I am forwarding this request from Helen Bird, a law lecturer in Australia,
orginally posted to a list for law school professors. They were giving her
all kinds of misinformation about our discipline (see Professor Boskey's
response to her below) so if any of you are inclined, please come to her
rescue! I sent a message to her, and to the lawprof list, giving a general
description of a Legal Environment Course, and telling her that I was
forwarding her request to "those in the know"! If you are interested, my
response to the misinformation is appended below.
Keith Maxwell
University of Puget Sound
>From: Helen Bird <[log in to unmask]>
>To: Multiple recipients of list <[log in to unmask]>
>Subject: Business Law Teaching
>X-Listprocessor-Version: 6.0c -- ListProcessor by Anastasios Kotsikonas
>X-Comment: List for Law Professors & Lecturers
>
> Subject: Time: 10:59 AM
> OFFICE MEMO Business Law Teaching Date: 4/11/94
>Hi, I am new at this so please forgive my poor netiquette.
>
>I am interested in discussing what should be the pedagogical goals for an
>introductory law course for undergraduate business, commmerce, management or
>economics students. I would be grateful if anyone could refer me to any
>literature on the topic.
>
>Thanks in advance,
>Helen Bird
>
>Lecturer
>
>Law School
>University of Melbourne
>
>I would agree with Andrew B-R, but would add that much of the focus should be
>on learning how to read a case and a statute and developing an understanding
>of the role that cases, statutes, etc. play in the system. The students who
>come to law school after the typical undergrad business law course spend so
>much time unlearning the bad habits they have been trained in or identifying
>The!!! rule of law from a case and thinking they have the!!! answer, that law
>school is even more frustrating for them than the average student without
>this background.
>
>Jim Boskey
>Seton Hall
>[log in to unmask]
(What follows is my response to the above. I may have over-reacted, but
Prof. Boskey's comments touched a nerve!)
To Helen Bird and the lawprof list:
I am afraid this is not the list (lawprof) from which to solicit
information if you are interested in teaching this type of course. Law
school professors have considerably different goals than those of us
teaching business undergraduates. We are not teaching "let's play law
school" classes.
Frankly, most law school professors are not aware of what is currently
happening in the "Legal Studies in Business" discipline. I am not certain
of his experience with business students in general, but I must challenge
Jim Boskey's impression that the dominate goal of the "typical" legal
studies in business course is to teach students "the!!" correct rule of
law. This may be the primary goal in those *a-typical* courses specifically
designed and offered for CPA candidates only because the CPA Exam requires
knowledge of specific rules of law. The bigger problem with this type of
teaching is, in fact, when the courses are taught by adjunct professors who
are practicing lawyers! They seem to have taken their Paper Chase days very
seriously and still have at hand their torts, contracts, or bar exam review
outlines of rules, rules, rules! Somehow they went through law school
thinking "the!!" rule was the thing!
The large majority of undergraduate business students take a "legal
environment of business" course taught by career legal studies faculty.
These courses focus on the legal and regulatory process. A great deal of
attention is devoted to legal reasoning, the court system, the processes of
regulatory agencies, with a representative sampling of substantive _issues_
(not just, or even mainly, rules) of common law and statutory law. Policy
considerations are discussed, as are the ethical issues which often coexist
with the legal issues. (Interestingly, the discipline actually seems to be
evolving into Legal *and Ethical* Studies in Business.)
Helen, there is an organization of teachers of business law and legal
environment of business--The Academy of Legal Studies in Business--which
has an internet discussion list. It requires membership to participate,
however, so I have forwarded your request so that our members who have
suggestions can respond directly to you. The Academy publishes 2
journals--the one of particular interest to you is The Journal of Legal
Studies Education which has articles devoted entirely to curriculum design,
course design, and effective teaching of students, most of whom have no
desire to go to law school and often possess only an incidental interest in
law.
Prof. Keith A. Maxwell | Voice: 206 756 3703
Legal and Ethical Studies in Business | Fax: 206 756 3500
1500 N. Warner | Internet: [log in to unmask]
University of Puget Sound |---------------------------------------
Tacoma, WA 98416 | "Brevity is the soul of wit."
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