Brian Leiter's Law School Reports

Bloomberg: Demand for Corporate Bankruptcy lawyers surges (Michael Simkovic)

See here.

Large U.S. law firms are scrambling to address a ballooning need for bankruptcy and corporate restructuring expertise.

The Covid-19 pandemic has unleashed an unprecedented severity and speed of corporate distress, as Chapter 11 filings pile up and fire-sale assets garner interest. Law firms are scouring the field to hire experienced restructuring attorneys, counter to what has otherwise been a declining attorney job market.

Bankruptcy is a niche area where many law schools have few full time faculty and instead rely on adjuncts (Chicago, NYU, Columbia, and USC are exceptions in terms of having a reasonably deep bench in this area).  With bankruptcy practitioners and judges overwhelmed with work, it may be difficult for schools that do not have full time bankruptcy faculty in place to meet student demand.

 

Update: Additional schools with relatively deep benches in bankruptcy include UCLA, Illinois, Texas, Georgetown, and Penn.  Apologies for any omissions.

Diamond & Cain on online vs. hybrid legal education during COVID (Michael Simkovic)

Steven Diamond and Patricia Cain discuss tradeoffs between online and hybrid legal education during the COVID pandemic and argue in favor of online based on health risks and concerns about diversity and inclusion.

An early sign about this year's job market for law teachers

According to a widely circulated list of hiring chairs at different law schools in the U.S., 117 have already named appointments chairs, compared to 138 last year.  That's not as big a drop-off as I had feared we might see.  Bear in mind that last year's 138 hiring chairs yielded 88 rookie hires at 66 law schools according to Professor Lawsky's data (of course, some schools hired laterals, not rookies).   Still, while this will definitely be a tighter job market, it may be somewhat better than many had feared.

July blogging hiatus

I'm taking a break from the blog in July in order to make progress on a book and deal with some other matters.  If there's something absolutely time-sensitive, I may put it up, but otherwise please don't send news items until very late July.  Thanks, as always, for reading.