SEALS Tidbits - 2019

I am just back from the 2019 Southeastern Association of Law Schools (SEALS) conference.  I participated in several different kinds of activities this year.  This post reports out on each.

I first served as a participant in a series of discussion groups tailored to provide information to aspiring law professors.  The attendees included newly minted fellows and VAPs, mid-to-later-career lawyers/judges looking to switch to full-time law faculty (some already adjuncts or visitors), and (in general) law practitioners testing the waters for possible engagement with the Association of American Law Schools faculty recruitment process.  SEALS has served selected prospective law professors with a specialized track of preparative programming for a number of years.  This set of discussion groups represents an extension of that type of programming, on a more general informational level, to a wider audience of folks interested in careers in law teaching.

I also presented in a discussion group, sponsors by West Academic, on "Teaching to Engage."  Steve Friesland of Elon Law moderated the session.  I shared some of my "first class" and assessment simulations for business law doctrinal and experiential courses.  I learned from many others who shared their own ways of engaging students.  It was a rich discussion.

The anual SEALS "Supreme Court and Legislative Update: Business and Regulatory Issues" featured a presentation from me on a few cases and things to watch for from a legislative viewpoint.  I was joined on the panel by several super-fun business and administrative law colleagues.  One of them, Lou Virelli, posted a summary of the session on the SEALS Blog.  You can find it here.

Michigan State law prof Carla Reyes's "New Scholar" presentation of her draft paper currently entitled "Autonomous Business Reality," was fascinating.  I was proud to serve as her assigned mentor for this session.  I hope I lived up to that role, considering she is a leader in law-and-technology research and I already cite to her work on blockchain technology!  Humbling to be a mentor under those circumstances, for sure.

As part of the Free Speech Workshop, I related the history and current status of student free speech issues involving registered student organizations at The University of Tennessee, Knoxville, based on my experience as a faculty advisor to a controversial student organization on our campus.  That presentation was part of a larger discussion group on campus free speech issues.  My UT Law colleague David Wolitz was a co-discussant. Howard Wasserman of FIU Law summarized the session here.

Last--but certainly not least--I co-moderated/moderated two substantive law SEALS discussion groups.  

First, John Anderson of Mississippi College Law (with only a bit of help from me) organized and moderated a session entitled "Insider Trading Stories," in which participants focused on the narratives underlying insider trading cases--known and unknown.  This proved to be an incredibly robust and diverse discussion, highlighting issues in insider trading theory, policy, and doctrine.  Longer versions of some of the discussion group offerings will be presented at a symposium at UT Law in the fall, sponsored by the Tennessee Journal of Law and Policy (TJLP).  The TJLP will publish the edited papers in a forthcoming volume.  I was pleased to see BLPB co-blogger Marcia Narine Weldon in the room!

Second, I moderated a discussion group entitled "Benefit Corporation (or Not)? Establishing and Maintaining Social Impact Business Firms."  The program description of the session follows:

As the benefit corporation form nears the end of its first decade of "life" as a legally recognized form of business association, it seems important to reflect on whether it has fulfilled its promise as a matter of legislative intent and public responsibility and service. This discussion group is designed to take on the challenge of engaging in that reflective process. The participating scholars include doctrinal and clinical faculty members who both favor and tend to recommend the benefit corporation form for social enterprises and those who disfavor or hesitate to recommend it.

The final group pf participants included researchers/writers from the United Kingdom and Canada as well as the United States.  BLPB co-blogger (and newly minted dean) Josh Fershee was among the group, and BLPB co-blogger Marcia Narine Weldon was again in attendance. The discussion was spirited and there were more than a few "aha" moments for me.

All-in-all, a busy--but enlightening--week's work.

It soon will be time to propose programs for the 2020 SEALS annual meeting, to be held in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. The date of the conference is likely to be moved up to start on July 30 to accommodate the very early (and getting earlier) starts for schools in the Southeastern United States (and probably elsewhere, too). If you have business law program ideas or would like to moderate or participate in a business law program, please contact me by email. I find that this conference (especially the discussion groups) helps to energize my teaching and scholarship in meaningful ways. Perhaps you also would find this a great place to jumpstart the academic year.