Matthew Marin & Brendan Beery, An Analytical Depth Chart for Law Professors and Students: How Deep Is Deep Enough, and How Deep Is Too Deep?, 39 T.M. Cooley L. Rev. 39 (Issue 1) (2024). 

Every law professor has heard this statement from students: Each
professor wants something different on exams. We confess to being dismissive of this common gripe. After all, in our (admittedly anecdotal) experience, a student who gets an A in one course is probably getting A’s across the board. The same, unfortunately, goes for C’s, D’s, and the unmentionable. In answering the question of whether law professors really expect different depths of analysis in essay responses, we found that, at least to some extent, our students have been correct. There is no one-size-fits all expectation about when a student has reached an adequate depth of analysis – or when a student has gone too far and wasted time.

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Matthew Marin, Mushrooms & the Law, 38 T.M. Cooley L. Rev. 1 (Issue 2) (2023).

Ah, the humble mushroom. It exists as a member of one of the five kingdoms of life. And they have been around for a long time. In fact, the first mushrooms are now thought to have evolved between 715 and 810 million years ago. Because they are such an old life form, many ancient cultures revered mushrooms. For example, the ancient Chinese called Reishi the mushroom of immortality, and it was only served to the Emperor of ancient China. And the Egyptians etched fungi into hieroglyphics depicting them as gifts from the gods sent to earth on lightening bolts. Even the Bible refers to fungi, stating that if mold if found in a home, a priest should go to that house and shut it up for seven days. Mushrooms are a species that we could not live without—they make plant life possible, and they also are responsible for keeping the world’s delicate environment balance in place. In addition, do you enjoy leavened bread or the occasional alcoholic beverage? Thanks, fungi! With that said, it is approximated that scientists have only discovered and categorized two percent of all the species of mushrooms that exist in our world. So with the prevalence of fungi, it should come as no shock that mushrooms have been at the center of litigation and other legal disputes, issues, and foci. Following are a few common-place and some not-so-common-place situations where mushrooms have proliferated in the legal field.

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Matthew Marin & Amanda Fisher, Memory: The Past, Present & Future of Law School Exams, 38 W. Mich. U. T.M. Cooley L. Rev. 29 (2023). 

Lawyers must have a basic understanding of the rules of law. To prepare students for practice, law schools must help students memorize copious amounts of law, concepts, and values, because memorization is ingrained in how licensure is measured. But do licensed attorneys actually practice based on the memorization of rules? Is the expectation to memorize and never consult and look up rules and authorities? In essence, does pure memorization of rules produce successful lawyers? Subsequent to the COVID-19 pandemic, many law schools transitioned online, and so did final examinations. Though some institutions had open-book exams pre-COVID-19, some did not. Because of the shift to the virtual world, most other law schools had to adapt and begin giving online (and in some cases untimed) final exams. As most law schools transition back to in person, it is back to closed book final examinations. But should it be that way?

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