Gotanda, John Y.

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Villanova University School of Law: Digital Repository

Volume 61 Issue 3 Article 1 10-24-2016 The Deans' Letters: 1956/2016 John Y. Gotanda Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.law.villanova.edu/vlr  Part of the Law Commons Recommended Citation John Y. Gotanda, The Deans' Letters: 1956/2016, 61 Vill. L. Rev. 377 (2016). Available at: https://digitalcommons.law.villanova.edu/vlr/vol61/iss3/1 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by Villanova University Charles Widger School of Law Digital Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in Villanova Law Review by an authorized editor of Villanova University Charles Widger School of Law Digital Repository. VILLANOVA LAW REVIEWVOLUME 61 2016 NUMBER 3Norman J. Shachoy SymposiumTHE DEANS’ LETTERS: 1956/2016JOHN Y. GOTANDA*As student Bob Garbarino walked along a law school corridor, he en-countered Dean Harold Gill Reuschlein.  The Dean waylaid him andinformed him that he would be the first editor-in-chief of theVillanova Law Review.  And so the adventure began.ON this sixtieth anniversary of the Villanova Law Review, our annualNorman J. Shachoy Symposium takes a celebratory retrospectivelook, examining various significant articles previously published in thejournal.  For this issue, I would like to focus on one of the very first writ-ings to appear in Volume I: an introduction in the form of a Dean’s Letter,penned in 1956 by our founding Dean, Harold Gill Reuschlein.  There,Dean Reuschlein introduced the inaugural issue of the journal by proudlyproclaiming that it marked “a point of time when the program of theSchool of Law has come to full flower.”1  He proceeded to paint a pictureof the then two- and one-half-year-old school: an institution with first-ratestudents and an innovative academic program, along with a faculty dedi-cated to teaching, scholarship, and service.  In addition, he used the occa-sion to announce the building of “the most modern and adequate lawschool facilities to be found anywhere”—Garey Hall.2  Dean Reuschleinwas a remarkable leader and a true visionary.  In record time, he builtVillanova Law into one of the country’s top law schools, laid the founda-tion for future generations of successful Villanova lawyers, and set forththe blueprint for the law school to thrive in today’s changing legal world.Dean Reuschlein also set forth his vision for the law school, whichincluded attracting students who would be leaders in the profession, offer-ing innovative academic programs, maintaining a student-centered focus,* Arthur J. Kania Dean and Professor of Law, Villanova University CharlesWidger School of Law, 2011–2016.1. See Harold Gill Reuschlein, The Dean’s Letter, 1 VILL. L.  REV. 2 (1956) [here-inafter Reuschlein, Dean’s Letter].2. Id. at 3.(377)1Gotanda: The Deans' Letters: 1956/2016Published by Villanova University Charles Widger School of Law Digital Repository, 2016378 VILLANOVA LAW REVIEW [Vol. 61: p. 377founding centers of excellence, and establishing a first-rate facility.  Bypursuing these goals, the law school has flourished.I. STUDENT LEADERSOne of the great strengths of Dean Reuschlein was in the area of ad-missions: he was a tireless student recruiter who had an eye for talent.  Henot only convinced many students with outstanding academic credentialsto forsake offers of admissions from well-established institutions, DeanReuschlein traveled from college to college, seeking out those with leader-ship skills and military service, encouraging them to join the fledgling lawschool.  This strategy paid off handsomely for Villanova Law.Graduates of those early classes, many from backgrounds with limitedfinancial resources, would go on to become managing partners in leadinglaw firms, heads of multinational companies, members of Congress, distin-guished judges, general counsels of Fortune 500 companies, and leaderscommitted to serving their communities.  Moreover, they paved the pathfor future classes, as well as provided role models for countless students.Indeed, today, our alumni include a U.S. Senator; a member of the U.S.House of Representatives; a former Governor of the Commonwealth ofPennsylvania; the Lieutenant Governor of Pennsylvania; numerous federaland state court judges; CEOs and general counsels of major companiesand businesses; the President of the AFL-CIO; the COO of the U.S. Cham-ber of Commerce; managing partners of some of the nation’s largest lawfirms; and lawyers who are at the forefront of some of the country’s mosthigh profile matters, like the 9/11 first responders suit and the NFL con-cussion litigation.  And true to our mission, Villanova lawyers, no mattertheir calling, distinguish themselves through serving the profession andtheir communities.II. INNOVATIVE ACADEMIC PROGRAMSFrom its beginning, Villanova Law has been committed to an innova-tive program that provides a first-rate legal education.  