Course Section | Columbia Law School

Section Description Provided by Instructor

NOTE - This course does not satisfy the Professional Responsibility requirement for students in the Juris Doctor program.

Seminar Goals: This year-long seminar and research practicum explores new frameworks, roles, and settings for advancing equality. It responds to the need to develop innovative approaches that move beyond litigation as the primary driver, and that can address the complex dynamics producing persistent inequality. It offers students a systems-approach to understanding and intervening to address these dynamics. The seminar identifies and analyzes the strategies of innovators involved in change initiatives, and does this through collaborative inquiry based on carefully selected readings from relevant disciplines, in-class participation of people involved in change, and field research exploring innovation in operation. The seminar encourages inquiry about what inclusive institutions look like, and how movement toward those goals occurs. It focuses on role of educational institutions in advancing or impeding full participation, but its approach applies across many other domains facing similar challenges. The seminar's work will be conducted in conjunction with the Center for Institutional and Social Change, which Professor Sturm co-directs. Students will receive 4 credits for the seminar in the fall semester and 3 credits for the seminar in the Spring semester. Students may also receive up to 3 additional clinical credits for the field research in the Spring semester.

Seminar Structure: During the first segment of the seminar, students co-facilitate two classes, write reflection papers, a political autobiography, and a research framing memorandum. They develop the research and analytical tools needed to conduct successful field research, including invaluable skills of facilitation, fact gathering, interviewing, and institutional design. Students will then conduct research, preferably in collaborative teams, on a variety of projects exploring innovation aimed at advancing full participation. The field research projects planned for 2010-11 include: (1) Innovative Lawyer Project, exploring the role of lawyers and law schools in enabling (or impeding) innovative approaches to diversity and inclusion, (2) Criminal Justice-to-College Project, exploring how a higher education institution can harness its capabilities and resources to address the problem of mass incarceration by focusing on the connections between education and criminal justice; (3) Advancing institutional Citizenship Project, exploring the frameworks and strategies in use at a higher education institution engaged in system-wide efforts to revitalize the community through research, teaching and community engagement; (4) Rutgers Future Scholars Project, exploring the frameworks and strategies of a partnership between Rutgers University and its neighboring schools, aimed at enabling college access and success of first generation students; and (5) Transformative Leadership Project, exploring the role of change agents responsible for advancing diversity and inclusion in higher education.

Seminar Selection: Admission to the seminar is by permission of the instructor. Interested students should email Professor Sturm (ssturm@law.columbia.edu) a resume and a paragraph describing: (1) the reasons they want to take the seminar, (2) any relevant background, coursework or experience, (3) possible areas of research interest, and (4) questions about the seminar. They should also include contact information and times they are available for an in-person or telephone interview with Professor Sturm. Students who apply before June 15 will receive preference. If space remains, Professor Sturm will consider applications for the seminar throughout the summer. Students are encouraged to consult current seminar participants about their experience.

Seminar Assessment: Students may receive major or minor writing credit for their work in the seminar. Students will be evaluated based on their seminar participation, their reflection papers and research memos prepared over the course of the semester, their data gathering and analysis, and their final project.