Students from five equity-facing groups respond to the Faculty’s changes in mandatory first year equity training
On September 22, Assistant Dean Sara Faherty informed the 1L class by email that their joint professionalism training (JPT) would be restructured “in the wake of the murder of George Floyd, and in response to student feedback.”
Traditionally, 1L students were required to attend two day-long JPT sessions, one on the last Friday of September and another on the last Friday of January. These were tentatively scheduled for Friday, September 25 and Friday, January 29. The restructuring cancelled these sessions and replaced them with a series of mandatory virtual lunchtime events revolving around anti-bias work.
In a follow-up email to 1L students on October 14, Assistant Dean Faherty announced that the first two lunchtime sessions are scheduled on November 9 and November 11. These sessions will focus on justice and equity. The first will provide basic anti-oppression training and the second will focus on racism in the legal profession. The remaining Wednesday afternoon sessions will occur sometime in January and February, and details are not currently finalized. Students will be evaluated by their responses to short essay questions.
In her October 14 email, Assistant Dean Faherty stated that the previous format for JPT scheduling is not workable “due to the changes to the Faculty’s academic schedule brought on by the coronavirus pandemic.” Indeed, some 1L classes are scheduled on Fridays, which were historically reserved for professionalism training events. Assistant Dean Faherty continued: “In past years several students have suggested holding a number of shorter sessions spread across the year, and it looks like the 2020-2021 year will be the year we finally pilot this format.”
Beyond changing the JPT from day-long to lunchtime sessions in order to accommodate scheduling adjustments, the content also changed. In her October 14 email, Assistant Dean Faherty states that “the JPT has always focused on contemporary issues, and long embraced the importance of understanding diversity in the legal profession.” Speakers have been asked this year to “reflect on the relevance of recent events, such as the Black Lives Matter movement, in their presentations.”
Though Assistant Dean Faherty does not name the “several students” who voiced concerns about the JPT, earlier this year five equity groups at the law school — Asia Law Society (ALS), Black Law Students Association (BLSA), Indigenous Law Students Association (ILSA), Out in Law (OIL), and South Asian Law Students Association (SALSA) — wrote in an open letter to the Deans’ Office a call to action to “review and revise the 1L Ethics and Professionalism training in recognition of the diverse and unique experiences of racialized students at the law school.” Their suggestions included mandating attendance at equity, diversity, and inclusion training sessions, and increasing opportunities for greater training in this area. These groups also recommended hiring professional consultants trained in equity, diversity, and inclusion (EDI) work to lead all 1L ethics and anti-oppression training, and recommended ensuring the content of ethics training includes meaningful discussion on the legacy of colonialism, anti-Black racism, and systemic legal discrimination.
In light of the recent changes to the JPT, Ultra Vires reached out to the same five equity-facing groups for their comments. The following can be attributed to Annecy Pang (2L), Asha Gordon (2L), Karlie Nordstrom (2L), Daniel Yang (3L), and Dhriti Chakravarty (2L) on behalf of ALS, BLSA, ILSA, OIL, and SALSA respectively:
“Our open letter was partially based on our feelings of the inadequacies of the existing professionalism and EDI training offered during the 1L curriculum. In 2019-2020, the training consisted of day-long sessions on Fridays in J250 that featured a variety of guest speakers that spoke on a range of topics. We felt that, although some speakers such as Toni De Mello were amazing, many students were not engaged during the training. We conducted an informal survey of our peers and many indicated similar opinions.
We met with Assistant Dean Faherty, Assistant Dean Archbold, and Student Mental Health & Wellness Program Manager Terry Gardiner on September 3 to voice our concerns and offer more concrete examples on how the EDI training could be revamped. Our suggestions centered on having smaller sessions more frequently, and throughout the entire three years of legal education so students are actually able to have a discussion and critically engage with the material and confront their own biases. We have not heard from the Assistant Deans since that meeting regarding the 1L training, and found out through the grapevine that the training originally scheduled for September 25 was cancelled and a series of lunchtime sessions centered around anti-bias work will take its place.
We hope that after these sessions, students, especially those that are not from historically marginalized backgrounds, are well-equipped to recognize and dismantle systemic racism within the legal sphere.”
Editor’s Note: Annecy Pang is UV’s Opinions Editor.
