In August, the American Bar Association house of delegates resolved to urge law schools to let students receive payment and course credit for externships.
This resolution was adopted at the ABA annual meeting in Chicago. It also urges legal employers to consider paying law students for field placements, even students who are already receiving course credit.
In 2016, the ABA house delegates approved accreditation standard changes eliminating a ban on students receiving credit and payment for externships. The ABA, however, continued to let individual law schools decide whether to adopt that policy.
Over half of respondents to the ABA Young Lawyers Division’s 2021 student loan debt survey said they had more than $150,000 in student loan debt at graduation, according to the report with the resolution.
The proposal to allow credits and payment is increasingly relevant, as the council of the ABA Section of Legal Education and Admissions to the Bar is considering increasing the number of required credit hours for experiential learning from six to 15, the report said.
The delegates also passed Resolution 515, which urges law schools to encourage pay transparency during the on-campus interview process and urges legal employers to engage in it as well.
The report with the resolution said that without transparent salary information, candidates may enter negotiations at a disadvantage, unaware of the standard compensation for their role or the firm’s pay structure and this information asymmetry can perpetuate inequality and lead to unfair salary discrepancies.
About a third of law students are first generation, and 35% of these first-generation students graduate expecting to owe more than $120,000 in debt, compared with 23% of their non-first-generation peers, the report said.
The ABA Law Student Division submitted both resolutions.
