Page 6 - University of Baltimore Law - Fall 2019

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Externships Come Into Sharper Focus
UBLaw students are now required to earn six credits of experiential
learning in order to graduate, three of those serving actual clients. To help
students get the most from these experiential learning opportunities, Prof. Margaret Johnson (top right), director of the Bronfein Family Law Clinic and co-director of the Center on Applied Feminism, has been promoted to associate dean for experiential education.
Johnson will oversee UB’s clinical law program, which is ranked 15th in the nation by U.S. News & World Report, and comprises 12 clinics. Johnson also will oversee the externship program, directed by the school’s newest faculty member and director of externships, Prof. Neha Lall (bottom right), who joined the faculty in May 2019.
Approximately 200 students work in the clinics or in externships each year. Clinic students serve an average of 460 low-income clients annually.
“By formally bringing the externship program into the experiential learning curriculum, the law school is demonstrating the important educational role that externships play. This puts UB Law ahead of the curve on this issue nationally,” says Lall, whose experience includes clinical teaching at Northeastern University School of Law and at the University of Chicago Law School. She is teaching an Attorney Practice Externship seminar, along with several adjunct faculty.
“We want to build on this externship program, which has a long history here,” says Lall, “and make sure it meets the needs of students and also provides them with the best quality learning experience.
“Externships are a powerful learning experience for law students, affording them an opportunity to see the law in action. We could not maintain this program without the commitment and dedication of our UB Law alumni and our community partners. I am excited to work with our partners to help them support our students on their journey,” she says.
These practical learning experiences have numerous benefits for students, who work throughout Maryland, Washington, D.C. and Virginia. “An externship is a great way to help define your professional identity. It’s a safe space to make mistakes that you don’t get in the real world,” says Lall, who spent 13 years as a Legal Aid attorney in Chicago, first working on domestic violence and sexual assault issues, and later as a supervising attorney for housing issues at the Legal Assistance Foundation, now LAF.
One of the goals of the externship seminar is to help students understand their own personalities and communication styles, so they can decide what career paths might work best for them. “We teach them how to ask for feedback from supervisors, how to receive that feedback, and how to integrate it,” she says.
“The associate deanship is a recognition by our dean that experiential education is critical to what makes the UB legal education special,” says Johnson. “We are so fortunate to have Neha here, because she brings such a wealth of teaching experience in the experiential learning curriculum, as well as lengthy experience as a practicing lawyer.”
Wehle Makes Media Splash Discussing Mueller Inquiry, Constitution Book
Prof. Kim Wehle has had quite a year. Her media appearances, in which she provides a constitutional
scholar’s perspective on questions about Russian interference in the 2016 election and subsequent actions by the Trump administration, escalated sharply in 2018- 19 as the probe by Special Counsel Robert Mueller gathered momentum.
In her book, How to Read the Constitution
— and Why, Wehle helps readers appreciate
how critical the Constitution is to preserving
democracy. Over the summer, Wehle had
multiple media appearances and gave public
talks to promote the book, which publisher HarperCollins touts as “an insightful, urgent, and perennially relevant handbook that lays out in common sense language how the United States Constitution works, and how its protections are eroding before our eyes.”
Following its June 25 launch, Wehle’s book was promoted in the nation’s airports and offered free to subway riders in New York City. Companion guides were created for book groups and high school students, and the author herself narrated the audiobook version.
Wehle, who joined the UB Law faculty in 2009, is already under contract with HarperCollins to write What You Need to Know About the Right to Vote – and Why, due out in July 2020. And she’s working on The Outsourced Constitution: How Public Power in Private Hands
Erodes Democracy, also due out in 2020 from Cambridge University Press.
Wehle is determined to seize the moment during this pivotal time in our history. “It has been a privilege to have
a voice on these topics that’s down the middle and rule-of-law-based,” she says. “Many Americans walk around assuming that their constitutional rights and the democratic structure are set in stone. Some worry that we’re in the twilight of our democracy, but I hope this [book] leads to greater constitutional literacy.”
Wehle teaches federal courts, civil procedure and administrative law at UB. Her experience as a former assistant U.S. attorney and associate independent counsel in the Whitewater investigation have made her especially valuable as a legal analyst on TV and radio programs, providing a constitutional law perspective on White House investigations, Supreme Court decisions and other matters involving the Department of Justice and the separation of powers.
She has appeared on CNN, MSNBC, NPR, PBS Newshour and
Fox News. This year she became an on-air and off-air legal expert, analyst and commentator for CBS News, a contributor for BBC World News and a contributor for The Bulwark and The Hill.
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