As many of you know, I have had many different roles and titles in bar leadership and within the legal profession. It’s been one of the great honors of my life that I’ve recently added “Adjunct Professor of Law” to that list. Becoming a teacher, specifically a professor, has been a dream of mine for as long as I can remember, and I still cannot believe I get the privilege to teach future members of our legal community. I think teaching is such an underrated skill, and teachers at all levels do not get the praise, recognition, and respect that they deserve. I am so incredibly grateful for my American education (grade school to law school), and that is in large part because of my well-qualified, passionate teachers. I’ve learned that the best teachers not only need to teach the subject content well but also to inspire their students to learn. Once I was offered the position of adjunct professor of law, I felt a little déjà vu. No one really prepares you for the shift from practicing law to becoming an adjunct professor, just as no one prepares you for the move from law school to lawyer life. Below are lessons I’ve learned as an adjunct professor that I hope will inspire some of you practicing attorneys to teach the next generation.
So, you’ve been offered an adjunct position; what’s next? Be confident. Trust yourself. You have the qualifications required to be an adjunct professor of law, or you likely would not have been offered the position. To stay confident, you need to prepare, prepare, prepare. The only way to feel remotely comfortable teaching class is to prepare the lesson plan for the day. I’ve learned to prepare for depositions and trials in great length and detail because it’s the only way I feel ready and less nervous on the actual day of the deposition or trial. The same can be said of the day of class. You owe it to your students to be prepared to teach that day’s material the best you can. I teach legal writing, and I usually read the assigned material before preparing the PowerPoint lecture for my students. This takes work. It’s extra work on top of my day job, but I still find it incredibly rewarding because when you teach something to someone, you’re also learning something yourself. In this case, I’m learning to communicate better with my students, so I am developing better verbal communication skills, which is something essential to all lawyers.
As lawyers, we know that no matter how much we prepare, things can always change, and we need to roll with the punches. The same can be said about teaching class. Sometimes, students ask questions that take your class in another direction, or you end up having technology issues (I teach class via Zoom). Whatever the obstacle, you need to gracefully handle the situation. Pay attention. This is so important—I cannot emphasize it enough. You are the teacher. You need to know what is going on throughout the duration of the course. If you do not know what just happened, you will not know how to address the situation. Lawyers are used to adapting, to solving problems relatively quickly while hiding our stress levels. There was one time when my audio stopped working while I was teaching, and my students could not hear me. This was critical given that I teach over Zoom. I had PowerPoint slides during the lecture that covered its content: the basics of case briefs, samples of case briefs, and case briefs for cases the students were to use for their first major assignment, Memo 1. Needless to say, the material for this class was extremely important. Fortunately, the sound outage was brief, but during that time, I communicated with my students over the Zoom chat. I usually stay after class just in case any students have additional questions, and for this class, I stayed longer than usual, given the audio hiccup. Remember that this is a learning experience. You’re going to get better after each class.
I have already received feedback from my students that they appreciate my being readily available. While I might not always respond to emails instantly, I do pride myself on responding to emails relatively fast. I have several inboxes, so I do have to sort through a lot of emails, but I will get to each email eventually! This is important. Students need you to be there for them. As adjunct professors, we are still practicing lawyers, so we have very busy lives, but we knew this before starting the job. Some of my students have expressed that certain of their other professors do not respond to any of their emails and have not made time for them via office hours. I find this alarming, given that this is our job. I remember that, as a student, I also found it very hard to see some of my professors during their office hours or receive responses from them to my emails. When your student reaches out to you, it might seem like a nuisance, but that’s part of the job. Try to remember your experience as a law student and be the good professor who is there for their students. In the end, your students’ efforts and skills will ultimately speak for themselves through their assignments and exams, but that is if you are available for them when they reach out to you.
If you are considering becoming an adjunct professor, do it. It is such a rewarding job. And it’s possibly a stepping stone to a tenure teaching position. It’s a position that takes you away from your billable lawyer life. Simply put, it is an opportunity to grow as a person and give back to the community as a whole. We all decided to go to law school in some regard because we enjoy learning about the law. While I understand teaching the law is different, you still get to learn about the law in the process, and it’ll stay fresh in your mind. Lawyers possess so much knowledge and owe a duty to help their community—knowledge really is power. Law professors have an even higher duty because they are not only lawyers but teachers of the next generation of lawyers. As Uncle Ben said to Peter Parker in Spider-Man, “With great power comes great responsibility.” It’s a huge responsibility and one I am so honored and humbled to bear.
