Paul L. Caron
Dean
Pepperdine Caruso
School of Law
Legal Education
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Article: Disbarment Disparities: How Law School Prestige Affects Disbarment Rates
Michael Conklin (Texas A&M), Christopher Houston (Angelo State) & Gayle Randall (Angelo State), Disbarment Disparities: How Law School Prestige Affects Disbarment Rates, 21 J. Bus. & Tech. L. 1 (2026): “This study examines the relationship between law school ranking and attorney disbarment rate. Drawing on a noveldataset comprising over 12,000 bar passers across eight law schools over a ten-year…
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Law Schools Tell Students to Put AI Away
From the Financial Times, although describing the practices of only two law schools. These days, we are all struggling to balance the human and the machine in the workplace. Take the training of lawyers. Generative AI can already do much of the grunt work normally given to young, inexperienced attorneys, but if we let it,…
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Law.Com: ABA Council Repeals Diversity Standard Amid Uncertainty About the Organization’s Future as a Law School Accreditor
Christine Charnosky for Law.com (subscription required) reports that “[t]he American Bar Association’s Accreditation Council repealed its standard that governs diversity and inclusion requirements in law school admissions during a special session held Tuesday, following an arduous review of Standard 206.” Click here for the Reuter’s report on he Council’s action. It appears that the Council’s…
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Above the Law: Law Reviews And AI Detection, A Letter To Law Review Editors: Law reviews potentially rejecting submissions because the journals detect AI is problematic for a variety of reasons
AI seems to be everywhere all the time. This post on Above the Law by LawProBlawg is a letter to a law review editor: “Bottom line: I have a problem with AI detection software being used if that policy a) is not disclosed, b) produces false positives for human writing, and the author has no…
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Grand Canyon University to Launch ‘Christian Worldview’ Law School in Fall 2027
Baptist News Global, Grand Canyon University Plans ‘Christian Worldview’ Law School: Grand Canyon University is the latest evangelical school to launch a law school, corresponding with increased interest in preparing “Christian worldview” students for legal careers. The Phoenix-based school announced Aug. 16 it plans to open a law school as early as fall 2027, pending approval…
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New Federal Law Student Loan Limits Did Not Hurt 1L Class Size—Yet
ABA Journal, New Financial Aid Rules Didn’t Hurt Incoming Law Class Size: The much-anticipated crisis brought on by changes in federal regulations regarding financial aid has not manifested—yet. That’s the conclusion of law deans contacted by the ABA Journal as well as officials at the Law School Admission Council and the AccessLex Institute. … Law…
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July MBE Scores Fall, Portending Declines in July 2026 Bar Exam Pass Rates, Despite Higher LSATs and UGPAs — Are AI and Increased Law School Exam Accommodations to Blame?
Press Release, NCBE Announces National Mean for July 2026 MBE: The National Conference of Bar Examiners (NCBE) announced today that the national mean scaled score for the July 2026 Multistate Bar Examination (MBE) was 140.7, a decrease of about 1.7 points compared to the July 2025 mean of 142.4. … 44,472 examinees took the July…
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Chronicle of Higher Education: Bob Jones and the DEI Tax
Chronicle of Higher Education, The Bob Jones Ruling Eats Its Own Tail: A DEI TAX: Go back to 1983. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the Internal Revenue Service could revoke Bob Jones University’s tax exemption because the religious institution’s prohibition on interracial relationships flouted “fundamental public policy” against racial discrimination. The Bob Jones decision was hailed by those who sought racial…
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Florida International Faculty Balk at Trump Aide Named Interim Law School Dean
Following up on Kevin’s post yesterday: ABA Journal, Florida International University Faculty Raise Red Flags as Trump Aide Moves to Interim Law Dean Post: Faculty at Florida International University are raising red flags regarding the appointment of Daniel Z. Epstein as the interim dean of the law school, who started in the post last month. Epstein,…
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Inside Higher Education: “AI Tends to Mark Students’ Essays Higher Than Humans, Study Shows”
From Inside Higher Education: “[R]esearch, published in the journal Assessment & Evaluation in Higher Education, found that generative AI tools such as ChatGPT `do not reliably reproduce human judgement in the marking of extended written work.’ . . . In all but one case [out of 50], the AI models typically returned higher average marks than…
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Inside Higher Ed: How Accreditation Changes Could Impact Professional Licensure
In late August, Department of Education staff suggested ending federal recognition of the American Bar Association’s accreditation authority. But how would losing federal recognition actually affect law schools, law students, and the bar admissions process? From Inside Higher Ed, the answer is classic law school: it depends. On the state, on the institution, on the…
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Are Many Universities Truly Experiencing a Budget Crisis?