In fact, when askedby the Pennsylvania Board of Bar Examiners whether the new schoolwould comply with the American Bar Association’s standards, Dean Reus-chlein responded that such standards only set forth the minimal require-ments for accreditation, and that Villanova would strive to provide asuperior legal education that would greatly exceed them.3  He set out tobuild a program that included a wide range of offerings, including newcourses designed to “give our students as much in the way of practicaltraining as is possible.”4  To this end, he engaged not only the eight mem-3. See HAROLD GILL REUSCHLEIN, J. EDWARD COLLINS & ROBERT P. GARBARINO,THE VILLANOVA UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF LAW (A HISTORY) 15 (1991) [hereinafterREUSCHLEIN ET AL., HISTORY OF VILLANOVA LAW].4. See Reuschlein, Dean’s Letter, supra note 1, at 3.2Villanova Law Review, Vol. 61, Iss. 3 [2016], Art. 1https://digitalcommons.law.villanova.edu/vlr/vol61/iss3/12016] THE DEANS’ LETTERS 379bers of the faculty, but also distinguished members of the bar and otherdisciplines.Today, we still follow his blueprint.  The program of legal educationat Villanova Law not only provides first-rate analytic skills, but real worldexperiences so that our graduates can hit the ground running on day one.Students hone their advocacy and writing skills through an intensive writ-ing program containing six semesters of writing requirements.  They alsocan gain highly-valued, hands-on experience through more than 150 ex-ternship opportunities and seven in-house clinics.  We also have broad-ened our interdisciplinary offerings, particularly at the intersection of lawand business, so that students learn to collaborate with professionals inother fields.III. STUDENT-CENTERED FOCUSVillanova Law has built a tradition of placing students at the heart ofthe law school.  The school’s inaugural faculty established an open-doorpolicy with respect to students.  They served as advisors, counseling stu-dents on “career planning, curriculum matters, and all other problemsthat may be associated with the study of law.”5  In addition, Dean Reus-chlein engaged the university’s practicing alumni to assist students in ob-taining preceptors for the Pennsylvania Bar.  He also set up a placementservice to help students obtain employment.  This tradition has continuedever since.Just this past year, the law school instituted an innovative, three-year,mandatory professional development program.  One of the most robustprograms of its kind among law schools, Villanova’s professional develop-ment program encourages and engages students in individualized and ac-tive career exploration and professional development.  This collaborativeprogram among Villanova Law School faculty, the career strategy office,and alumni mentors ensures context for and continuity between academicwork, clinic experiences, and externships.  Through lectures, individualand small group meetings, self-directed assignments and career strategyevents, the professional development program covers topics such as pro-fessionalism, networking, communication and presentation skills, goal de-velopment, time and project management, professional independence,and the lawyer as entrepreneur.  By requiring these new professional de-velopment courses during all three years of law school, we are working toensure that our students not only have top-notch legal skills, but also the“soft skills” so coveted by today’s employers.IV. CENTERS OF EXCELLENCEDean Reuschlein also recognized that a law school must not only pro-vide a top-quality education to its students, but it must also play a role in5. See id.3Gotanda: The Deans' Letters: 1956/2016Published by Villanova University Charles Widger School of Law Digital Repository, 2016380 VILLANOVA LAW REVIEW [Vol. 61: p. 377the creation of knowledge, provide a forum in which “information andopinion may be brought and weighed by persons,” and serve as a resourcefor the profession and the community.6  He thus founded the Institute ofChurch and State Relations to serve these goals.Today, Villanova Law is home to three endowed centers of excel-lence: the Jeffrey S. Moorad Center for the Study of Sports Law; the DavidF. and Constance B. Girard-diCarlo Center for Ethics, Integrity and Com-pliance; and the John F. Scarpa Center for Law and Entrepreneurship—each established with a generous $5 million gift to the law school.  Thesecenters have made Villanova a thought-leader on laws and public policy intheir fields.  They bring leaders in academia, business, government, andthe community to the law school to discuss today’s most important issues.They provide students with innovative courses, as well as journal, clinical,and externship opportunities.Plans are underway to establish a fourth center of excellence: theCenter for Law and Religion, which would bring under its umbrella themany programs already existing at the law school in this area, as well as thegoals of the Institute of Church and State which for many years had beensilent.  Furthermore, the Institute to Address Commercial Sexual Exploita-tion has established Villanova Law as the statewide clearinghouse for train-ing and information regarding the urgent issue of sex trafficking inPennsylvania.V. FROM GAREY HALL TO THE NEW SCHOOL OF LAWIn 1953, the law school welcomed the first class to its temporary homein Falvey Library.  