California Refuses To Retroactively Lower Bar Exam Cut Score

Following up on yesterday's post, California Bar Exam News:  The Recorder, California Justices Won't Retroactively Lower Bar Exam Passing Score:

California’s Supreme Court said Monday it will not retroactively apply the lower passing score on the bar exam despite pleas to do so from hundreds of law school deans, graduates and state lawmakers.

In a letter to the state bar, court clerk Jorge Navarrete said that the justices are “unaware of any jurisdiction in the past decade that has lowered the exam passing score and applied that decision retroactively.”

The decision is a blow to many law school alumni who had lobbied the court to apply the lower score it adopted in July—139, reduced from 144—at least as far back as the February 2020 exam. An additional 376 applicants would have passed the February test if the lower cut score had been in place at the time, according to figures provided by the state bar.

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Death Of Gersham Goldstein

Gersham Goldstein:

Gersham Goldstein, z"l, died Aug. 6, 2020, at age 81. He is survived by his wife, Pauline, and daughter, Deborah, and her husband Magid, daughter-in-law Jennifer, and his four grandchildren, Noah, Krystal, Logan and Jakob. He was preceded in death by his son Marcus in 2015.

He was a prominent Portland tax lawyer and an active member of the Jewish community. He served as president of the board of the Jewish Federation of Greater Portland from 2009 to 2011. He also served on the boards of the Robison Jewish Home, Congregation Neveh Shalom and Greater Portland Hillel. He was also active with Chabad in Portland for many years.

Gersham was born in Brooklyn, New York on Dec. 5, 1938. After matriculating at City College of New York with a Bachelor of Business Administration in 1959, he attended the University of Pennsylvania Law School, graduating with a Bachelor of Laws in 1962. Immediately following graduation, Gersham took a position as a research assistant for Gerald L. Wallace at NYU who became a significant influence in his career.

In 1963 Gersham drove to Oregon to work for Oregon Supreme Court Justice Alfred T. Goodwin. Over his early career he worked for Governor Mark Hatfield, Jacob Javits and taught at New York University and the University of Cincinnati. In the mid 1970s he and his wife, Pauline, returned to Portland where he took a position at Davies Biggs, which later became Stoel Rives, from which he retired as partner.

From Jack Bogdanski (Lewsis & Clark):

My friend and former partner, Gersham Goldstein, died of cancer on Thursday. He was 81.
Gersh was a tax lawyer, nationally known and for many years the pre-eminent tax practitioner in Oregon. Before going into law practice, he had been a law professor at the University of Cincinnati and the first law clerk of the Oregon Tax Court. He was the editor-in-chief of the journal Corporate Taxation for more than 45 years, up to the time of his death.

Gersh was a collaborator (that's the guy who does all the work) on the Seventh Edition of Bittker & Eustice's corporate tax treatise. "B&E," as it's known, is the best known book of all time on U.S. income taxation. In the 20 years since the Seventh Edition appeared, no one has been able to update the whole thing, as Gersh did. No one has been crazy enough even to try. He was also the "compiler" (again, the source of the elbow grease) for a publication known as the Index to Federal Tax Articles. Back in the day before computerized tax research, it was the bomb.

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Brookings: Taxing Wealth Transfers Through An Expanded Estate Tax

The Brookings Institution:  Taxing Wealth Transfers Through an Expanded Estate Tax, by William G. Gale, Christopher Pulliam, John Sabelhaus, and Isabel V. Sawhill:

American political leaders are currently focused on policies to address the health and economic implications of the COVID-19 pandemic. Nevertheless, it is not too soon to consider policy changes that could be beneficial to implement after the crisis has passed.

The U.S. faces two related and persistent threats to long-term, shared prosperity: growing inequality and rising federal debt. Inequality, especially wealth inequality, has risen sharply over the past 40 years. Children from different socioeconomic backgrounds do not have the same opportunities to achieve the American Dream. The Black-white gap in social mobility is especially concerning. The government’s budget outlook has long been a concern, with the federal debt projected to rise continually relative to the size of the economy, because of an aging population, rising healthcare costs, and inadequate revenues. The pandemic has made each problem more difficult to solve.

Policy makers should be looking for ways to address both issues. One place to start is by raising taxes on the most well-to-do households. During the Democratic primary, there were several proposals for a wealth tax, which would target the richest Americans and raise substantial amounts of revenue. Although a wealth tax would face difficult questions regarding its administrability and constitutionality, proposals for such taxes have re-energized the debate about taxing the wealthy. In some ways, the discussion has shifted from debating whether the rich should pay more in taxes toward determining the best way to achieve that goal.

In this policy brief, we consider the virtues of expanding the estate tax. Coupled with the gift and generation-skipping tax, the estate tax directly targets the intergenerational transfer of wealth. Whether it is ultimately borne by decedents or inheritors, the estate tax is extremely progressive. Inheritances are a major contributor to growing wealth inequality—large inheritances tend to flow to already wealthy heirs. The top ten percent of households by wealth receive 56 percent of all intergenerational transfers, while the bottom half receives only eight percent.

The estate tax is already part of the tax code. It has been administered – albeit imperfectly – for decades.

As a backstop to the income tax, the estate tax raises a significant share of its revenue from taxing the capital gains that wealthy decedents have avoided paying while alive. The estate tax also encourages charitable giving, both by providing a deduction for charitable gifts and by amplifying the effect of the income tax deduction for charitable giving. ...

The long-term threats of unsustainable federal debt, rising inequality, and the need for government investments should compel policymakers to seek new ways to raise substantial revenue from the well-to-do. An expanded estate tax would raise large amounts of revenue, be highly progressive, and directly target a major source of wealth inequality.

Oh Reviews Glogower's Taxing Inequality

Jason H. Oh (UCLA), Combining Income and Wealth into a Single Instrument, 93 N.Y.U. L. Rev. Online 174 (2018) (reviewing Ari Glogower (Ohio State), Taxing Inequality, 93 N.Y.U. L. Rev. 1421 (2018)):

Ari Glogower’s Taxing Inequality is an ambitious, thought-provoking piece. He makes three major arguments: (1) that the economic power theory justifies taxing wealth in addition to income, (2) that separate taxes on wealth and income are inferior to a combined tax that incorporates both into a single instrument, and (3) that the best way to accomplish this goal is to include in income an amount equal to an annuity-equivalent portion of the taxpayer’s wealth. Although it departs from the structure of the article, I will address (2) before considering (1) and (3) together. ...

