Do you think it will be better if we had like different degrees, syllabus and colleges for corporate and litigation. According to me it will help out in eliminating subjects that are of no use to a particular individual in practical life. Plus five years/three years can be utilised in a better manner by focussing on field specific skills. I do realise that an overall understanding of all areas of law has its own merits, but can't we just learn it for the sake of learning rather than being evaluated on it.
Yeah this is pretty asinine. You want 17 year olds to decide what they want to do for their whole lives ? Commit to either Corp or litigation?
You want universities to cater to the marketplace rather than build a broad range of skills so their graduates would be good at doing whatever they chose to do?
A legal education is supposed to prepare you for a number of roles in your career. Not all students want to do either Corp or litigation, and most students don’t actually know what they want to do with their lives a couple of years after graduation. And honestly- any education that you’d get that was that hyper focussed would be a poor education. If you can’t understand labour laws and even laws about some white collar crimes- you can’t serve your corporate overlords well. Maybe you can do due diligence your whole life but you can’t really build and maintain a relationship with a client that might have many needs over time.
If you don’t understand interpretation of statutes or jurisprudence or constitutional law you won’t know what you’re doing the next time they decide to amend/ replace the companies act.
The best corporate lawyers in my batch- the ones who have been most successful post graduation- took a wide range of electives courses and did very well in all of them.
The syllabus doesn't need to be changed. The pedagogy does. No career academic can teach you how to litigate well. The university is there to teach you the theory with some basic understanding about applicability. Internships etc. are there for the rest. Indian law firms provide zero training to the associates, that's one of the biggest problems.
I hear you all and I agree to a certain extent as well. In an ideal world, yes an eighteen year old can't take such crucial decisions. Especially when the choice is related to passion or individual interest.
However, I have come across many such students who had a clear mindset since their first year that they want to choose corporate simply because they knew that they will have to repay the loan that they took for UG or because they knew that their family background is not such that they can afford lit. Not every student is pursuing law because they are passionate about it but simply because they want to earn a decent sum and have somewhat better living condition than their previous generation.
And I am assuming that a kid who has a law background, is already very much sure from the beginning that after graduating they'll be joining their parents.
@2 With respect to your other points, I do feel that these are skills that can be easily acquired at a workplace.
Maybe we can have a common syllabus for the initial two years of law course and different syllabus thereafter?
Nope. It just wouldn’t work. Look I know you don’t want to study subjects you personally have no interest in, but that doesn’t make them useless. This kind of mindset is basically poison at school and at the workplace. There’s nothing stopping you from learning for learning’s sake now - except here you are whining about having to learn things you don’t use during internships.
If you want that much flexibility in your academic plan- you can always go to your starts university and intern like hell. People do get Corp jobs that way. But if you want an NLU education- you want the tag and everything that comes with it- you then need to agree to a more rigorous standard of education. That includes attendance norms, plagiarism checks, and yes, a wide range of mandatory subjects. These are not “skills that can be picked up at the workplace” there is plenty to be learnt at the workplace and it cannot and must not be a substitute for a proper legal education.
If you only want to learn Corp stuff - it’s like only learning one language - how could any law school vouch for you? What would make you different from the throngs of students who do certificate course after certificate course hyperspecialising and hoping it gets them a job when it actually undercuts their credibility.
I knew first day of law school that I wanted nothing to do with big corporations or their money. But I still attended every Corp law class and topped my batch in Corp law. Learning that stuff wasn’t “useless” it’s given me perspective on how the law works in its breadth, and it actually is perspective I use in my work. And who knows one day I might even write about Corp law.
My best friend in law school knew before entering she needed a Corp job. She still learnt law and sociology and labour law and family law- and it made her better at her job. She understands the logic of the law and she uses that understanding to do her work better and faster.
Law school cannot cater to these micropockets of students who only want to learn what they want to learn. It’s law school- not Netflix. Enough entitlement. A legal education is supposed to make you equipped to follow whatever career path that comes your way, litigation, Corp , or even public policy. It might do well to actually trust in academics who have spent some time thinking about how these courses ought to be structured. And your seniors who tell you that other subjects are also essential.
