How Should We Assess Interviewing and Counseling Skills?

The need to teach interviewing and counseling skills has long been established among clinical legal educators. Even among our non-clinical colleagues, these skills are recognized as integral to competent lawyering. While there remains considerable difference of opinion within the United States as to whether teaching such skills should be in a required course or simply be available as an elective, there is no doubt that a twenty-first century American law school must include the teaching of these skills in its curricular array.This paper first briefly describes the structure of legal education in the United States (insofar as clinical and skills teaching is concerned) and the almost total absence of any bar admission training or apprenticeship requirements. If the law schools are not required to fully train all future lawyers and the bar admission authorities likewise disavow responsibility for doing so, should clinical law professors assume the burden? I then go on to discuss the primary clinical evaluation technique of directly observing the student's performance, sometimes referred to as the gold standard method of assessment. Against the backdrop of the assertion that it is beneficial to use multiple methods of assessment, I then describe the several methods I have used to address the question of how best to assess interviewing and counseling skills. As an aside, it becomes clear that much more empirical analysis is in order

How Should We Assess Interviewing and Counseling Skills

This paper discusses the various ways in which interviewing and counseling skills may be assessed. It proceeds on the assumption that such skills are integral to competent lawyering and that they ought to be taught and evaluated in law school. After briefly describing the American legal context in which these skills might be taught, the paper begins with a discussion of One-on-One Teacher Feedback. This method might be used for learning purposes or for grading purposes or both. In either case, there should be criteria distributed with notice to the students. While this has been the preferred method among law school clinicians, medical education researchers have demonstrated that live professorial assessments are not always fair or consistent. This suggests, therefore, that alternative techniques ought to be explored, and that a more valid way to evaluate these skills might be to use multiple methods of assessment. At a minimum this approach might reflect more fairly students\u27 different learning styles. It might also take advantage of the opportunities students would have to improve their skills through repetition. The paper goes on to describe various other evaluation methods: Videotaped Performance Test - This is a written exam in which students are asked to complete an analysis of a video depiction of a lawyering performance. Multiple Choice Questions - In response to a video performance, a transcript of a performance or a transcript of the interaction, the students would be asked to answer multiple choice questions focused on the skills. Self Assessments - Students would be asked to complete an analysis of their own performance (usually videotaped) using the same kind of criteria or analytical framework used for the videotaped performance test. Standardized Clients - A lay person is trained to roleplay a client or witness and then to assess the performance of the student lawyer. The evaluation is done on a checklist prepared by the professors. Computerized Exams - One or more of the above options done either on line or on a DVD in which the students\u27 responses could be recorded and then transferred to the professor in the course. Each of these methods of assessment has its pros and cons, and that leads me to the conclusion that using a variety of methods of evaluation might be the best route to follow