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McCouch: Adversity, Inconsistency, And The Incomplete Nongrantor Trust

Grayson M. P. McCouch (Florida), Adversity, Inconsistency, and the Incomplete Nongrantor Trust, 39 Va. Tax Rev. 419 (2020):

Federal tax considerations have traditionally played a prominent role in the planning and drafting of family trusts. State taxes, by comparison, have received far less attention. Since 2001, however, sophisticated estate planners have developed a specialized form of trust, known as an "incomplete nongrantor" (ING) trust, which purports to avoid state fiduciary income taxes on accumulated trust income. Unlike most tax-driven trusts, the ING trust is not designed to reduce federal tax liability. Nevertheless, its efficacy depends on a threshold determination of federal tax consequences. To ensure that the ING trust is respected as a taxable entity separate from the grantor, the grantor must scrupulously eschew any interest or power that might give rise to deemed ownership under the grantor trust rules; in other words, the transfer must be complete for federal income tax purposes. This is easily accomplished if the trust is irrevocable and the grantor is willing to relinquish any prospect of beneficial enjoyment or control. The grantor, however, typically wishes to retain sufficient control over the trust to make the transfer wholly incomplete for federal gift tax purposes. In theory, a transfer may be treated as complete for income tax purposes and incomplete for gift tax purposes. With careful planning, a trust may be designed to avoid the gift tax as well as the grantor trust rules, but no judicial decision or revenue ruling to date directly confirms that an ING trust successfully achieves this feat.

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California Bar Exam News

• Above the Law, The California Cut Score (What Again?), Another Report On Diversity And Inclusion (What Again?), And More
• Above the Law, No Dummies, It’s Not ‘Racist’ To Say Lowering The California Bar Exam Cut Score Will Improve Diversity
• Bloomberg Law, Online Bar Exams Come With Face Scans, Bias Concerns
• Courthouse News Service, California High Court Debates Making Lower Bar Exam Passing Threshold Retroactive
• Daily Report, Bar Exams’ Facial Recognition Deployment Is Heightening Test Takers’ Anxiety in California and Michigan
• Jurist, California Supreme Court Considers Applying Lower Bar Passage Score Retroactively
• Law360, Calif. Bar Exam Pass Score Must Drop Retroactively

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The Professional Responsibility Case For Valid And Nondiscriminatory Bar Exams

Joan W. Howarth (UNLV), The Professional Responsibility Case for Valid and Nondiscriminatory Bar Exams, 33 Geo. J. Legal Ethics ___ (2020):

Title VII protects against workplace discrimination in part through the scrutiny of employment tests whose results differ based on race, gender, or ethnicity. Such tests are said to have a disparate impact, and their use is illegal unless their validity can be established. Validity means that the test is job-related and measures what it purports to measure. Further, under Title VII, even a valid employment test with a disparate impact could be struck down if less discriminatory alternatives exist.

Licensing tests, including bar exams, have been found to be outside these Title VII protections. But the nondiscrimination values that animate Title VII disparate impact analysis for employers apply just as fundamentally to attorney licensing through principles of professional responsibility and legal ethics.

This Article examines the civil rights cases from the 1970s that established bar examiners’ immunity from Title VII.

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Welcome, Pepperdine Caruso Law School Class Of 2023

Welcome to the members of the Pepperdine Caruso Law School Class of 2023 who begin their legal education today in a week-long introduction to law school and professional formation, as well as the over 400 students pursuing joint, LL.M., and masters degrees and certificates, including our LL.M. and certificate programs in Entertainment, Media, and Sports and our online masters in Legal Studies and Dispute Resolution and our online LL.M. in Dispute Resolution.

Our incoming J.D. class is the first to enter our re-named Rick J. Caruso School of Law and the first to begin their legal education online. We are thrilled that despite the COVID-19 pandemic, a higher than expected yield rate produced a class of over 180 1Ls (much larger than our 160 enrollment target), with higher median LSAT scores (162) and UGPAs (3.68) as well as more students of color and first-generation students than last year. 

This is my fourth year as Dean, and I am thrilled that you have decided to join our very special law school community. We cannot wait until you will be able to learn and study on our spectacularly beautiful campus in Malibu with easy access to Los Angeles, one of the world's most vibrant cities for young professionals. Beginning today you will experience the faculty and staff's faith-fueled commitment to you and to your success that manifests itself in various ways, large and small, in daily life at Pepperdine Caruso Law. My fervent wish is that you will love your time at Pepperdine Caruso Law as I have since joining the faculty in 2013, and that you will leave here with a deep sense of your professional and personal calling in law and in life.

This is an especially exciting time at Pepperdine Caruso Law. In March, we rose to #47 in the U.S. News law school rankings, the highest ranking in our school's history. We are well positioned with the resources provided by our $50 million naming gift to continue our ascent. 

Lesson From The Tax Court: The Unwritten Advantage Of Small Case Procedure

Taxpayers who petition the Tax Court to contest $50,000 or less of a proposed deficiency can elect to have their case heard under the procedures authorized by §7463 and set out in Tax Court Rules 170-174.  Cases decided under these small case procedures are called S-Cases.

The written advantages of S-Cases include a quicker trial date and a more informal trial.  In Adam Jordan Winslow v. Commissioner, T.C. Summ. Op. 2020-22 (Aug. 3, 2020) (Judge Colvin), the Court allowed the taxpayer a highly dubious alimony deduction based on an argument that would probably not have succeeded in a regular case.  To me, the case shows us an unwritten advantage of S-Cases: the Court may be willing to apply the law in a more relaxed fashion when presented with a sympathetic taxpayer.  Details below the fold.

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Law School Deans, Recent Graduates Urge Maryland To Be Fifth State To Adopt Diploma Privilege During COVID-19

Baltimore Sun, Maryland Law School Deans, Recent Graduates Urge State to Temporarily Waive Bar Exam:

Maryland law school deans and recent graduates are calling on the state’s highest court to waive the bar exam for new lawyers, citing concerns from the COVID-19 pandemic.

Applicants to the Maryland Bar, who are scheduled to sit for the Oct. 5-6 bar exam, took the unusual step of filing a petition July 31 with the Maryland Court of Appeals requesting the waiver.

Deans Donald Tobin of the University of Maryland’s Francis King Carey School of Law and Ronald Weich of the University of Baltimore School of Law also delivered a letter Wednesday in support of the petition to Court of Appeals Chief Judge Mary Ellen Barbera. ...

Prior to the pandemic, Wisconsin was the only state that allowed graduates from its two accredited law schools to secure a law license without taking the bar exam — a practice known as “diploma privilege,” Weich said.