Your law school degree (BA LLB) certifies that you’re a lawyer- that’s based on you fulfilling all the minimal criteria. If you only learn Corp law subjects - you’ll just have to get a different sort of degree. There have been attempts to introduce hyper specialisation before and give out a different kind of degree- but those degrees haven’t been met with market approval.
According to me it will help out in eliminating subjects that are of no use to a particular individual in practical life. Plus five years/three years can be utilised in a better manner by focussing on field specific skills.
I do realise that an overall understanding of all areas of law has its own merits, but can't we just learn it for the sake of learning rather than being evaluated on it.
You want universities to cater to the marketplace rather than build a broad range of skills so their graduates would be good at doing whatever they chose to do?
A legal education is supposed to prepare you for a number of roles in your career. Not all students want to do either Corp or litigation, and most students don’t actually know what they want to do with their lives a couple of years after graduation. And honestly- any education that you’d get that was that hyper focussed would be a poor education. If you can’t understand labour laws and even laws about some white collar crimes- you can’t serve your corporate overlords well. Maybe you can do due diligence your whole life but you can’t really build and maintain a relationship with a client that might have many needs over time.
If you don’t understand interpretation of statutes or jurisprudence or constitutional law you won’t know what you’re doing the next time they decide to amend/ replace the companies act.
The best corporate lawyers in my batch- the ones who have been most successful post graduation- took a wide range of electives courses and did very well in all of them.
Specialisation is for insects.
@1.2
@2
I hear you all and I agree to a certain extent as well.
In an ideal world, yes an eighteen year old can't take such crucial decisions. Especially when the choice is related to passion or individual interest.
However, I have come across many such students who had a clear mindset since their first year that they want to choose corporate simply because they knew that they will have to repay the loan that they took for UG or because they knew that their family background is not such that they can afford lit.
Not every student is pursuing law because they are passionate about it but simply because they want to earn a decent sum and have somewhat better living condition than their previous generation.
And I am assuming that a kid who has a law background, is already very much sure from the beginning that after graduating they'll be joining their parents.
@2
With respect to your other points, I do feel that these are skills that can be easily acquired at a workplace.
Maybe we can have a common syllabus for the initial two years of law course and different syllabus thereafter?
If you want that much flexibility in your academic plan- you can always go to your starts university and intern like hell. People do get Corp jobs that way. But if you want an NLU education- you want the tag and everything that comes with it- you then need to agree to a more rigorous standard of education. That includes attendance norms, plagiarism checks, and yes, a wide range of mandatory subjects. These are not “skills that can be picked up at the workplace” there is plenty to be learnt at the workplace and it cannot and must not be a substitute for a proper legal education.
If you only want to learn Corp stuff - it’s like only learning one language - how could any law school vouch for you? What would make you different from the throngs of students who do certificate course after certificate course hyperspecialising and hoping it gets them a job when it actually undercuts their credibility.
I knew first day of law school that I wanted nothing to do with big corporations or their money. But I still attended every Corp law class and topped my batch in Corp law. Learning that stuff wasn’t “useless” it’s given me perspective on how the law works in its breadth, and it actually is perspective I use in my work. And who knows one day I might even write about Corp law.
My best friend in law school knew before entering she needed a Corp job. She still learnt law and sociology and labour law and family law- and it made her better at her job. She understands the logic of the law and she uses that understanding to do her work better and faster.
Law school cannot cater to these micropockets of students who only want to learn what they want to learn. It’s law school- not Netflix. Enough entitlement. A legal education is supposed to make you equipped to follow whatever career path that comes your way, litigation, Corp , or even public policy. It might do well to actually trust in academics who have spent some time thinking about how these courses ought to be structured. And your seniors who tell you that other subjects are also essential.
Your law school degree (BA LLB) certifies that you’re a lawyer- that’s based on you fulfilling all the minimal criteria. If you only learn Corp law subjects - you’ll just have to get a different sort of degree. There have been attempts to introduce hyper specialisation before and give out a different kind of degree- but those degrees haven’t been met with market approval.