School To Decide On Paid Externships Behind Closed Doors

  After months of work, on January 29th, 2024, the CSU|Law Student Bar Association (SBA) voted to approve a proposal to, among other things, lift the ban on paid externships (see the full proposal at the QR code). We then offered to work together with the clinical faculty to study the proposal and come to a joint recommendation. 

They declined. 

Many Externships CSU law students choose are located downtown including judicial externships with both state and federal courts.

  Mindful of the history of this issue, we were worried something like this would happen. In the past five years, the school has rejected paid externships twice—once without even taking a vote. We have therefore made our process as open, transparent, and participatory as possible, both to make sure that students are informed and that the issue cannot be ignored. 

We are also aware of the valid concerns that faculty have, and of the expertise that they bring to the discussion. No response to the issue of unpaid externships can be truly comprehensive without the collaborative efforts of both students and clinical faculty. So, our next step—after issuing the proposal—was to ask the faculty to join students in a working group that could study the experiences of other schools, consult alumni and employers, and address faculty concerns. This would give faculty and students a chance to work together on a final recommendation to the Curriculum Committee and Faculty Senate. 

On January 22nd, we notified the chair of the Curriculum Committee that we planned to ask for a working group instead of an immediate vote. 

Instead of a response, we got an email from Dean Fisher, who told us that, because the Faculty Curriculum Committee has a “very full semester agenda,” he had unilaterally decided to form an ad hoc committee on externships. He also told us that “we have decided that the best way to get meaningful student input is to meet with students as part of the Committee’s process rather than have 1-2 students serve on the committee.” 

We have some concerns. 

First, this shuts students out of an area of school governance they have an established role in (through their representatives on the Curriculum Committee). This is like if the President announced that, because Congress has a lot on its plate, he’s starting his own committee to enact a new federal budget. 

Deciding on such a crucial issue without students adds to many students’ growing sense that they have little to no say in major decisions made at CSU|Law. Dean Fisher has told SBA that he will encourage the committee to be transparent with the student body. We hope that’s true. But without actual student involvement in the process, we can only rely on promises (which, as future lawyers, none of us should be comfortable with). And the fact that SBA (which has been publicly working on this issue for months) never heard about this new committee until now does not inspire confidence. 

Second, the idea that the best way to get “meaningful student input” is to deny students the right to participate in the process is also highly questionable. We agree that one or two student committee members shouldn’t claim to speak for the entire student body, but a committee can easily solicit a wide range of student input while including student members. It’s a false dichotomy, and it’s difficult to avoid the conclusion that the school simply does not want students involved in this process. 

Third, and most importantly, this decision threatens to make history repeat itself. Instead of the open, collaborative process SBA called for, the school has decided to deliberate on its own, behind closed doors. There is no guarantee that the committee will seek out the facts we think are essential to an informed decision—such as, for example, the experiences of other schools with paid externships. There is nothing to stop the committee from simply using its time to formulate the best way to say “no,” rather than making a good faith effort to study the issue. There is nothing to stop the school from voting “no” with no explanation—or, worse, not voting at all. Because the committee has no deadline, it’s not hard to imagine the issue falling by the wayside as the semester drags on. It’s not hard to imagine because in 2019, that’s exactly what happened. 

We don't have a problem with forming an ad hoc committee to study the issue of paid externships—indeed, we support that. We don’t have a problem with any individual members of the committee. We are ready to consult with the committee as much as possible and answer any questions the committee has. And we fervently hope that the committee will do what Dean Fisher says it will do—work with students in a transparent way. 

But we are nevertheless deeply concerned with students being cut out of the process. We have a problem with a committee with no set end date that can easily allow the issue to die. We have a problem with confining the two indispensable parties in this discussion, students and clinical faculty, within their own siloes. We have a problem with going around students' elected representatives. And we have a problem with history repeating itself.