As the COVID-19 pandemic jeopardizes states’ ability to safely proctor the two-day exam, Washington, Oregon, Utah and Louisiana have temporarily adopted “diploma privilege.”

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TaxProf Blog Weekend Roundup

Saturday:

• This Week's Ten Most Popular TaxProf Blog Posts
• Why Do Liberal Universities Eschew Progressive Budget Cuts That Would Take More From Highly Paid Administrators And Faculty?
• Concerned Girlfriend Goes Public With Boyfriend’s Plan To Quit Law School To Become Sports Podcaster
• The Tax Provisions Of The HEALS Act

Sunday:

• Software That Monitors Students During Tests Perpetuates Inequality And Violates Their Privacy
• Brunson: Mormon Profit — Brigham Young, Tithing, And The Bureau Of Internal Revenue
• ‘Racism Makes A Liar Of God’: The Catholic Church Wrestles With The Black Lives Matter Movement
• The Top Five New Tax Papers

Software That Monitors Students During Tests Perpetuates Inequality And Violates Their Privacy

MIT Technology Review:  Software That Monitors Students During Tests Perpetuates Inequality and Violates Their Privacy, by  Shea Swaugerarchive (University of Colorado Denver):

The coronavirus pandemic created a surge in demand for exam proctoring tools. Here’s why universities should stop using them.

The coronavirus pandemic has been a boon for the test proctoring industry. About half a dozen companies in the US claim their software can accurately detect and prevent cheating in online tests. Examity, HonorLock, Proctorio, ProctorU, Respondus and others have rapidly grown since colleges and universities switched to remote classes.

While there’s no official tally, it’s reasonable to say that millions of algorithmically proctored tests are happening every month around the world. Proctorio told the New York Times in May that business had increased by 900% during the first few months of the pandemic, to the point where the company proctored 2.5 million tests worldwide in April alone.

I'm a university librarian and I've seen the impacts of these systems up close. My own employer, the University of Colorado Denver, has a contract with Proctorio.

It’s become clear to me that algorithmic proctoring is a modern surveillance technology that reinforces white supremacy, sexism, ableism, and transphobia. The use of these tools is an invasion of students’ privacy and, often, a civil rights violation. ...

Technology didn’t invent the conditions for cheating and it won’t be what stops it. The best thing we in higher education can do is to start with the radical idea of trusting students. Let’s choose compassion over surveillance.

Brunson: Mormon Profit — Brigham Young, Tithing, And The Bureau Of Internal Revenue

Samuel D. Brunson (Loyola-Chicago), Mormon Profit: Brigham Young, Tithing, and the Bureau of Internal Revenue, 2019 BYU L. Rev. 41:

Since the enactment of the modern federal income tax, churches have been exempt from taxation. But that exemption is neither necessary nor inevitable. In fact, at the end of the 1860s, the Bureau of Internal Revenue decided that tithing received by the Mormon church was taxable under the Civil War income tax.

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‘Racism Makes A Liar Of God’: The Catholic Church Wrestles With The Black Lives Matter Movement

New York Times op-ed:  ‘Racism Makes a Liar of God’: How the American Catholic Church Is Wrestling With the Black Lives Matter Movement, by Elizabeth Bruenig:

In 1963, when 250,000 demonstrators gathered at the Lincoln Memorial and heard the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I have a dream” speech, they did so under the prayerful invocation of Archbishop Patrick O’Boyle of Washington. He called for the Holy Spirit to open the eyes of Christians to the injustice of racial discrimination, condemned violence and praised the activists who had possessed the courage to go forth, like Moses, in search of a beautiful country.

Five decades later, these hopes seem in many respects unfulfilled. About one in five Americans identify as Catholic, and as of 2018, roughly six in 10 white Catholics felt that police killings of Black men were isolated incidents rather than evidence of a profound and lethal bias. Prominent Catholic commentators, including Bill O’Reilly and Father Dwight Longenecker, fear and reject the Black Lives Matter movement.

American Catholic unease with Black Lives Matter has been particularly noticeable during the protests over the killing of George Floyd. Statues commemorating Junipero Serra, a Spanish monk responsible for founding several of California’s Catholic missions in the early days of European colonization, have been torn down by protesters outraged by what they say was Father Serra’s eager participation in the conquest of North America, including the torture, enslavement and murder of some of the Native Americans he intended to convert — accusations disputed by many Catholics.

Other religious statues, too, have been damaged by protesters. Coupled with the vandalism of a handful of Catholic churches along with a slew of ordinary buildings, the attacks on statuary have sparked fury among conservative Catholics, confirming what they perhaps already believed: that racial justice movements — or at least this particular one — are antithetical to the Christian faith, rooted in Marxism and atheism. ...

Andrew Sullivan, a Catholic writer, argued in July that Black Lives Matter and Christianity are “fundamentally incompatible world views.”

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The Top Five New Tax Papers

There is a bit of movement in this week's list of the Top 5 Recent Tax Paper Downloads, with a new #1 paper and a paper returning to the list at #4:

1. [434 Downloads]  Policy Options for Taxing the Rich, by Lily Batchelder (NYU) & David Kamin (NYU)
2. [327 Downloads]  Rethinking Tax for the Digital Economy After COVID-19, by Tarcisio Diniz Magalhaes (McGill) & Allison Christians (McGill) (reviewed by Young Ran (Christine) Kim (Utah) here)
3. [284 Downloads]  Deeming Fictions in the Context of Tax Treaties — Analyzing Arguments in HMRC v. Fowler, by Dhruv Sanghavi (Maastricht)
4. [197 Downloads]  What Are Minimum Taxes, and Why Might One Favor or Disfavor Them?, by Daniel Shaviro (NYU)
5. [193 Downloads]  The Effect of U.S. Tax Reform on the Tax Burdens of U.S. Domestic and Multinational Corporations, by Scott Dyreng (Duke), Fabio Gaertner (Wisconsin), Jeffrey Hoopes (North Carolina) & Mary Vernon (Wisconsin)

This Week's Ten Most Popular TaxProf Blog Posts

1. James Phillips (Chapman), Which Law Schools Will Thrive (46), Survive (65), Struggle (23), Or Perish (18) In The Age Of COVID-19?
2. Bryan Camp (Texas Tech), Lesson From The Tax Court: You Get What You Pay For
3. Newsweek, University Of North Carolina Faculty Tell Students It Is Not Safe To Return To Campus, Prepare Class Action Lawsuit To Prevent Planned August 10 Reopening
4. Bryce Clayton Newell (Oregon), 2020 Meta-Ranking of Flagship U.S. Law Reviews
5. New York Times, The U.S. Is Pursuing The Worst Possible COVID-19 Education Policy, Forcing Young Children Online While Risking On-Ground Classes For College Students
6. Nina Kohn (Syracuse), Teaching Law Online: A Guide For Faculty
7. Law360, Tenured Law Prof Suspended For Use Of N-Word In Torts Class Sues Emory And Former Dean For Libel And Retaliation
8. James Phillips (Chapman), Political Discrimination And Law Professor Hiring
9. U.S. News, 2021 Law School Peer Reputation Rankings (And Overall Rankings)
10. U.S. News, 2021 Tax Rankings

Why Do Liberal Universities Eschew Progressive Budget Cuts That Would Take More From Highly Paid Administrators And Faculty?

