The American Association of Law School’s, AALS, isn’t an organization that lawyers think much about. We take for granted that law schools are going to do their job, more or less, in turning out students who will someday join the guild and demonstrate at least minimal competence, if not excessive self-esteem in their early years until they finally figure out how little they know, how poorly they perform and how hard the job is. But I digress.
The mission of AALS is lofty and important, not to mention vague and facile.
The Association of American Law Schools’ mission is to uphold and advance excellence in legal education. In support of this mission, AALS promotes the core values of excellence in teaching and scholarship, academic freedom, and diversity, including diversity of backgrounds and viewpoints, while seeking to improve the legal profession, to foster justice, and to serve our many communities–local, national, and international.
It’s kind of them to add in “diversity of backgrounds and viewpoints,” as if they don’t have enough former Yale and Harvard students, with the occasional Stanford grad thrown in to prove the depth of their diversity.
A friend sent me a solicitation from the AALS to its members to further their putative goal.
This spring and summer, the AALS Section on Balance and Well-Being in Legal Education General Programming Committee will host a Speed Sharing Presentation Series on “Incorporating New ABA Standards for Legal Education: Professional Identity, Cross-Cultural Competency, and Well-Being Resources for Students.” We are seeking presenters who are willing to speak *for five minutes or less* on how you have successfully incorporated substantial opportunities for professional identity formation, education to law students on bias, cross-cultural competency, and racism, and information on law student well-being resources. We firmly believe your successes can help guide those of us who are eager to avail ourselves of the opportunities presented by new Standards for Legal Education 303(b), 303(c), and 508(b), respectively. If you are interested in presenting in the Speed Sharing Series, please complete this form by March 21.
Much as this seems right up my alley, it’s unlikely that I’m the sort of fella they want presenting, even though I’m more than willing to speak for five minutes or less and have much to offer on the topic, particularly if they are sincere in their concern to “uphold and advance excellence in legal education.” What I have to say may not seem to directly respond to the call, but it does if you share my appreciation of what law school is supposed to accomplish. The nice folks at AALS will likely not appreciate it, so I figured it might be better to offer it here.
Nobody cares. Nobody, but nobody cares. When a lawyer steps into the well and stands beside a defendant, neither the prosecutor, judge nor defendant cares what color your skin is, what genitalia hide beneath your clothing, or with whom you prefer to share your bed. They don’t care what your pronouns are, or whether you like puppies or kittens.
They don’t care if you feel sad. They don’t care if you’re empathetic. They don’t care if you cry yourself to sleep at night.
They don’t care if the other kids called you bad names on the playground. They don’t care if your mother was a prostitute and your father was a junkie. They don’t care if you’re the first in your family to go to college or law school. They don’t care if you carry a huge student loan debt.
It’s not about you. It’s about the client.
Win the case, whether the clients is black, white or green. Win the case whether you’re happy or sad. Win the case whether you’re privileged or marginalized. Or if you don’t win, know that you’ve done everything possible within the bounds of the law to give the defendant the most zealous representation possible.
If you realize this and can teach this to students, then you have educated law students on “bias, cross-cultural competency, and racism.”
I might have to talk fast to squeeze all this in, but I’m up to the task.
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