Reflective Journal: Curricular Deficits, Pedagogical Challenges, And Constructing Community In A Non-Traditional Law School Class

Rita A. Sethi (Hofstra), Reflective Journal: Curricular Deficits, Pedagogical Challenges and Constructing Community in a Non- Traditional Law School Class, 27 Roger Williams U. L. Rev. 57 (2022):

In adherence to honest praxis, this essay is a reflective journal about the experience of teaching a law school class consisting of predominantly students of color, as a woman of color and second-generation immigrant, about subjects that interact with identity. Looking back at the class’s powerful alchemy through this reflection, I will highlight the fertile and susceptible openings in the curriculum where adaptation, including more targeted exploration and expansion, would have enriched our discussions of client-centeredness and cultural humility; assess my pedagogical tools for facilitating painful conversations and incorporating anti-racist teaching; and consider the liberatory potential inherent in these spaces.

At the Maurice A. Deane School of Law at Hofstra University, I teach a lawyering practice course in developing the skills to nurture, sustain, and repair the attorney-client relationship using the vehicle of a simulated, semester-long case in employment law. The key milestones include: interviewing and interacting with clients and witnesses, counseling clients throughout the course of investigation and discovery, and managing the client relationship when engaged in settlement negotiation and mediation. Students practice and refine these skills by using role-play, recorded exercises, reflective journaling, and peer feedback.

The demographics of my Spring 2020 semester seminar were vastly different than my typical class composition over the last ten years. On the first day, the energy was electric as the classroom began to populate; after class, students of color proactively pointed out to me how the class composition was “multicultural,” “diverse,” and “not representative of most classes” at the law school. In fact, nine out of the twelve students enrolled in the seminar were people of color. While the anticipation was certainly palpable, I wasn’t sure exactly what students were expecting. Some could not get past their astonishment and giddy relief at encountering this mix in a law school classroom. Others assumed they would acquire concrete knowledge and skills about cultural difference from their peers. Still others anticipated that race and culture would be discussed as a regularized and explicit “determining factor in shaping the attorney-client relationship.” At the beginning of the semester, none of us knew what would emerge from this combination of ingredients and whether my role was that of catalyst, convener, or confidante. However, no one could have predicted how the cyclone of COVID-19 would blindside this group.

https://taxprof.typepad.com/taxprof_blog/2023/09/reflective-journal-curricular-deficits-pedagogical-challenges-and-constructing-community-in-a-non-tr.html