Chronicle of Higher Education op-ed:  The Biggest Cuts Need To Come From The Top, by Silke-Maria Weineck (Michigan):

It is true that academics vote overwhelmingly for Democrats. This has led conservative enemies of higher education to claim that universities are left-wing institutions. They are not. They are quintessentially bourgeois institutions — liberal, sure, but not on the left in any meaningful sense. Their prime function is the reproduction of civil society and the managerial class. ...

Universities are facing terrifying budget shortfalls as a result of the Covid-19pandemic, and they need to do one or a combination of three things. (1) They can spend their endowments — but most colleges either don’t have the amounts they would need, or, like my home institution, they do have the money but, for a mixture of good and bad reasons, do not want to dip into it too deeply. (2) They could take steps to increase revenue — but the very circumstances that have led to the crunch make that nearly impossible, certainly to the extent necessary. (3) They can cut expenses — meaning cut staff and salaries, which are by far the biggest budget item.

A left-wing or even a left-liberal institution would make sure those cuts come from the top and are structured like a progressive income tax, with those earning more forking over not only more of their salary but a higher percentage of their salary. Progressive taxation is the bedrock revenue principle of liberal democracies, including the United States. It’s impossible to imagine leftists, left liberals, or even centrist Democrats advocating for a flat tax.

And yet, all over the country, this is what universities are doing. If they are not firing faculty and staff members, shuttering entire departments, or cutting salaries directly, they are pausing retirement contributions. ...

This is a flat cut. The staff member who makes $30,000 a year is giving up the exact same percentage of her salary as the business-school professor raking in $300,000. 

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Concerned Girlfriend Goes Public With Boyfriend’s Plan To Quit Law School To Become Sports Podcaster

Legal Cheek, Concerned Girlfriend Goes Public With Boyfriend’s Plan to Quit Law School to Become Podcaster:

We’ve been together 2 years, ... and things were great until May when my boyfriend and his friends started a sports podcast. At first it was just a hobby, my boyfriend is a big podcast nerd so it was really nice to see him do something he liked so much. But then he started getting more and more invested, and stopped watching his remote classes/studying to dedicate his full time to his podcast.

He is seriously considering dropping out of law school because he “can’t concentrate on both studying and running a podcast” and he “would rather do what he loves." Which would be fine if what he loved wasn’t a 2 month old podcast with barely 30 listeners and the same content of at least a hundred other podcasts.

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The Tax Provisions Of The HEALS Act

David S. Miller (Proskauer) & Sean Webb (Proskauer), The Tax Provisions of the HEALS Act:

On July 27, 2020, Senate Republicans introduced a series of bills and proposals that have been collectively referred to as the “Health, Economic Assistance, Liability Protection and Schools Act” (the “HEALS Act”). The HEALS Act would enhance and expand certain provisions of the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act (the “CARES Act”) (H.R. 748), and provide additional forms of relief, including certain tax credits for employers. This paper summarizes the most important tax proposals in the HEALS Act and compares them with the Health and Economic Recovery Omnibus Emergency Solutions Act (the “HEROES Act”) that was introduced by House Democrats on May 12, 2020, and the Jumpstarting Our Business’ Success Credit Act (the “JOBS Credit Act”) that was introduced by a bipartisan group of House representatives on May 8, 2020.

Weekly SSRN Tax Article Review And Roundup: Elkins Reviews McCaffery's The Property-Tax Bundle Of Rights

This week, David Elkins (Netanya) reviews a recently posted work by Edward J. McCaffery (USC), The Property-Tax Bundle of Rights:

In a highly ambitious and extremely well-written article, Prof. McCaffery takes us on a fascinating journey through the concept of property in law and legal thought from Ancient Rome to the present day. He argues that the modern conception of property rights as embodying complete dominion over a thing, including the right to destroy it, is a nineteenth century aberration that stands in stark contradiction to the seventeenth and eighteenth century liberal tradition. He focuses particular attention on John Locke, the titular godfather of private property. Many have noted that Lockean property rights are considerably more limited than is often claimed, as Locke expressly conditioned an individual’s exclusive rights in what had originally been the common property of all humankind on one leaving for others “enough, and as good” as one takes for oneself. McCaffery takes a more unusual approach. He points out that according to Locke, once one has acquired exclusive rights in a thing, one is obligated to preserve that thing for the good of the community as a whole. Allowing one’s “own” fruit to rot is impermissible and punishable. 

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Tax Policy In The Trump Administration

• Accounting Today, Election 2020: Trump vs. Biden on Tax Policy
• Bloomberg, Business Tax Breaks Could Move Fast if Big Ticket Items Resolved
• Bloomberg, Carried Interest Rules Prompt Investment Funds to Rethink Plans
• Bloomberg, Carried Interest Tax Rules Could Bring Legal Fights for Treasury
• Bloomberg, Sanders Tweets He Wants to Tax Titans’ ‘Obscene’ Wealth Gains

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Weekly Legal Education Roundup

• Albuquerque Journal, Suspected Ransomware Attack Hits UNM Law School
• Nicholas Allard (Former Dean, Brooklyn), ABA Must Seize Opportunity To Respond To Bar Exam Chaos
• William J. Carney, Curricular Change in Legal Education (Emory)
• Paul Caron (Dean, Pepperdine), ABA Votes 64%-36% To Urge States To Ditch In-Person Bar Exams During COVID-19
• Deans Letter to Council of the ABA Section of Legal Education and Admissions to the Bar on Bias Training (July 30, 2020)

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Tenured Law Prof Suspended For Use Of N-Word In Torts Class Sues Emory And Former Dean For Libel And Retaliation

Following up on my previous posts (links below):  Law360, Emory Law Prof Calls Punishment For Using N-Word Unjust:

An Emory University School of Law professor hit his employer and former boss with a libel and retaliation suit Thursday, telling a Georgia federal court that they wrongfully suspended him and irreparably damaged his reputation after he used the N-word during a torts class in 2018.

