Poverty Law Prof Blog

Advice on Entering the Law Teaching Market/AALS

A number of friends have recently emailed seeking advice on entering the law teaching market, inspired by the upcoming deadline to make the first AALS deadline (this FAR deadline is important), and with that in mind I have complied here a number of resources available online and added a few observations.

A great listing of Fellowships for Aspiring Law Professors from Paul Caron, TaxProf Blog.  Some schools have someone in their career service office that can help with the law teaching market.  Note: at the bottom of the list, Prof. Caron has also made a list of other resources/articles that discuss becoming a law professor; Caron's list is below:

• Jack Chin (Arizona) & Denise Morgan (New York Law School), Breaking Into the Academy: The 2002-2004 Michigan Journal of Race & Law Guide for Aspiring Law Professors, 7 Mich. J. Race & L. 457 (2002)
• James D. Gordon III (BYU), An Insider's Guide to the Faculty Recruitment Conference, 43 J. Legal Educ. 301 (1999)
• Eric Goldman (Santa Clara), Careers in Law Teaching
• Law Crossing, Becoming a Law Professor: Part 1 and Part 2
• Brian Leiter (Texas), Information and Advice for Persons Interested in Teaching Law
• Rick Swedloff (Temple VAP), The Fellowship of the (Hi)Ring
• Brad Wendel (Cornell), The Big Rock Candy Mountain: How to Get a Job in Law Teaching
• David Zaring (Washington & Lee), Whether a Fellow or a Visitor Be
• Don Zillman (Maine), Marina Angel (Temple), Jan Laitos (Denver), George Pring (Denver) & Joseph Tomain (Cincinnati), Uncloaking Law School Hiring: A Recruit's Guide to the AALS Faculty Recruitment Conference, 39 J. Legal Educ. 345 (1988)

My own experience was that while a fellowship at Harvard, Chicago, or Georgetown (they have a great 18 month one that based on its description gives you a great deal of freedom) may be great, I really appreciated being a fellow at a less prestigious institution, Loyola University New Orleans, both because of the mentoring that can take place as part of these fellowships and for the chance to write they can offer.  As I now am a "regular" faculty member, looking back I am even more appreciative of the time these fellowships open up for doing research, time that seems more precious now with committee, class, and student demands higher than they are during a fellowship.  The key to a fellowship is to use that time to write enough that law schools pay attention to your CV and FAR form. 

One "resource" not included in the above list is an article that is illuminating, hilarious, and well worth reading: Robert A. Williams, Vampires Anonymous and Critical Race Practice, 95 Mich. L. Rev. 741 (1997). 

Other things perhaps of interest to those thinking about a legal academic job:

• Daniel J. Solove, Law Professor Hiring: Statistics on JD Placement on Concurring Opinions
• Lawrence B. Solum, Entry Level Hiring Report on Legal Theory Blog
• Dan Merkel, Hiring Chairs 2008-2009: Announce Yourself at PrawfsBlawg (check the comments for self-identified chairs)

Note: I have no clue about the effectiveness of reaching out yourself to hiring chairs or really when to send a letter if you do decide to contact those hiring in your field (I haven't seen a listing specifically looking for "poverty law") that you find out about through either the FAR Bulletin or the Announce Yourself listing above.  Another purely personal observation is that it does seem to matter if your mentors reach out to schools on your behalf and with that in mind, the summer before you enter the market it is worth emailing your mentors, updating them with what you have been doing and expressing your hope that they will help you as you enter the market. 

-E.R. erosser@wcl.american.edu

Poverty Law Syllabi

I am moving this to the front because people are again starting to think about this.  If you would like to share your syllabus, email me either the syllabus or a link and I'll post it.

