Facilitating Meaningful Change Within U.S. Law Schools

Despite the widely recognized challenges and complaints facing U.S. legal education, very little is understood about how law schools can adapt faster and better. This Article uses institutional theory, behavioral economics, and psychology to explain why change has proven so difficult for U.S. law schools. Next, using institutional entrepreneurship, the Article explains the theoretical steps necessary to overcome the institutional resistance to change. The Article then discusses the characteristics of opportunities that are most likely to better meet the needs of law students while also providing sustainable benefits to the individually innovating law schools. Using management theory, the Article then proposes a seven-step change process model to enable individual law schools to systematically overcome institutional resistance, formulate unique strategies, and actually achieve meaningful change

Ramshackle Federalism: America’s Archaic and Dysfunctional Presidential Election System

Accordingly, this Article proposes five sensible and achievable reforms to modernize the presidential election system. Each requires Congress and the federal government to play a much more proactive role in the presidential election system. The Constitution may be founded on federalist principles, but excessive decentralization is not serving us well in presidential election administration. In an age of tumultuous and accelerating change, the presidential election system must be modernized to meet the needs of twenty-first century America

Facilitating Distinctive and Meaningful Change Within U.S. Law Schools (Part 2): Pursuing Successful Plan Implementation Through Better Resource Management

In Part 1 of this series, one of the current authors used institutional theory, behavioral economics, and psychology to explain why U.S. law schools have had difficulty evolving faster and better. The author then used institutional entrepreneurship to propose a seven-step, faculty-led, operational change process designed to overcome institutional isomorphism and to enable each law school to formulate a distinctive, meaningful, strategic plan. In Part 2, the current article addresses the typical implementation challenges to be expected within the context of existing law school governance. The article begins by discussing the Resource Based View of the firm and the role of resource management in achieving competitive advantages. These considerations lay the foundation for the critical role of faculty engagement and law school leadership in successful strategic plan implementation. Next, within this context, the article discusses four questions whose answers may foreshadow implementation problems. Lastly, the article discusses the results of several Monte Carlo Simulations. The simulations provide insight into the likely performance problems caused by faculty misaligned with, or disengaged from, their law school’s strategic goals. The results suggest that even minimal faculty misalignment can have a significant deleterious effect on the ability of a given law school to achieve any distinctive position. All told, the article concludes that U.S. law schools can successfully implement distinctive and meaningful strategic plans within existing shared governance structures. However, success will be difficult to achieve. It requires the full engagement and leadership by both the faculty and the Dean, sustained operational support for strategic change, and the active management of law school resources

Smartbay: the development and implementation of an advanced marine technology platform on the west coast of Ireland

This paper is about the development, implementation and operation of SmartBay - a subsea cabled observatory and supporting infrastructure to stimulate the development of marine technology in Ireland. Blue Growth is the long term strategy of the European Union to support sustainable growth in the marine sector and offers great potential for innovation. The development of Ocean Technologies currently presents a number of challenges globally in terms of costs, reliability and longevity of infrastructure in the development of Renewable Energy, Blue Biotechnology, Water, and Environmental Monitoring & Management as well as more established markets such as Oil and Gas, Shipping and Security and Fishing and Aquaculture. We discuss the rationale behind the development of SmartBay in terms of addressing these challenges and focus particularly in the area of marine renewable energy technology development The design and installation phases of SmartBay are discussed. Costs were minimised, whilst maximising the range of features and applications that the infrastructure can provide to scientific and commercial users. The scientific subsea instrument node is also described in detail, along with the advanced supporting cyber-infrastructure that ensures the data is collected, processed archived and displayed as per end user requirements. The facility provides access to state of the art marine assets and resources for Researchers, Designers, Innovators and Entrepreneurs within Ireland and the EU and is a unique catalyst in the attraction of inward investment and venture capital investment. The SmartBay infrastructure platform centres on a core technology or service, the provision of high quality, time-series marine data. This is essential for a broader, interdependent ecosystem of businesses to develop and supply complementary value-added products and applications to wide multidisciplinary set of users. SmartBay’s role as a key technology node in broader European initiatives Ocean Observation initiatives like the European Multidisciplinary Seafloor and water column observatory (EMSO), which has been established as a European Research Infrastructure consortium (ERIC) is also discussed.Peer Reviewe

Print News Media and Prisoner Reentry: An Exploratory Study of Local Newspapers in 2018

In hopes to fill gaps on this subject, the current study uses ethnographic content analysis on newspaper articles while investigating the following research questions: (1) How does local news media portray recidivism by reentering prisoners? and in turn, (2) What are some characteristics of those news articles associated with the likelihood of local media using specific portrayals or “frames”? There are several reasons to examine these research questions. First, this research aims to convey how local news media might use their positions to create narratives for public consumption that foster worry and panic. This study can shed light on the overall narrative of risk that is provided for public consumption, including the differences in prevalence of different kinds of narratives. Second, in describing how media might create fear of those released from the criminal justice system, the current project also aids in understanding why more or less restrictive prison release policies may be adopted in certain communities. In some cases, this may mean that communities pursue policies that lack empirical evidence and, in turn, can lead to more harm to the community than good. Broadly, this project addresses disparities in support of reentry initiatives by focusing on both how it is portrayed across different local media sources and some of the factors associated with that portrayal. In doing so, the current project can help to shed light on public receptiveness that, subsequently, shapes the prospects and reception of returning prisoner

It\u27s not a phase mom: How Parental Acceptance Influences Long Term Well Being for Sexual and Gender Minorities

Disclosure of sexual and/or gender minority status, or coming out , is often an important step for sexual and gender minorities (SGM) that, along with components of familial acceptance such as support, discussion, and expression of affection, are critical in identity formation. While many studies have examined the harms of familial rejection on emerging SGM adults, few studies have examined the possible benefits of family acceptance. Our study examined the influence of SGM\u27s reported levels of accepting parental behaviors in regards to self-image, sexual satisfaction, and outlook on relationships which may have far-reaching implications for long-term health and happiness of emerging SGM adults.https://orb.binghamton.edu/research_days_posters_spring2020/1026/thumbnail.jp

Is it Automatic?: The Mens Rea Presumption and the Interpretation of the Machinegun Provision of 18 U.S.C. § 924(c) in \u3cem\u3eUnited States v. Burwell\u3c/em\u3e

In United States v. Burwell, the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit reviewed en banc the question of whether the Government must prove that the Defendant knew of the firearm’s automatic capability before invoking 18 U.S.C. § 924(c)(1)(B)(ii)’s mandatory thirty-year minimum sentence. The majority affirmed the Defendant’s conviction, holding that the D.C. Circuit’s previous holding in United States v. Harris determined that no mens rea applies to the machinegun provision. The dissenting opinion, however, argued that the Supreme Court’s decision in United States v. O’Brien, in which the Court held that the automatic capability of the firearm was an element of the offense, calls for the mens rea presumption to extend to that element. This Comment explains the differences in interpretation of the mens rea presumption between the majority and dissent, and argues that the dissenting opinion more accurately reflects the fundamental principles of the mens rea presumption