This exhaustive 160-page study explores expected changes in law school instruction program formats, subject areas, experiential education, and much more. It is designed to answer questions such as: inwhich areas of law will be stressed more, or less, or about the same as now, in the near future? How will law school staffing shape up over the next few years? Will law schools use more adjuncts or fewer? How will law schools react to the challenges of artificial intelligence and how will this impact the law school curriculum?
Selected findings
More hybrid J.D. programs are expected by 63.24% of respondents; 51.47% anticipate more flexible or part-time schedules and 50.00% foresee more fully online J.D. programs.
Artificial intelligence and law is the leading expected area of substantial instructional expansion, selected by 88.24%. Data privacy and cybersecurity follows at 67.65%, and legal technology and automation at 57.35%.
Experiential education draws a more mixed forecast: 38.23% expect expansion, 20.59% expect little change, and 20.59% anticipate contraction.
On staffing, 45.59% foresee a combination of greater use of non-tenure-track faculty, adjuncts, and technology-assisted instruction; 44.12% expect greater reliance on adjunct faculty and practicing attorneys. No respondent selects greater reliance on tenure-track faculty.
Concern about entry-level hiring is pronounced: 41.18% expect employer demand for new J.D. graduates to decrease in the next five years, while 8.82% expect it to increase. Another 27.94% foresee little change.
The report provides law school deans, faculty, and curriculum planners with benchmarks on how respondents expect programs and teaching roles to develop.
Data is broken out by numerous variables including age, gender and work title of individuals and the size and public/private status of their institutions.