LEGAL PROFESSION
By Andrew Pearce
Where Do We Go from Here? Texas Law Schools Chart a Course
T
his year has witnessed a renewed resolve concerning diversity and antiracism, with many asking: “Where do we go from here?” To answer that question, we reached out to the leaders of Texas’ law schools to learn what they have been doing, and what more they plan to do, to engage in meaningful conversations with their students, faculty, and community. We also asked how they plan to move from conversation to action, in an effort to make meaningful and lasting change.1 For many, the work to foster a diverse and inclusive law school and legal profession began years ago, and those efforts have already begun to show results. For example, SMU Dedman School of Law has increased the diversity of its incoming class from 18.7% students of color in 2014 to over 30% in this fall’s incoming class. South Texas College of Law Houston saw its percentage of students of color increase over the last decade from 31.1% to 45.5%, and the percentage of women went from 46.0% to 54.4%. Similarly, Texas Tech School of Law’s admissions numbers are among the school’s most notable diversity successes over the last three years. The school’s entering class went from 28.1% students of color in 2017 to 38.8% by 2019. More recently, Texas law schools have begun
efforts to identify and implement wideranging initiatives, such as creating new faculty positions focused on diversity and inclusion, requiring implicit bias training, finding ways to increase the pipeline of diverse students applying to study law, and encouraging authentic conversations between faculty, staff, and students. Below is what the deans and other representatives of several Texas law schools had to say. Thurgood Marshall School of Law at Texas Southern University Thurgood Marshall School of Law (TMSL), named after the late Justice Thurgood Marshall, is the only law school in Texas created as a result of state-sanctioned discrimination. Yet, despite its unprivileged beginning, TMSL has embraced its mission of expanding opportunities for the underserved in the legal profession and has been at the forefront of diversity and inclusion initiatives since its founding. According to Chevazz Brown, a partner at Jackson Walker and former TMSL valedictorian, “No school in Texas has done more in terms of creating access for people of color to the legal profession than TMSL.” And the numbers back up that statement. As reported by Texas Lawyer in a March 2018 article, 91% of TMSL’s students hail from minority racial and ethnic backgrounds. TMSL plays a critical role in addressing racial injustice by, among other things, supplying the legal profession with lawyers from those communities who truly understand and represent the experiences of their communities. For many, TMSL provides the only opportunity into the profession. As Dean Joan Bullock stated, “TMSL’s next chapter in addressing racial injustice is its emphasis on educating law students not just on the law, but more importantly, on the history and context in which the laws as we know them were created. This knowledge will equip these soon-to-be attorneys as discerning advocates leading the charge to address seemingly neutral laws that have a disparate and negative impact
