Those of us who went to law school back in the days before computers, cellphones, light bulbs, carry one very similar memory with us when we step into the well of the court.  No professor ever called us by name.  I was routine called “mustache man.”  I believe this had something to do with having a mustache, though another guy was called “blue shirt” and we both had blue shirts.

Back then, it was viewed as one of those quirky oddities that distinguished law school from, oh, kindergarten.  We are being toughened up so that when we stepped into the real arena, the one where real people’s lives were on the line, we didn’t expect to be coddled.  We suspected profs knew our real names, and occasionally one would slip and utter a syllable before correcting himself.  Others just pointed and called us “you”.  These were heady times.

The ABA thinks this is just horrible, and has developed “Best Practices” to “Foster a Supportive Environment.”  No doubt, that’s to simulate the supportive environment students will find when they enter a real courtroom someday as lawyers.  The ABA has promulgated rules :

Learn students’ names. This is perhaps the single most important thing a teacher can do to create a positive climate in the classroom. Call students by name in and out of the classroom. Do not allow them to be anonymous, to feel they can fade out without anyone’s knowing or caring.

Learn about students’ experiences and use them in class. Ask students to provide you with information about themselves: where they are from, undergraduate school and major, graduate degrees, work experience, other experience related to the course, hobbies, and anything else they want you to know. Ask students to share their experiences at relevant times in the course.

Let students get to know you. Introduce yourself at the beginning of the course, letting students know about your professional and personal interests. Fill out the same informational survey you ask the students to complete. Go to lunch with students and attend student events.

“Wipe their noses” and “Serve them milk and cookies” failed to capture a majority vote of the committee. Go figure.

This has caused a raging debate to break out in the academy.  Randazza wants to treat them like human beings. Jay Wexler called his students by their last names when he started professoring, but then his “Doofus Prevention System” kicked in and he’s opted for first names.  The Rickster Esenberg at Co-Op mixes it up, possibly as a result of early onset dementia, while Nate Olman, wannabe curmudgeon, defaults to the formality of last names, but admits his reasoning:

Of course, the sad truth is that I am really bad at remembering names of all kinds, and I regularly screw-up even my own students’ last names. I had been married for several years before I was able to sort out all of the names in my wife’s extended family. I am still working on all of the names in my own. Given that some sizable proportion of the male law student population is named “Matt” I might be better off simply dispensing with last names entirely. Still, I keep last names because I actually think that there is some pedagogical and social value to formality.

Curious how none of these scholars, sufficiently concerned about their choice to mention it, have asked themselves the primary question:  What is the ABA talking about?  Supportive environment?  Why?

Deep within the bowels of the academy, professors, while sipping sherry and adjusting the elbow patches on their tweed jackets, complain about the whininess of their students.  Putting an end to this whining is high on their priority list, yet they thoughtlessly enable this “supportive environment” nonsense because the phrase involves two words currently in vogue. 

So let’s clear this up now.  There is no “supportive environment” in the law.  Our job is done under constant siege, with everyone else in the courtroom out to get us.  That’s why they call it an “adversary system” instead of a “happy friendly system.”  When everybody is being nice to you, it’s either because you have a brain tumor and won’t last the trial or they are setting you up for the fall. 

Do you think this is helping your students, by lulling them into a false sense of warmth and caring?  Turn up the heat.  Turn up the pressure.  If they can’t perform when they’re feeling alone and vulnerable, then this isn’t the job for them.  Or maybe they can take the abbreviated law school curriculum calculated to perfect their skills at document review and leave the rest to the students who can tough it out. 

Gideon just provided a list of the 10 things he didn’t learn in law school.  Let me add to the list, perhaps as number 8(a), that judges may smile warmly at you when you give your appearance, but they don’t really like you.  They don’t feel much of anything at all.  And if you open your mouth and the wrong thing comes out, they will rip your throat out in a flash, some of them still smiling as they do it.  Have you prepared Mr. Jones or Ashley for that?

I realize that pedagogical approaches, like skirt hems, move around all the time so that new lawprofs can write stories about how last year’s approach was wrong.  But in the trenches, things rarely change.  If your students care too much about what you call them, there’s a strong chance that they aren’t going to be able to stand up to the rigors of abuse of a system designed to constantly test their mettle.

Do your students a favor.  Forget their names.  The judge will.

And while you’re at it, make them call you “professor”.  They have to learn not to choke on that, just as they will when the call judges “your honor.”  Consider it a learning experience.