Northwestern Hops on the Esquire Express

By Ali Trachta in News on Jun 20, 2008 5:24PM

Today Northwestern University will announce its new accelerated law degree program in which students will be bar exam-ready in two years instead of the usual three. At the heels of the University of Dayton and Southwestern Law School, NU is the third school in the nation to attempt this, but the first that is considered top-tier. The program also breaks from tradition by incorporating practical skills such as leadership, teamwork, project management, and accounting into its curriculum alongside the typical law school focus of reasoning and analysis.

Not surprisingly, other local law schools question the validity of this new system. Calling the program, "irresponsible," University of Chicago professor and former dean Geoffrey Stone stated, "My sense is that compressing the educational process is likely to seriously derogate from the quality." University of Illinois dean Lawrence Solum agrees, criticizing the program for cramming too much information into too few hours.

NU's law dean David Van Zandt isn't surprised he's being knocked by the competition, retorting that "any time you innovate, you are always going to have people who pooh-pooh it or look down their nose." He's confident this program will churn out more business-oriented lawyers who will have a competitive edge in the job market. Van Zandt has the street cred to back up his confidence, considering in the 13 years he's been dean, Northwestern’s law school ranking in U.S. News and World Report has risen to No. 9. Then again, he was also supportive of having Jerry Springer speak at NU Law’s commencement this year, so the jury’s still out. [Trib]