RECENTLY ADDED SYLLABI (July 2008 - )

• Joan Flocks (Florida-Levin), Download syllabus_flocks.pdf
• Jon C. Dubin (Rutgers-Newark), Download poverty_lawsyllabusspring_2008a.pdf
• Jeff Selbin (Berkeley), Download law_poverty_course_syllabus.pdf
• Ezra Rosser (American Univ.), Download law_and_poverty_syllabus_fall_2007_rosser_w_no_cell_number.pdf
• Joel Handler (UCLA), Download law_215_cl_sch_08.pdf

Barbara Glesner Fines (University of Missouri Kansas City) emailed with a number of course syllabi that she found online that may be of interest to others (some are more dated than others):

• UPDATE: My own syllabus for this year can be found here. 
• Poverty Law Course Materials - University of St. Thomas and University of Minnesota Schools of Law; taught by Lawrence McDonough and Monica Bogucki, both of the Legal Aid Society of Minneapolis.
  
  • NOTE: this is a VERY good, up-to-date, website and the course materials (which incorporate a "book club") seem very interesting.    
• UCLA Poverty Law and Social Welfare 2001, Syllabus Here.
• UCLA Law and the Poor, Spring 2003, Syllabus Here. 
• University of Washington, Spring 2006, Syllabus Here; taught by Sara Ainsworth. 
• Northeastern, Summer 2003, Syllabus Here; taught by Wally Holohan and Jim Rowan . 

Thank you to Barbara Glesner Fines!  (I am also willing to send my syllabus to those who email, but it is still a work in progress as I look to good ideas in the newer course syllabi above). 
-E.R. erosser@wcl.american.edu

Another Harvard Law Review Note of Interest: on the Myth of Meritocracy

The Harvard Law Review editorial board is showing that it is a glutton for punishment from the right, which is perhaps still salivating over the earlier Harvard Note, Never Again Should a People Starve in a World of Plenty.  Some of the critical responses to Never Again can be found here, here, here, and here.  (As an aside, I have written a more sympathetic response to Never Again for the Harvard Law Review Forum, but am still keeping my fingers crossed that the editors will choose to publish responses to a piece that generated such controversy.)  Harvard Law Review just published a new Note bound to have its share of critics:

• Note, "Trading Action for Access": The Myth of Meritocracy and the Failure to Remedy Structural Discrimination, 121 Harv. L. Rev. 2156 (2008). 

Personally, I liked Trading Action for Access.  Recently, I have been fairly concerned about structural cooptation in my own life and in the legal profession/academy and I like that this Note takes that on.  Just like Never Again that focused on the choice of students to enter corporate law, this Note could be critiqued for focusing upon the narrow example of law firms to illustrate the myth of meritocracy, but given that this is being published in a law review, that should be forgiven!  The Note reminded me of Inequality by Design (Claude S. Fischer et al, 1996) that also takes on the Horatio Alger and "meritocracy." 

Although they take on somewhat divergent issues, an earlier Harvard Law Review Note, A Look Inward: Blurring the Moral Line Between the Wealthy Professional and the Typical Criminal, 119 Harv. L. Rev. 2165 (2006) and my own article also came to mind when thinking about these two recent Notes.

END NOTE: I will be traveling a good amount this coming month (next week Alaska, later Colorado and El Salvador), so posts will be infrequent.  As I have stated before, I WELCOME any contributors, whether you have a single post you want to share or want to participate more actively.  =)
-E.R. erosser@wcl.american.edu   

House Committee on Ways and Means to hold Hearing on Establishing a Modern Poverty Measure

The Ways and Means Committee of the U.S. House of Representatives is holding a hearing this Thursday, July 17th, on "Establishing a Modern Poverty Measure." Submissions for the record can be uploaded here.  This hearing is similar to one that took place almost a year ago, the testimony and written submissions of which are available here. 

Today, New York City announced, see N.Y. Times story here, it was abandoning the federal poverty line in favor of the model originally proposed by the National Academy of Sciences, a change that would define a greater number of people in New York City as poor.  The NAS report is available as a book but is also available from the Census Bureau website, here: Measuring Poverty: A New Approach.  Gordon Fisher's Development and History of the Poverty Thresholds is available here.

-Thanks to the Kojo Nnamdi show for their coverage of this.  E.R. erosser@wcl.american.edu