Law Schools

Asked And Answered: What Law School Classes Do You Wish You'd Taken?

Are there any other classes you'd add or suggestions that you have regarding ways to improve the typical law school curriculum?

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Earlier in the summer, I wrote a three-part blog post series on whether attending law school makes sense in 2018. My posts also included advice for incoming law students and were based in large part on input from my fellow attorneys.

Because my earlier blog post series was so well-received and seemed to strike a chord with my readers and social media connections, I decided to follow up with a similar two-part blog post series, this time focused on law school classes.

For Part I of this series, I asked my online connections the following question: Which law school classes did you find to be the most useful in terms of preparing you for the practice of law? The answers ran the gamut, but a few key themes emerged. First, many found hands-on classes, such as litigation clinics, to be particularly useful. Second, certain substantive classes sometimes proved useful depending on the practice area(s) that lawyers ended up handling. And finally, some shared that the professor often made the class, even when the substantive legal topics covered weren’t particularly interesting or, ultimately, useful.

For this post, the second in this series, I asked my online community the following question: What law school classes do you wish you’d taken or do you wish had been offered to prepare you for practicing law? I received more than 60 replies, with opinions on this issue varying significantly.

Many shared that they wish they’d been able to gain more practical experience while in law school, whether in the form of law school clinics or internships — such as Sarah Gold, a New York attorney (Facebook):

I wish I had taken more practical courses like trial advocacy or other hands-on classes, but I was always locked out due to the class size.

Others echoed this sentiment, explaining that opportunities to learn practical skills like how to draft legal documents would have been particularly useful (Twitter):

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@Lawnewsie71 (Twitter) Real world practice beyond legal writing/research, such as how to actually draft a contract or will (playbook for each), real estate closing, etc. Law has changed, the curriculum should too.

A number of attorneys lamented the lack of instruction available to them on client service and how to understand and respond to the needs of legal clients. For example, Shane Parris, a Barbados attorney, suggested that lawyers need to learn “soft skills” (LinkedIn):

I wish that there had been a class on how to interact with clients the correct way. Learning how to treat with clients on a human level and not just telling them the law or how much it is going to cost is something that we’re expected to know intuitively or pick up on in practice. While soft skills may come easy to some attorneys, it’s clear that they don’t come easy to all.

Similarly, Michael Polk, a lawyer based in South Carolina, also emphasized the importance of attorneys understanding how both lawyers and clients are psychologically affected by legal practice (LinkedIn):

I think a course on the brain and the law would have been helpful, to teach a little bit about how people think, emotional intelligence, stress and ways of coping with it, both from the lawyer side and the client side.

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Another theme that emerged repeatedly was the need for law students to learn about the business side of running a law firm. Matthew Johnston, a D.C. attorney, summed up this concept succinctly:

Practicing law is a business and no matter what we think of the profession as a learned profession, lawyers as a class are horrible business owners because we never learned about the fundamentals of business.

According to Alan Klevan, a Boston-based lawyer and legal technology consultant, law practice management classes would have been useful when he was in law school. Because these skills are an important part of running a successful law practice, he suggested that the following courses should be offered:

Law practice management classes such as: 1) Finance, 2) Technology, 3) Marketing, and 4) Practical practice skills.

Finally, some lawyers suggested that the third year of law school should be replaced with a year-long internship, much like a medical residency.  Monroe County Court Judge Christopher Ciaccio summed up that idea as follows (Facebook):

Fewer classes should be offered, not more. I think law school should be a two-year degree, with third year internships. Students don’t need to be paying $60K/year for trial advocacy or mock trial, let alone taking the fluff courses typically offered third year. And, the courses that are offered should include as a component the writing of briefs, or essays, rather than the entire semester coming down to how many issues can be spotted in a one-page fact pattern.

Rochester lawyer Don Thompson agreed, opining that classes offered during the third year of law school typically offer little value:

Fewer classes would be better. The third year should be a co-op or internship – more like the medical profession.

Do you agree? Are there any other classes you’d add or suggestions that you have regarding ways to improve the typical law school curriculum? Feel free to weigh in and share your perspective here on LinkedIn.

Niki BlackNicole Black is a Rochester, New York attorney and the Legal Technology Evangelist at MyCase, web-based law practice management software. She’s been blogging since 2005, has written a weekly column for the Daily Record since 2007, is the author of Cloud Computing for Lawyers, co-authors Social Media for Lawyers: the Next Frontier, and co-authors Criminal Law in New York. She’s easily distracted by the potential of bright and shiny tech gadgets, along with good food and wine. You can follow her on Twitter @nikiblack and she can be reached at niki.black@mycase.com.

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