Law school is challenging, but systemic inequality magnifies those challenges for some students, especially first-generation law students. These challenges often translate into negative feedback, frustration, alienation, and resignation. What if we imagined a law school teaching environment that centered students most affected by systemic inequality? What would we do differently? What would we keep the same?
The presentation will include voices from three parts of our faculty at Seattle University School of Law: Academic Support, Legal Writing, and Law Clinics. By reaching across disciplines, we seek to generate ideas to reach students exactly where they are. How can we build a skills learning scaffold that stretches from before the first year through graduation? How can we build a formative assessment bridge from our academic success programs, through legal writing, into doctrinal courses and clinics? How can we normalize confusion and struggle among our students and within our faculty? How can we build problem-solving and reflection skills that our students can use to identify their own learning needs?
We envision starting this discussion with an exercise intended to build empathy and respect for struggle among the session participants. Then, we will frame the question, focusing on the following areas: building skills scaffolding; using formative assessment and individualized support; normalizing confusion and building empathy; and building problems solving skills. Then, we will use appreciative interviewing in breakout sessions to allow participants to think about what is working in their institutions. Finally, we will use a simple online tool to capture participants’ visions for centering our students most affected by systemic inequalities.