Paul Zwier, who is white, has taught torts, evidence and advanced negotiations at Emory's law school in Atlanta since 2003. He has also written about equity and inclusion, race relations, racism in courts and the rule of law. According to the suit, his Emory career went without incident until a fateful first-year torts class in August 2018. ...

"Professor Zwier's use of the racist term was part of the class discussion and used as an example of how a tortfeasor's words could elevate the severity of the tort being committed," according to the complaint. "Professor Zwier did not direct the word at any individual student, but instead used it as a teaching moment and integral part of the lecture and discussion."

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Women’s Experiences At The University Of Chicago Law School

Mallika Balachandran (J.D. 2018, Chicago; Sidley, New York), Roisin Duffy-Gideon (J.D. 2018, Chicago; Law Clerk, U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois) & Hannah Gelbort (J.D. 2018, Chicago; Law Clerk, U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia), Speak Now: Results of a One-Year Study of Women’s Experiences at the University of Chicago Law School,  2019 U. Chi. Legal F. 647:

The Women’s Advocacy Project (WAP) was a research project designed and run by law students at the University of Chicago Law School (“the Law School” or “UChicago Law”) during the 2017–2018 academic year—the first study of its kind to be conducted there. WAP collected data in an attempt to accumulate a rich and detailed set of information about women’s experiences at the Law School. WAP had four primary research components: classroom observations, achievement data collection, a student survey, and professor interviews. The project represents the efforts of over seventy law students. This article, written in the fall and winter of 2018, is a condensed version of WAP’s initial report. Readers interested in more detailed information about WAP’s methodology, findings, and recommendations should access the report here.

WAP found significant differences between men’s and women’s experiences at the Law School, many suggesting that women still face considerable roadblocks and hurdles in legal education there. For example, women graduate with honors proportionately less frequently,

participate voluntarily in class less,

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Nevada Pushes Forward With Online Bar Exam Next Week, Despite Petition For Diploma Privilege Amid Pandemic

Nevada Independent, Supreme Court Rules To Keep Plans For Remote Bar Exam in Place, Despite Petition For Diploma Privilege Amid Pandemic:

After more than 170 comments bombarded the Supreme Court over the last three days, the court’s seven justices denied a petition to allow law school graduates to temporarily practice without passing the bar in an order issued late Wednesday.

The decision marks the end of a months-long debate over just how to handle the administration of the bar exam in the middle of a pandemic and paves the way for a remote essay-based test on Aug. 11 and 12. ...

Wednesday’s decision follows reports late Monday that another beta test of the software being used to administer the remote exam had experienced yet more technological hiccups. ...

The issue of the exam’s timing has also become a mounting frustration for many recent law school graduates, who cannot work before becoming barred and are left both with thousands in outstanding debts and no timeline for a new possible income stream.

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NY Times: The U.S. Is Pursuing The Worst Possible COVID-19 Education Policy, Forcing Young Children Online While Risking On-Ground Classes For College Students

New York Times:  The United States Is Reopening Many of the Wrong Schools, by Susan Dynarski (Michigan):

When it is safe enough to return to school, young children would benefit the most. Yet financial pressures are pushing colleges to reopen most rapidly, an economist says.

With coronavirus cases spiking in dozens of states, the prospect of anything resembling a normal school year is fading fast.

Schools can’t safely reopen if infections are exploding in the communities they serve.

But in regions where the pandemic appears to be under control, it is most important to get the youngest children back into school buildings, to stop the alarming slide in their learning. Older students, especially those in college, are better equipped to cope with the difficulties of online education.

That is the broad consensus among experts on back-to-school priorities. But, as things stand now, much of the United States is preparing to do exactly the opposite.

In many towns, college students are more likely than kindergartners to return to school for in-person instruction. An example is my home of Ann Arbor, Mich., where schoolchildren will be learning completely online and university students will be attending at least some classes in person. ...

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Simpson Thacher West Coast Tax Leader Jumps To Latham

American Lawyer, Simpson Thacher West Coast Tax Leader Jumps to Latham:

Simpson Thacher & Bartlett’s West Coast tax practice leader has decamped for Latham & Watkins after two decades with the firm.

Latham announced Wednesday that Katharine Moir had joined its tax department as a partner in the Bay Area. She spent her first two years out of law school as an associate at the firm before moving to Simpson Thacher.

“I was very excited about this opportunity to move to Latham,” Moir said in an interview Thursday. “Its superb client base and its private equity practice are just a great fit.”

Moir said that the opportunity to make the move only emerged after the start of the pandemic, another data point that suggests that the timeline for lateral moves is indeed accelerating.

Latham & Watkins, Leading Transactional Tax Partner Joins Latham & Watkins in the Bay Area:

“Latham is widely recognized for its integrated global platform, collegial culture, and premier Tax Department, and I am thrilled to be joining this world class firm,” said Moir. I look forward to collaborating with colleagues in the Bay Area, New York, and around the world to continue providing the highest level of service to Latham’s sophisticated base of clients.”

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Dean Presents A Constitutional Moment In Cross-Border Taxation Today At The Indiana/Leeds Summer Zoom Tax Workshop Series

Steven Dean (NYU) presents A Constitutional Moment in Cross-Border Taxation today as part of the Indiana/Leeds Summer Zoom Tax Workshop Series hosted by Leandra Lederman (Indiana) and Leopoldo Parada (Leeds):

The Classification and Assignment Constitution has shaped cross-border policymaking for a century. Two global crises in quick succession have created both an opportunity and an urgent need to remake that material constitution, altering its substantive rules by transforming the processes that shape them. In tax, just as in trade and investment law, critics find “not a borderless market without states but a doubled world kept safe from mass demands for social justice and redistributive equality by the guardians of the economic constitution.” In order to rewrite the protective algorithm at the core of the Classification and Assignment Constitution to provide all states—and developing states in particular—with access to the revenues they desperately need, a more inclusive cast of constitutional actors must be empowered.

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Aprill: Standards For Charitable Disaster Relief During A Pandemic

Ellen P. Aprill (Loyola-L.A.), Standards for Charitable Disaster Relief In the Time of Pandemic, 81 Exempt Org. Tax Rev. 395 (2020):

This short piece explains how exempt organizations currently face uncertainty about the standards for determining need for disaster relief, particularly in the time of a crisis, such as the current pandemic. The available IRS guidance is not any official document published in the Internal Revenue Bulletin, but only a Publication 3833, “Disaster Relief: Providing Assistance through Charitable Organizations.” This IRS publication states that organization must make an individualized, specific determination of need before giving such assistance. This piece argues that the IRS should issue official guidance for the COVID-19 crisis, modeled on that given in connection with the September 11 terrorist attacks.

