Scalia Urges Law Profs to Spend More Time Teaching, Less Time Writing
Justice Antonin Scalia has joined the debate over law school instruction.
Speaking Wednesday at a dedication for Marquette University Law School’s new $85 million building, Scalia said law professors should devote less time to academic research to free up more time for instruction, according to stories in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and WUWM Milwaukee Public Radio.
“Research and writing is of course a part of the academic life and perhaps the part that makes you best known for the time being beyond the walls of your own institution,” Scalia said. “But the reality is that the part of your academic career that will have the most lasting impact is the hours you spend producing an intellectual legacy in the classroom.”
Scalia also had some advice for students: Take a wide range of classes. During his time at Harvard Law School, he said, “I could not take all the courses I wanted to, and I feel deeply the existence of some gaps in my education as a lawyer, gaps that I will never be able to fill.”