Of course, from the beginning, Dean Reuschlein hadgrand plans for a permanent facility.  As he announced in the introduc-tion to the first issue of the Villanova Law Review, the law school would bemoving the following year to a new home in Garey Hall.  When it openedin 1957, Garey Hall had a library capable of housing 160,000 volumes,twelve faculty offices, and a “well-appointed student lounge replete with agreat stone fireplace and an adjoining outdoor flagstone terrace overlook-ing the campus.”7  It also had three classrooms—“one for the first yearstudents [that] could comfortably accommodate 170, [one] for the secondyear [students that held] about 90, while the third year students were as-signed to an attractive courtroom with [a] jury box . . . which seated 60students.”8While Garey Hall underwent many renovations throughout the years,it was clear by the nineties that the law school needed a new building.After years of searching the Main Line for a suitable location, we settledon the perfect site—the lot adjacent to Garey Hall.  With the generous6. See id. at 4.7. See REUSCHLEIN ET AL., HISTORY OF VILLANOVA LAW, supra note 3, at 30.8. Id.4Villanova Law Review, Vol. 61, Iss. 3 [2016], Art. 1https://digitalcommons.law.villanova.edu/vlr/vol61/iss3/12016] THE DEANS’ LETTERS 381support of the university and our alumni, in 2009, we moved into one ofthe finest buildings in all of legal education.9Our new facility boasts over three times the usable square footage asGarey Hall when it opened.  It has approximately five times as many class-rooms and faculty offices, a state-of-the-art ceremonial courtroom, dedi-cated offices for the law school’s three journals and Moot Court Board,and a beautiful library with 45,000 net square feet of space, with stackspace for over 350,000 volumes.  The building also contains an open two-and one-half story commons; a dining room on the lower level and coffeebar on the first level, providing breakfast, lunch, and snacks; a facultycenter; a student lounge; and space for student organizations.  It not onlyprovides an exceptional teaching environment, but also an ultra-modernfacility to host academic conferences, workshops, and symposia.  Today, itstands as the home for the school that Dean Reuschlein envisioned—oneof “the most modern and adequate law school facilities to be foundanywhere . . . .”10VI. VILLANOVA LAW REVIEW THEN AND NOWDean Reuschlein closed his introduction to the first volume of theLaw Review with a discussion of his hopes and dreams for the new journal.He wanted it to “serve as a worthwhile tool for the better training of stu-dents in the skills of legal research and writing.”11  He wanted it to “stimu-late productive thinking in the purposeful study of problems, particularlycurrent problems in new and expanding fields.”12  And he wanted it torepresent “the depth and intensity of our program.”13  He concluded by“predict[ing] for it a bright future.”14As I noted at the outset, Dean Reuschlein was indeed a visionary.  To-day, the Law Review is one of the country’s leading academic law journals.It publishes articles from prominent scholars, judges, and lawyers on im-portant and pressing issues.  It not only contributes to the academic dis-course, it shapes it, as evidenced by numerous citations to the journal bycourts and commentators, including by the United States Supreme Court.True to its mission, the Law Review continues to provide critical train-ing for students who hone their research, writing, and editing skills, de-9. See Mike Stetz, Best Law School Facilities, PRELAW, Fall 2014, at 26, 26–27,available at http://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/cypress/prelaw_2014fall/#/26[https://perma.cc/5RUW-A4EM] (ranking Villanova seventh in preLaw Maga-zine’s list of “Best Law School Facilities”).  In selecting institutions for inclusion,the magazine assessed aesthetics, square footage per student on campus, libraryhours and amenities, and accommodations, including dining options, parking,and lockers. See id.10. See Reuschlein, Dean’s Letter, supra note 1, at 3.11. Id. at 4.12. Id.13. Id.14. See id.5Gotanda: The Deans' Letters: 1956/2016Published by Villanova University Charles Widger School of Law Digital Repository, 2016382 VILLANOVA LAW REVIEW [Vol. 61: p. 377velop a critical eye and an attention to detail, and build organizational,leadership, and advocacy skills.  Perhaps most importantly, through thisexperience, students have learned to work as a team and have forged rela-tionships that will not only carry into practice, but also last a lifetime.  Inshort, the Law Review has become all that Dean Reuschlein envisioned andso much more.  It stands today as a shining example of what the institutionhas accomplished over the past six decades.* * *Dean Reuschlein was justifiably proud of what this fledgling institu-tion had accomplished.  Sixty years later, I believe he would also be proudof what the law school has become.6Villanova Law Review, Vol. 61, Iss. 3 [2016], Art. 1https://digitalcommons.law.villanova.edu/vlr/vol61/iss3/1

The Deans\u27 Letters: 1956/2016

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The Deans\u27 Letters: 1956/2016

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