After 9/11, the IRS issued a notice permitting charities to distribute funds so long as payments were made in good faith using objective standards. The IRS should do the same now. If it does not, Congress should act, as it also did after 9/11.

Teaching Law Online: A Guide For Faculty

Nina A. Kohn (Syracuse), Teaching Law Online: A Guide for Faculty, 69 J. Legal Educ. ___ (2020):

As law school classes move online, it is imperative that law faculty understand not only how to teach online, but how to teach well online. This article therefore is designed to help law faculty do their best teaching online. It walks faculty through key choices they must make when designing online courses, and concrete ways that they can prepare themselves and their students to succeed. The article explains why live online teaching should be the default option for most faculty, but also shows how faculty can enhance student learning by incorporating asynchronous lessons into their online classes. It then shows how faculty can set up their virtual teaching space and employ diverse teaching techniques to foster an engaging and rigorous online learning environment. The article concludes by discussing how the move to online education in response to COVID-19 could improve the overall quality of law school teaching.

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Report On The Future Of The Indiana Bar Exam

Report of the Study Commission on the Future Indiana Bar Exam: Findings and Recommendations:

Executive Summary
The Indiana Supreme Court issued an order on December 4, 2018, creating the Study Commission on the Future of the Indiana Bar Examination, to evaluate current trends and issues and to make recommendations to the Court.

Following a series of productive public meetings, the review of comments from the Indiana legal community and careful deliberation, the Study Commission recommends the following:

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W&L Law Prof: University Must Drop Both Robert E. Lee And George Washington From Its Name

Brandon Hasbrouck (Washington & Lee), White Saviors, 77 Wash. & Lee L. Rev. Online 47 (2020):

It is time for Washington and Lee University to drop both George Washington and Robert E. Lee from the University name. The predominantly White faculty at Washington and Lee recently announced that it will petition the Board of Trustees to remove Lee from the University name. This is the first time in Washington and Lee’s history that the faculty has drafted such a petition. It is worth exploring why the faculty has decided to make a collective statement on Lee now and why the faculty has not included a demand to drop Washington in their petition. The answer is simple—it is no longer acceptable, profitable, or convenient to be associated with Lee but it is for Washington. At least for now. ...

Truth and reconciliation require more—more everything. At Washington and Lee University, it starts with the following:

1. The removal of both namesakes;

2. Acknowledgement from this predominantly White faculty that you all have profited and benefitted from Black pain—through promotion, tenure, competition, and other ways;

3. Acknowledgment from the predominantly White faculty that you all have been deaf or unresponsive to Black suffering—and that the difference is immaterial;

4. Acknowledgment from the predominantly White faculty that each year you have remained silent, neutral, or worse, harm was committed against Black people;

5. Acknowledgment from the predominantly White faculty that your (at best) neutrality perpetuated racist thinking and policy decisionmaking;

6. Acknowledgment from the predominantly White faculty that it has been students, particularly law students and students of color, who have demonstrated leadership, courage, and advocacy on issues of race and racial justice and equality;

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At Least 1/6 Of Law Schools Will Be Online This Fall

National Law Journal, Law Schools That Planned to Return to Campus in Fall Are Reversing Course:

At least 32 law schools—or about a sixth of the law campuses accredited by the American Bar Association—have thus far announced that they will be entirely online for the fall semester, or will offer a very limited amount of in-person instruction to select groups of students. Harvard Law School in early June became the first to say it would remain virtual for the fall. Among the campuses that have followed suit are all five law schools within the University of California systems [Berkeley, Davis, Hastings, Irvine, UCLA] (though Irvine hopes to offer a few 1L classes on campus); the University of Southern California Gould School of Law; George Washington School of Law; Howard University School of Law; and the University of Connecticut School of Law.

Deans say the process of planning for the fall semester has been difficult given the intensification of the pandemic, changing local and state public health directives, and the additional layer of university-mandated safety measures. ...

Nearly every law school is giving students the option to complete their studies entirely online during the fall, but not every school is extending the option to attend at least one or two classes in person. And there is little geographic uniformity in the reopening decisions that schools are making.

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Political Discrimination And Law Professor Hiring

James C. Phillips (Chapman), Political Discrimination and Law Professor Hiring, 12 N.Y.U. J.L. & Liberty 560 (2019):

There are comparatively few conservative and libertarian law professors on U.S. law school faculties. Why is this? One possible explanation is discrimination based on political orientation. This paper tests this using a model of discrimination based on the work of Nobel Prize-winning economists Gary Becker and Kenneth Arrow in order to measure the “rank gap”—the difference in the ranking of a hiring law school based on one’s political orientation after controlling for other predictors of that ranking (clerkships, publications, the law school one graduated from, etc.).

The paper, using matching statistical methods, finds that upon comparing conservative/libertarian law professors hired from 2001- 2010 with equally-credentialed liberal law professors, conservatives/libertarians end up, on average, at a law school ranked 12-13 spots lower (i.e., less prestigious). (See pages 36-37.) This rank gap is not uniform, being more moderate with the top 75 schools, non-existent with schools 76-100, and the largest with the lowest-ranked schools. (See page 40.) The paper finds a similar “rank gap” for law professors whose political orientation was unknown or moderate compared to their liberal peers. Thus, while there may be other mechanisms causing the dearth of conservative/libertarian law professors in the legal academy, those who do make it in the door appear to experience discrimination based on political orientation.

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Mann & Roberts: Tax Law And The Environment

Tax Law and the Environment: A Multidisciplinary and Worldwide Perspective (Roberta F. Mann (Oregon) & Tracey M. Roberts (Samford) eds. 2020):

Tax Law and the Environment: A Multidisciplinary and Worldwide Perspective takes a multidisciplinary approach to explore the ways how tax policy can is used solve environmental problems throughout the world, using a multi-jurisdictional and multidisciplinary approach. Environmental taxation involves using taxes to impose a cost on environmentally harmful activities or tax subsidies to provide preferred tax treatment to more sustainable alternatives to those harmful activities. This book provides a detailed analysis of environmental taxation, with examples from around the world. As the extraction, processing and use of energy use resources is has been a major cause of environmental harm, this book explores the taxation and subsidization of both fossil fuels and renewable energy. Its analysis of the past, present, and future potential of environmental taxation will help policymakers move economies toward sustainability, as well as and informing students, academics, and citizens about tax solutions for pressing environmental issues.

