ABA

FAMU official calls canceled ABA hearing ‘very good news’

A brief spike in attrition a couple of years ago at Florida A&M University’s College of Law apparently prompted a request for a Friday hearing by the American Bar Association’s accrediting board, according to FAMU’s interim president and the law school dean. But the law school was able to offer…

Jan 24, 2014 10:10 PM CST

ABA task force calls for sweeping changes in legal education system

The ABA should create a task force or a commission to undertake an in-depth examination of law school price and funding issues, an ABA task force says. The ABA should also establish a mechanism to institutionalize the process of assessing and improving the legal education system, the Task Force on…

Jan 24, 2014 1:58 PM CST

ABA urges federal lawmakers to nix draft provision requiring law firms to adopt accrual accounting

The American Bar Association is urging federal lawmakers to rethink a possible plan to require businesses to use the accrual method instead of traditional cash accounting in the discussion draft Tax Reform Act of 2013. Accrual accounting would be more complex and expensive, the ABA’s president writes in letters to…

Jan 15, 2014 11:50 PM CST

ABA fosters discussion on reasonable, enforceable gun laws and safer streets

Gun violence affects Americans in our biggest cities and smallest towns alike. More than 100,000 Americans are shot each year—either by their own hand or by another’s—with 31,000 resulting deaths. The rate of per capita gun violence in the U.S. far exceeds that of any other industrialized nation. Lawyers are…

Jan 1, 2014 11:00 AM CST

Committee calls for caution as more lawyers use group-coupon or prepaid marketing

You’ve seen them online at Groupon or LivingSocial: A business charges a small fee for discounted services or products—such as restaurants, movie tickets or spa treatments—as a lure to attract customers. Such creative deal-of-the-day or group-coupon marketing programs have been all the rage. But more lawyers are also taking advantage…

Jan 1, 2014 9:30 AM CST

Organized crime leaders and terrorists cross paths in cyberspace

The nexus between organized crime and terrorism can be tenuous and sometimes hard to see. And there can be copycat appropriation of methods and means used by terrorists for fundraising. But that nexus is growing so fast in the cyberage, we ignore it at our peril. That was the takeaway…

Jan 1, 2014 8:00 AM CST

ABA backs bipartisan bill supporting permanent families for foster children

The ABA is urging enactment of bipartisan legislation in Congress to enhance federal efforts to provide permanency for children in foster care. The legislation, unanimously passed by the House in October and expected to garner Senate approval as well, would extend and expand the Adoption Incentives Program originally enacted as…

Jan 1, 2014 7:50 AM CST

ABA Announcements

2014 BOARD OF GOVERNORS ELECTION At the 2014 Midyear Meeting, the Nominating Committee will announce nominations for district and at-large positions on the ABA Board of Governors for terms beginning at the conclusion of the 2014 Annual Meeting and ending at the conclusion of the 2017 Annual Meeting. Pursuant to…

Jan 1, 2014 7:40 AM CST

Law school’s online-hybrid degree program gets first-ever approval from ABA

In September, the American Bar Association Task Force on the Future of Legal Education called on law schools (PDF) to innovate and embrace technology as a means for educating future attorneys. William Mitchell College of Law in St. Paul, Minn., has answered the call. The ABA Council of the Section…

Dec 19, 2013 7:45 PM CST

University of Kansas School of Law censured, fined for ‘willful’ accrediting violations

The University of Kansas School of Law has been publicly censured and fined $50,000 for admitting two students into a new LLM degree program without the ABA’s prior approval and for withholding that information from accreditors while they were considering the matter. The sanctions were announced Thursday in a press…

Dec 19, 2013 7:15 PM CST

Law school enrollment down 11 percent this year over last year, 24 percent over 3 years, data shows

Law school enrollments nationwide are down 11 percent this year from last year and 24 percent from 2010, new figures show. The nation’s 202 ABA-accredited schools reported that 39,675 full- and part-time students were enrolled in a first-year J.D. program this fall, according to figures released Tuesday by the ABA…

Dec 17, 2013 2:30 PM CST

Legal Education Section considers doing random audits of law school jobs data

Law schools would be subject to random audits of their graduate employment data under a draft proposal presented Friday to the governing council of the ABA Section of Legal Education and Admissions to the Bar. Under the draft proposal (PDF), all ABA-accredited schools would be subject to an annual website…

Dec 9, 2013 8:26 PM CST

Nelson Mandela, ‘a giant among men’ who taught us the meaning of the rule of law, dies at 95

Nelson Mandela, a longtime political prisoner who went on to become globally recognized as an inspirational leader of his country and win the Nobel Peace Prize, died peacefully amidst his family Thursday night at his home in Johannesburg, South Africa. He was 95 years old. Convicted and sentenced to a…

Dec 6, 2013 8:20 PM CST

Rutgers School of Law-Camden is fined $25K and censured for accrediting violations

Rutgers School of Law-Camden has been publicly censured and fined $25,000 for violating an accrediting standard that requires law schools to use a valid and reliable admissions test to evaluate an applicant’s prospects of graduating. The sanction was announced Wednesday in a press release by the accreditation committee of the…

Dec 4, 2013 6:33 PM CST

Former ABA and Bingham leader with a ‘life-affirming bounce’ dies at 80

John J. “Jack” Curtin Jr., a longtime leader of the law firm now known as Bingham McCutchen, died last week in a senior living community in the Boston area. He was 80 years old. In addition to making a name for himself in corporate practice, Curtin was a former president…

Dec 2, 2013 10:14 PM CST