A. Introduction

A plan for revitalizing public interest law at Georgetown would not be complete without addressing the heart of legal education—the curriculum. While Georgetown has steadily increased the diversity of public interest courses it offers, several changes in focus are necessary to create a curriculum which supports public interest more fully. The following changes are recommended by EJF:

1. Expand Course Offerings in Public Interest Practice Areas;
2. Feature a Public Interest Emphasis in Certain Courses;
3. Foster Public Interest Sensitivity in the Classroom;
4. Grant Equal Credit for Public Interest Courses; and
5. Maximize Clinical Opportunities.

1. Expand Course Offerings in Public Interest Practice Areas

Georgetown currently claims forty-seven courses and seminars in public interest law, including offerings in subject areas ranging from homelessness to weapons proliferation. However, many of them are not offered regularly, and many specific areas of public interest practice are not covered by the current course offerings. EJF recommends that Georgetown continue to add diversity to its course offerings in public interest law. In addition, we recommend that Georgetown aggressively pursue faculty members who can bring their experiences in public interest practice to the classroom.

2. Feature a Public Interest Emphasis in Certain Courses

Another way to offer students a classroom experience which is more sensitive to public interest is by teaching special sections of traditional courses with an emphasis on public interest issues. This is currently being experimented with in professional responsibility courses at Georgetown. It could also be done in many of the other required courses, such as Corporations (emphasizing non-profit corporations), Property (emphasizing housing and homelessness problems), or Constitutional Law I & II (emphasizing civil rights, discrimination, etc.).

The danger of such course offerings is that they tend to separate public interest students from others, which could lead to a stigma if the public interest courses are thought to be less difficult. Stanford overcomes this problem by offering a sub-curriculum which is more demanding than the standard curriculum. The benefits, however, are the creation of a stronger public interest community, and a legal education which is substantively more relevant to students' career goals.

EJF recommends that Georgetown study the success of its newly added public interest-oriented sections of Professional Responsibility. If student interest warrants it, the faculty should investigate the possibility of adding public interest sections of other courses.

3. Foster Public Interest Sensitivity in the Classroom

Public interest advocates speak often of classrooms where public interest law is largely ignored, where examples are drawn almost without exception from the law practiced in major firms. —Judy Karasik, in Young People Working in the Public Interest: What Are They Doing and How Can We Help (1990)

Perhaps the area in which classroom reform is most drastically needed is the area in which the problems are most subtle and difficult to detect. We refer to the way in which the core law school curriculum treats public interest law.

Reflecting upon two or three years of law school classes, many Georgetown students can conclude that public interest is not a significant part of many core courses at Georgetown. By and large, when professors give hypotheticals in class, they ask students to imagine themselves an associate in a firm, having been given an assignment by their senior partner. Rarely, if ever, is a student asked to offer his or her legal analysis from the hypothetical role of staff attorney at a legal services office.

While this failure to mention public interest roles in class goes unnoticed and seems harmless, the exclusion of such discussion is notable. Students hold their professors in high regard, especially in the first year as they are introduced to the legal profession. A student's professors impart to him or her much more than the subject matter of a course; they impart a view of the legal profession. When professors exclude public interest work from the legal landscape, students do not consider it an option. This effect is pervasive at Georgetown, despite our reputedly liberal faculty.

EJF recommends that faculty members be made aware of the effect which their failure to integrate public interest work into classroom discussion can have on students' career choices. We ask that they be urged to show sensitivity to public interest practice in class, and to encourage students to pursue public interest, both in and out of class.

4. Grant Equal Credit for Public Interest Courses

In order to graduate from Georgetown, each student must write two twenty-five page research papers—an "A" Paper and a "B" Paper. Given the extraordinary amount of time and effort which students expend, few students find that they can take many more than the two required writing seminars. Students learn early that they get the most credit for their effort in courses which offer four semester hours of credit. Hence, the popularity of subjects such as Commercial Law and Decedents Estates.

Of the forty-seven "public interest" courses offered at the Law Center, twenty-seven are seminar courses. In almost all, students must complete a research paper to pass. While that does not detract from students' interest in the subject matter, it does diminish their enthusiasm for the course, since a realistic assessment of time commitments usually reveals that they do not have time for an original research project.

In order to make these courses more accessible, EJF proposes that many be opened to students who have fulfilled their writing requirement by making them three- or four-credit courses, rather than two- or three-credit seminars. Alternatively, students could elect either to write a paper or to take an exam. In this way, Georgetown will breathe life into its public interest curriculum, making more than just a few of its most interesting courses open to each of its students.

5. Maximize Clinical Opportunities

Many students interested in public interest base their decision to come to Georgetown on the excellence of the clinical programs available here. Currently, Georgetown's diverse clinical programs are used largely as a teaching tool. While EJF endorses this form of teaching enthusiastically, we believe that the current clinical program could be implemented in a manner which would allow it to have a greater influence on students' career choices.

Most clinical experiences are only available to students during the third year of law school. By then, most students have made decisions about their careers. Many have already accepted their post-graduation jobs before they even complete a month in their Clinic. Consequently, students who were drawn to Georgetown by its clinics because of their desire to do public interest work end up in the clinics after their career path is sealed.

EJF proposes that every effort be made to open the clinics up to more students, and to make them available in the second year of law school, when they might serve more than a pedagogical purpose. For example, at Yale, students may enroll in clinics during the first or second year, and may take more than one clinic in many cases. We are aware that concerns such as bar certification and prerequisite courses make this difficult in some clinics. However, we urge the University to make these changes wherever possible.