I am not sure whether there is a growing budget crisis at many universities or not. In my experience, university leaders frequently claim to be suffering a budget crisis in order to justify desired spending cuts. Is the contemporary moment different? International students have declined dramatically. The Trump administration has slowed down and cut research…
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Women and People of Color as Deans: The Other Side of the Glass Cliff
Over the last few months, I have been mining the AALS Rosenblatt’s Deans Database for posts on the AALS TaxProf Blog. This recent article sheds light on the experiences of women and people of color serving as law deans. The Other Side of the Glass Cliff by Angela Onwuachi-Willig and Kellye Testy is in a…
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The University Campus as a Borderlands? Transnational Campus Borderlands by Khaled A. Beydoun & Sheldon Evans
Many universities rely heavily on revenues from international students. The faculty dismissals at Illinois Institute of Technology was justified by the decline in international students. In recent years, law schools expanded international student programs as the J.D. market tightened. With that in mind, I found this article of great interest: Transnational Campus Borderlands by Khaled…
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Book of the Week
David Dyzenhaus, University Professor and Albert Abel Professor of Law at the University of Toronto offers this thoughtful new monograph from Cambridge University Press, In The War Against Law: What’s Wrong with Common Good Constitutionalism, Dyzenhaus sounds the alarm about where the ideology of an unchecked executive branch is truly headed. His examples are British…
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How to Excel on Law School Essay Exams: A Guide for Students by Orin S. Kerr
More sage advice for law students. How to Excel on Law School Essay Exams: A Guide for Students by Orin S. Kerr Abstract This Essay offers guidance on how law students can earn high grades on law school essay exams. It starts with the goals law professors have when writing exams, which then frames what counts…
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Wisdom of the Ages
As another school year commences, Stanford’s Orin Kerr shares with us these remarks from the legendary Learned Hand made in 1958 reflecting back on his student days in the 1890’s. As Professor Kerr prescribes “Go ye and do likewise.”.
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AccesLex Joins the Blog Party
I missed this announcement that AccessLex had launched its own blog on legal education, with the site’s customary emphasis on finance but containing a host of other stories of interest to our readers. I came across the site this week and noted a host of strong content with an article focused on the important question…
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Dean Opening: City University of New York School of Law
Call for applications. The City University of New York (CUNY) seeks a mission-oriented, engaged, and highly collaborative leader with a deep commitment to social justice and the public interest for the position of Dean of its School of Law. CUNY School of Law’s unique dual mission is to educate lawyers in the service of human needs and…
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Teaching Tidbit of the Week: My Students Have Spoken; Now, It’s Your Turn
In each class I teach, I ask students to fill out index cards in which they share with me how they wish me to pronounce their names, why they are in law school, anything else they want me to know about them, their teaching method preferences, and what else I can do to support their…
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The Florida Bar Tax Section’s 2027 National Tax Moot Court Competition
Registration is open for the Florida Bar Tax Section’s 2027 National Tax Moot Competition. The competition will take place January 21-23, 2027: For almost 40 years, The Florida Bar Tax Section has hosted an annual National Tax Moot Court Competition to invite law students from across the country to demonstrate their written and oral advocacy…
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National Jurist: 7 law school study habits that improve learning and retention
Michelle Weyenberg, 7 law school study habits that improve learning and retention, National Jurist (August 25, 2026). While I do not agree with everything in the article, this short article does describes seven habits that really can make a difference for law students: I have two quibbles. First, the suggestion that outlining is required is…
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New Financial Aid Rules Did Not Impact Class Size, Other Impacts Uncertain
The latest from the ABA Journal: The much-anticipated crisis brought on by changes in federal regulations regarding financial aid has not manifested—yet. That’s the conclusion of law deans contacted by the ABA Journal as well as officials at the Law School Admission Council and the AccessLex Institute. . . . . [W]ith many schools now…
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Plans for New Arizona Law School
Last week, news indicated that Grand Canyon University is moving forward with plans to open a new law school in Arizona. From the announcement: GCU is moving forward with plans to establish a College of Law that would integrate the Christian worldview throughout its curriculum while emphasizing Constitutional law, free-market principles and the rule of law.…
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The Bluebook: An Insider’s Perspective
The Blue Book and blue booking is a gift that keeps on giving law professors. M. Burke Craighead (Law Clerk, Hon. Chad Readler, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit), The Bluebook: An Insider’s Perspective, 124 Mich. L. Rev. 1145 (2026) offers perspectives on the latest edition of the Blue Book: “This Review provides an insider’s…