years later, Genovese says he isn’t able to count on either of his two supporters to advance his plans for the school, which include starting the first law school in North Louisiana.