Groups begin zeroing in on specific areas of study
When the Vision 2016 commission met in Orlando during the Bar’s Winter Meeting, administrator Jay Cohen tasked the four subgroups to narrow their fields of study.
Cohen said the groups will spend the next six months educating themselves on those core topics, so the commission may begin to build a “a roadmap to come up with some kind of deliverables,” as Vision 2016 moves into its second year. The subgroups were assisted by some outside consultants who are considered experts in the related fields.
Bar Admissions Group
Bar Admissions Group Chair Lanse Scriven of Tampa said the subcommittee will dig deeply into the areas of multi-jurisdictional practice, both internationally and domestically, and other licensing issues.
Washington State recently passed legislation that provides for a limited law license, he noted.
“Essentially, it creates a whole new infrastructure for licensing nonlawyers to engage in the limited practice of law,” Scriven said.
The group will also study the uniform bar examination movement. There are 14 states now using a unified bar exam, he said.
“Everything we are looking at — ranging from reciprocity to uniform bar examination — is all what I consider to be sea changes,” Scriven said. “Whether we have persons besides lawyers who are permitted to engage in things lawyers do now, these things will affect our profession tremendously.”
The Bar Admissions Group was assisted by Kellie Early of the National Conference of Bar Examiners and Michele Gavagni, executive director of the Florida Board of Bar Examiners.
Technology Group
Chair John Stewart of Vero Beach said the Technology Group will concentrate over the next six months on five areas most likely to technologically impact the profession by 2020:
* Technology that performs lawyer or legal functions;
* Integration of technology into law offices;
* Courtroom technology;
* “Big Data,” which includes assisted review and predictive coding software; and
* How technology affects the work and employment of lawyers, both in dissipation and opportunities.
The Technology Group was assisted by University of Miami law Professor Michele DeStefano; Jim Calloway, director of the Oklahoma Bar’s Management Assistance Program; and Jordan Furlong of Edge International.
Legal Education Group
Chair Debra Moss Curtis, a professor at Nova Southeastern University Law Center, said the Legal Education Group will focus on external factors affecting legal education, which is coming from changes in the legal profession itself.
“We talked about a variety of those external factors, including the accreditation process, technology, Bar admissions, and the needs of the public,” Curtis said. “All of these are external factors that press on and shape legal education.”
“We ended with the idea that we want to be in a place where we, as this commission, could be in a position to work with law schools to help them and partner with them to determine what it is that they can do to effectuate whatever changes,” she said.
Curtis said the group doesn’t think it can come up with “one- size-fits-all” answers.
“That is not possible in today’s economy, nor is it desirable,” Curtis said. “We know we are coming to a place where some law schools simply may be restructuring what they are doing, and other law schools may be completely exploding what they are doing and making major changes.”
The Legal Education Group, she said, will study the idea of competencies.
“When we talk about competencies, we are talking about knowledge, skills, and professional identities,” Curtis said. “What students should be learning, what they should be shaping, what should be happening to them during this time period that we can say they have developed competencies.”
“There may be some core competencies that anybody who comes through legal education should be learning. And there might be different competencies for different kinds of law schools or students within the same law school who want to practice in different ways or places or do something else with their law degree.”
The next step is to identify, define, and develop a range of competencies that take into account all of the external pressures “and will lead us to the place of being able to work with law schools in positive ways,” she said.
The Legal Education Group was assisted by Nova’s Law Dean Emeritus Joe Harbaugh.
Delivery of Legal Services/Pro Bono Group
Chair Adele Stone of Ft. Lauderdale said the Delivery of Legal Services/Pro Bono Group has narrowed its focus to delivery of services, which will have a lot of overlap with the other subgroups, including looking at the trend of allowing nonlawyers to deliver what is traditionally a legal service.
“That has to be explored, whether you like it or don’t like it, whether it scares you or doesn’t scare you,” Stone said.
The panel will also study unbundled legal services, innovations to assist pro se litigants, and the overabundance of lawyers.
“We talk about how the population is underserved, but there are an awful lot of lawyers, and the paradox and irony that there are so many lawyers who can’t find employment, yet there are so many clients who can’t afford lawyers,” Stone said.
Stone said the subcommittee has decided not to delve too far into delivering legal service to indigents because The Florida Bar Foundation recently engaged a consultant to look at the current system of legal aid. Stone said the group will work with the Foundation, but not duplicate its efforts.
The Delivery of Legal Services/Pro Bono Group was assisted by Melissa Pershing of The Florida Bar Foundation and Kent Spuhler, director of Florida Legal Services.
