Bridging Law and Society: Empowering Students Through Sociolegal Writing Courses and ABA Standard 303(c)

  1. Introduction

The American Bar Association (ABA) adopted Standard 303(c) in February 2022, mandating that law schools provide education on bias, cross-cultural competency, and racism at the start of the legal-education program and at least once more before graduation.[1] Standard 303(c) presents a prime opportunity for law schools to rethink and innovate their curricula by incorporating upper-level writing electives that

“I Was But The Learner, Now I Am The Master”: Using the Protégé Effect to Accelerate Learning Outcomes

My jaw dropped.  She nailed it.  She explained to our class not just where—but how—this 1L’s memo could be more synthesized, more precise, and more logical.  I could not have done it better. 

But remarkably, she was herself only a 1L.  In fact, she was the 1L who authored the memorandum only a week earlier.  And even more remarkably, several of her colleagues did the same thing with their own work in that same session, only a few weeks into the semester.