ABA Finally Puts Law School On Probation For Horrendous Bar Passage Rates

What does this mean for the future of the law school?

oops keyArizona Summit Law School’s numerous weaknesses and failures have been documented in these pages for years. From its dubious admissions practices to its repeated bar-exam embarrassments to its depressing employment statistics, this for-profit InfiLaw institution has been maligned in the press for good reason. One would think there wasn’t enough lipstick in the world to be put on this pig to make it look enticing, but the school recently entered into a questionable affiliation with Bethune-Cookman University, a historically black college.

People have wondered for quite some time when the American Bar Association would step in and take action to discipline this school for the good of its students and those who would dare to attend in the future. At long last, after years of poor results for Arizona Summit graduates, the ABA finally decided to do something about it.

Yesterday afternoon, after finding the school to be out of compliance with numerous standards required for it to maintain its accreditation, the ABA put Arizona Summit Law School on probation. Here’s a relevant excerpt from the ABA’s public memorandum to the school (available in full on the next page):

The council determined that the law school’s admissions practices, academic program (including its academic standards and academic support) and outcomes (graduation and bar passage) have resulted in the law school now being in a position where only immediate and substantial action can bring about sufficient change to put the law school on a realistic path back to being in compliance within the time allowed by the Standards and Rules of Procedure.

The memorandum, sent from Barry Currier, the ABA’s managing director of accreditation and legal education, goes on to note that due to the “critical nature and urgency of this matter,” the law school must attend additional hearings before the Accreditation Committee in September and the Council of the Section of Legal Education and Admissions to the Bar in November to review its progress with the remedial action recommended by the Council, and to consider whether additional remedial actions must be taken or additional sanctions must be levied, up to and including stripping Arizona Summit of its accreditation.

Upon notice that the disciplinary memorandum had been made public, we immediately received this statement from Don Lively, the president of Arizona Summit Law School:

I want to give you a heads up that the ABA Council for the Section of Legal Education has placed our school on probation. Having just received this notice, we are not in a position to say much other that we have been and will be taking the steps needed to demonstrate full compliance. At some point, I am hoping you will spend some time with us and take a closer look at our school. We have rather unique origins, having been borne out of frustration with traditional legal education (namely its disconnect from the profession and lack of progress in diversifying the nation’s least diverse white collar profession) and resorting to private capital because of the inability to identify a traditional university interested in the mission. Those of us who conceptualized the institution are working to accomplish what we set out to achieve.

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At the same time, this school-wide email was disseminated about the ABA’s decision:

The American Bar Association Section of Legal Education has notified us that Arizona Summit Law School is being placed on probation. Over the course of this week, in town hall meetings and other ways, we will be providing additional information about what probation entails and the needed steps and processes for demonstrating full compliance.

The only thing that’s certain is that two out of three of the InfiLaw schools — Charlotte and Arizona Summit — now find themselves in perilous positions. What about Florida Coastal School of Law? Dean Scott DeVito rushed to assure students that, despite rumors being floated in the halls that the school may also be placed on on probation, any such rumors weren’t true. Dean DeVito also sent this statement to us:

Florida Coastal has not received any information from the ABA that would indicate that the ABA is considering placing Florida Coastal on probation. Nor has the ABA provided Florida Coastal with any indication that it is thinking of beginning proceedings whose outcome could be probation.

What will happen to Arizona Summit Law School? How will this affect its affiliation agreement with Bethune-Cookman? Will the Department of Education decide to strip the school of its access to federal student financial aid funds, like it did to Charlotte School of Law? The Education Department can act swiftly: if you recall, it took only about one month for it to boot Charlotte from the federal student loan program (but who knows what will happen now that there’s been a regime change there).

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Stay tuned for further updates as this situation unfolds. For the sake of the students who are currently attending the school, we hope that Arizona Summit works hard to right its wrongs, before it winds up in a difficult situation similar to that of Charlotte Law.

(Flip to the next page to see the American Bar Association’s memorandum placing Arizona Summit Law School on probation.)

ABA puts Arizona Summit School of Law on probation [ABA Journal]
Arizona Summit Law School in Phoenix put on probation for low bar-passage rates [Arizona Republic]

Earlier: Arizona Summit: Now Counting On Black People Not Knowing How To Use Google
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Staci ZaretskyStaci Zaretsky is an editor at Above the Law. She’d love to hear from you, so feel free to email her with any tips, questions, or comments. You can follow her on Twitter or connect with her on LinkedIn.