Reviews:

 

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Fleischer & Hemel: The Architecture Of A Basic Income

Miranda Perry Fleischer (San Diego) & Daniel Jacob Hemel (Chicago), The Architecture of a Basic Income, 87 U. Chi. L. Rev. 625 (2020) (reviewed by David Elkins (Netanya) here and Susan Morse (Texas) here):

The notion of a universal basic income (“UBI”) has captivated academics, entrepreneurs, policymakers, and ordinary citizens in recent months. Pilot studies of a UBI are underway or in the works on three continents. And prominent voices from across the ideological spectrum have expressed support for a UBI or one of its variants, including libertarian Charles Murray, Facebook co-founder Chris Hughes, labor leader Andy Stern, and—most recently—former President Barack Obama. Although even the most optimistic advocates for a UBI will acknowledge that nationwide implementation lies years away, the design of a basic income will require sustained scholarly attention. This article seeks to advance the conversation among academics and policymakers about UBI implementation.

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NY Times: DA Is Investigating Trump And His Company Over Fraud

New York Times, D.A. Is Investigating Trump and His Company Over Fraud, Filing Suggests:

The Manhattan district attorney’s office suggested on Monday that it had been investigating President Trump and his company for possible bank and insurance fraud, a significantly broader inquiry than the prosecutors have acknowledged in the past.

The suggestion by the office of the district attorney, Cyrus R. Vance Jr., came in a new federal court filing arguing that Mr. Trump’s accountants should have to comply with a grand jury subpoena seeking eight years of his personal and corporate tax returns. Mr. Trump has asked a judge to declare the subpoena invalid.

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Penn State Dickinson Law Dean Danielle Conway Makes $125,000 Gift For Student Aid During COVID-19

Penn State News, Conway Makes Gift to Provide Financial Relief to Students:

Dickinson Law Dean and Donald J. Farage Professor of Law Danielle Conway knows the unsettling feeling of having bills you aren’t sure you can pay. And she has made a $125,000 gift to the Dickinson Law Future Fund and Penn State Student Care and Advocacy Emergency Fund to help students navigate those financial difficulties.

“Although Danielle has only been at the helm of Dickinson Law for one year, she has demonstrated exceptional leadership during these tumultuous times,” said Penn State President Eric Barron. “This gift is just one inspiring example of her commitment to the Dickinson Law community, especially the students who need our support. We are very grateful for her vision and investment in the future.”

Conway received a full scholarship to attend Howard University School of Law, but it didn’t cover her living expenses right away. She relied on emergency loans from the law school to pay her bills until her financial aid came through and she could repay what she borrowed. “Those emergency loans were the difference between showing up for class ready to work and being anxious about not being able to pay my bills,” said Conway.

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South Dakota Is 24th Law School To Receive A Naming Gift ($12.5 Million)

Following up on my previous post, The 23 Law School Naming Gifts ($3 Million - $125 Million): Press Release, USD Law School Receives Historic Gift, Honors David Knudson with Renaming:

To honor the legacy of Sioux Falls lawyer, businessman and public servant David Knudson, the University of South Dakota’s law school will take on the name of the University of South Dakota Knudson School of Law, as announced today.

The naming of the USD Knudson School of Law is the result of a $12.5 million gift from Knudson’s friend and colleague, T. Denny Sanford. The gift will ensure the law school remains a national leader in excellence, service and leadership.

"It's quite meaningful to see an investment of this size and to see the vision Mr. Sanford and Mr. Knudson have for securing the future of law in the state of South Dakota," said USD President Sheila K. Gestring. "The USD Knudson School of Law is the only law school in the state, and most of our graduates practice in the state and regionally. This gift is very important to continuing law in South Dakota."

"This gift is tremendous because it more than doubles the size of our current endowment at the law school, and it will fund up to 10 full-tuition student scholarships for every incoming class," said Neil Fulton, dean of the law school. "It literally changes the lives of 10 students every year, and it gives us the opportunity to help 10 students begin their careers right here in South Dakota."

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ABA Votes 64%-36% To Urge States To Ditch In-Person Bar Exams During COVID-19

ABA Press Release, ABA House Concludes Historic Meeting After Adopting Robust List of New Policies:

The American Bar Association House of Delegates adopted nearly 60 new policies at its two-day meeting that ended today, including a resolution that urges state lawyer-licensing authorities to make public health issues paramount for upcoming bar exams and provide options for recent graduates who cannot take the bar.

The HOD, as the 597-member group of state, local and specialty bar associations is known, met virtually because of the COVID-19 pandemic to conclude the 2020 Virtual ABA Annual Meeting, which began July 29. ...

The bar exam resolution, 10G, was adopted by a 256-146 vote. It asks the highest court or bar admission authority in each state or other licensing jurisdiction to cancel or not administer in person the examination during the COVID-19 crisis unless cleared by public health authorities. The resolution offers several alternative approaches to the bar exam, including a diploma privilege during the crisis. It does not favor any specific option.

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Miami And AALS Host Free Virtual Symposium Today On Power, Privilege, and Transformation: Lessons From The Pandemic For Online Legal Education

The University of Miami School of Law, in partnership with the AALS Journal of Legal Education, hosts a free virtual symposium today (noon - 6:00 pm ET) on Power, Privilege, and Transformation: Lessons from the Pandemic for Online Legal Education (registration):

Keynote Address:  Cass R. Sunstein (Harvard)

Panel #1: Power, Race, Gender, Class, Disability and Family Status

• Meera E. Deo (Thomas Jefferson)
• Doron Dorfman (Syracuse)
• Sheila R. Foster (Georgetown)
• Mary Anne Franks (Miami)
• Osamudia James (Miami)
• Margaret Y. K. Woo (Northeastern; Co-editor, Journal of Legal Education)

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Common Mistakes In Online Teaching

Margaret Ryznar (Indiana-Indianapolis), Common Mistakes in Online Teaching:

This article explains five common mistakes in online teaching and how to fix them. To do so, this article draws on student comments coming from mid-semester surveys in an Online Trusts & Estates course, as well as focus groups on online law courses.

