Interesting essay by Ben W. Heineman, Jr., is Distinguished Senior Fellow at Harvard Law School’s Program on the Legal Profession on the Yale Law Journal, calling for leadership training and experience for law students:
"To prepare for contemporary leadership, one set of courses would be the study of organizational theory and behavior, of moral and ethical (not just legal) reasoning in an institutional context, and leadership styles and methods. Another example would be broader interdisciplinary courses on key international issues: global security, global economic integration, and global institution-building. Such courses could be complemented by developing for-credit semesters at law schools abroad (Beijing, Heidelberg, London, Paris).
More ambitiously, we should bust the barriers between law, business, and public policy schools and offer truly integrated joint degree programs in three, not four, years. Such three year JD-MBA or JD-MPP programs would based on the premise, well understood but not publicly acknowledged, that the second and third years of law school are progressively more repetitive and less valuable to students.
Finally, law schools should involve the profession more frequently and more intensely in their intellectual life (for example, practicing lawyers are today on the cutting edge of many global issues). Indeed, it may be time for a candid discussion of whether the faculty at law schools looks down on the profession—and on teaching broader skills for those who would become leaders—and exploration of what this implies for a professional school.
In sum, law schools should, of course, continue to teach core legal competencies, but they should more systematically teach, in tandem with others, the “complementary competencies” required for students who today will likely have diverse careers and hopefully achieve positions of leadership and responsibility. These students need “general professional education”—a “major” in law, business, or public policy, with “minors” in the other two professional disciplines (or in relevant social sciences). An emphasis on leadership ultimately requires a re-think not just of legal education but of the necessary interrelationship between law, business, and public policy schools."
Me: Amen.
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