The council of the American Bar Association’s Section of Legal Education and Admissions to the Bar recently approved proposed revisions aimed at increasing the number of distance education credits offered by law schools. These revisions are expected to be presented to the House of Delegates for review in August before any formal changes are made.
The decision to revise the existing standards comes after consideration by the council and a notice and comment period.
The number of law schools applying to the ABA for special approval to offer distance education programs has significantly increased due to the need during the COVID-19 pandemic and the awareness about the benefits of distance education that came after.
According to the revisions, the proposed changes would allow schools to offer up to 50% of the credit hours for a JD program online without ABA approval. Law schools are only permitted to offer up to 33% of the necessary credit hours through distance education without council approval under the current version of Standard 311.
These revisions hope to meet the fast demand for the expansion of online education and align with the U.S. Department of Education standards. Changing the policy would reduce the number of substantive change requests that the council receives because the U.S. Department of Education only needs accreditor approval if a program offers more than 50% of its credits online.
In addition to the increase in credits, the proposed revisions ask for a change in wording to guarantee a standard for quality in distance education. This entails utilizing technology that promotes learning objectives and offering faculty and student training on the use of the technology.