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Taxation And Gender Equality Conference: Postponed

Following up on my previous post, Conference Announcement And Call For Contributions: Taxation And Gender Equality: 

Taxation and Gender Equality Conference: Postponed:

As the Organizers and members of the Academic Advisory Committee we regret to confirm what you probably assumed:  The Taxation and Gender Equality Conference and Research Roundtable that were to be held on September 14 and 15, 2020, in Washington, DC, have been postponed due to the travel and other risks brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic.  The Conference and Research Roundtable were to have explored the interaction between tax law and gender equality with the objective of shining a spotlight on gender issues in taxation and bringing consideration of gender impacts into mainstream discussions surrounding the enactment and administration of tax laws.  With the continued support of our sponsors, the Tax Policy Center, the American Tax Policy Institute, the American Bar Foundation, the Tax Section of the American Bar Association and the American College of Tax Counsel, we expect to hold the Conference in Fall 2021.  We will announce a date and venue once the public health crisis brought on by the pandemic has abated sufficiently to allow for safe travel and large in-person gatherings, and we will issue another Call for Papers at that time.

We thank all who submitted papers in response to our original Call for Papers and are endeavoring to provide virtual outlets for at least some of them. Please be on the lookout for further developments and thank you for your continuing support of this important project.

Organizers
Julie Divola (Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman and American Tax Policy Institute), Elaine Maag (Tax Policy Center), and Alice Abreu (Temple Center for Tax Law and Public Policy and American Tax Policy Institute)

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Columbia Journal Of Tax Law Publishes New Issue

The Columbia Journal of Tax Law has published Vol. 11, No. 2 (Summer 2020):

• Nir Fishbien (S.J.D. 2012, Michigan), The Case For Tax Integration and Current-Base Taxation, 11 Colum. J. Tax L. 1 (2020)
• Kimberly A. Clausing (UCLA), Fixing Five Flaws of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, 11 Colum. J. Tax L. 31 (2020)
• David M. Schizer (Columbia), Enhancing Efficiency at Nonprofits With Analysis and Disclosure 11 Colum. J. Tax L. 76 (2020)

Infanti & Crawford: A Taxing Feminism

Anthony C. Infanti (Pittsburgh) & Bridget J. Crawford (Pace), A Taxing Feminism, in The Oxford Handbook of Feminism and Law in the United States (Deborah L. Brake (Pittsburgh), Martha Chamallas (Ohio State) & Verna Williams (Dean, Cincinnati) eds. 2021):

Feminist perspectives are not new to tax law. The first academic piece bringing a feminist perspective to bear on tax law dates to the early 1970s, when Grace Blumberg published Sexism in the Code: A Comparative Study of Income Taxation of Working Wives and Mothers. Contemporaneously, none other than Ruth Bader Ginsburg (along with her tax lawyer husband Marty Ginsburg) brought a feminist perspective to bear on tax law when she argued Moritz v. Commissioner before the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals, as depicted in the movie On the Basis of Sex. Since then, numerous other contributions have been made to the tax literature identifying ways in which a feminist perspective might influence tax reform debates.

After sketching the rich history of feminist tax jurisprudence, this chapter reflects upon the historical intransigence of mainstream tax academics, legislators, and the public when it comes to recognizing tax law as something more than a form of applied economics with no relation to feminist (or, for that matter, any other “noneconomic”) concerns.

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Texas Lifts Tampon Ban At Bar Exam

Following up on my previous post, Tampons And The Bar Exam:  Texas Tribune, Texas Lifts Tampon Ban at Bar Exam After Complaints Over Discriminatory Policy:

Tampons and pads are no longer contraband at the upcoming bar exam for aspiring lawyers in Texas.

Pausing a practice that critics called retrograde and discriminatory, the state’s board of law examiners said in late July that test takers will be allowed to bring feminine hygiene products in clear plastic bags with them to the grueling, multiday exam that’s needed to obtain a law license. It’s unclear if the policy will remain in place for a later exam, in February; the board’s executive director, Susan Henricks, said the board doesn’t know the “conditions” under which the test will take place due to the pandemic. ...

Hundreds of lawyers, law professors and students recently signed a letter to the National Conference of Bar Examiners that said test takers unable to access the size and kind of menstrual product they want would be taking the test in conditions more “onerous and stressful” than for others.

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COVID-19 Update For Fall 2020 Semester

@professorbren

##phdlife ##academia ##covid19 ##Summer2020 ##college

♬ Plans in the works - austin_maguire

August 4, 2020 in Legal Ed News, Legal Education | Permalink | Comments (0)

Penn State Law Prof: Faculty Should Put Aside Their Scholarship And Devote 100% Of Their Time To Teaching This Fall

Karen Sloan (Law.com), Should Faculty Ditch Scholarship Next Semester?:

Here’s something I’ve never heard before in my decade or so of covering legal education: A law professor arguing that teaching loads should be higher. So when I caught wind that a professor from Pennsylvania State University Law School was making the case that law faculty ought to put aside their scholarship next semester in order to concentrate fully on teaching, I had to hear more. I hopped on the phone with Tom Sharbaugh, the director of the school’s Entrepreneur Assistance Clinic, last week to get the pitch.

But first, some caveats: Sharbaugh isn’t your typical tenured law professor. He’s a “professor of practice” who spent 35 years in the law firm world. For 15 of those years, he was the managing partner of operations at Morgan, Lewis & Bockius. ...

[L]aw schools are facing unprecedented challenges in the fall semester with most if not all classes happening online. Instead of teaching just one or two courses during the fall while working on their scholarship, he said law professors should put their scholarly endeavors aside temporarily and take on more teaching responsibilities so that law students have more classes to choose from and can learn in smaller sections.

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NY Times: More Than 6,600 COVID-19 Cases Have Been Linked To U.S. Colleges

New York Times, More Than 6,600 Coronavirus Cases Have Been Linked to U.S. Colleges:

As college students and professors decide whether to head back to class, and as universities weigh how and whether to reopen, the coronavirus is already on campus.

A New York Times survey of every public four-year college in the country, as well as every private institution that competes in Division I sports or is a member of an elite group of research universities, revealed at least 6,600 cases tied to about 270 colleges over the course of the pandemic. And the new academic year has not even begun at most schools.

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Ransomware Attack Blocks New Mexico Law School Faculty, Staff, And Student Access To Email, Shared Files

Albuquerque Journal, Suspected Ransomware Attack Hits UNM Law School:

Officials at the University of New Mexico School of Law believe they have been attacked by ransomware, a malicious software that is preventing students, faculty and staff from accessing emails and shared files at the school.

It appears that the attack is only disrupting computer systems at the law school, and not other parts of campus, according to a letter from Dean Sergio Pareja that was sent to students Thursday evening and posted to UNM’s website.

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