Some commenters on the thread about no-laptop policies in law schools (and the related thread on libertarianism and actions within institutions) asked: Why not rely on each student's own judgment about whether laptops are too distracting to them? Shouldn't we assume that our adult students generally know best what's best for themselves?
It's an interesting question (a question of ethics and good sense rather than of rights-based constraints on government power) to what extent universities and law schools should be paternalistic to the students who have chosen to attend. A simple example: Many professors require students to hand in a rough draft of a seminar paper at a particular date, rather than just handing in a final draft. (If the student is late with the rough draft, they may get penalized, and in any event the student understandably thinks that the professor's rule is a demand and not just a request.) The main reason for this is to help discipline the student into getting a rough draft in early, so that the student can profit from the professor's comments, and so the student will produce a better paper and learn more about the subject and about writing in the process. Is that improper, because it's unduly paternalistic? Should I stress to students that the rough draft deadlines are optional, and that if they don't want to hand in a rough draft, that's likely to be a mistake but it's entirely up to them? I'm not sure, but I think the right answer isn't obvious.
But in this post I want to focus on something else: The role of class discussion in legal education. I want to argue that students — though they of course pay lots of money to us — are not just customers of legal education, but are also in a sense a sort of employee: Law school classes rely on students' participating in the class, as a means of helping educate the other students. Learning, the theory goes, is a cooperative endeavor, in which students benefit from hearing each other's comments.
This is most obvious in seminars, classes that are usually of twelve or fewer students, in which most of the discussion involves students discussing the materials, or each other's papers. Naturally, the discussion is guided by the professor, but the point is for the students to learn by having a conversation. That's the format for seminars in most subjects, I think, and certainly for law school seminars.
Because of this, both attendance and discussion are required in seminars. If you don't show up, your grade might be reduced; likewise if you don't talk in class. If the professor calls on you, passing is not an option. (In some large classes, professors offer a no-hassle pass option, but if you pass in a seminar, the professor may well publicly reprimand you, and might penalize you more formally if you keep doing this.) The reason isn't paternalistic concern for the particular student. Rather, it's that the student's job is to participate, in order to create the class discussion that is supposed to be the mechanism through which all the students learn.
Likewise, some seminars involve students commenting on each other's rough drafts or on each other's presentations of their works in progress. This means that students must hand in rough drafts on time, or else they won't be available as subjects for discussion, and for the other students to practice their editing skills and their constructive criticism skills. (This is why I don't need to decide whether a mandatory rough draft policy is improperly paternalistic when the students just hand in the rough drafts to me: The seminar I teach is heavily organized around students' commenting on each other's work product, so punctual submission of rough drafts and other stages of a paper is necessary for the benefit of the other students, and not just of the submitting students.)
Most law school classes are between seminars and lectures: The professor talks more than he does in a seminar, and class discussion is less important than in a seminar, but class discussion still takes up a large part of the time, and the professor's conversations with the students — and sometimes students' conservations with each other — are an important pedagogical tool. Some question whether it's an effective tool; perhaps we'd be better off lecturing more and drawing the students in less. But most of our classes do heavily rely (rightly or wrongly) on this tool.
This means that whether students are paying attention in class affects not just themselves, but their classmates. Students who tune out, either because they're distracted by non-class materials, or because they are so focused on taking verbatim notes that they aren't really mentally engaging the information, aren't doing the job they're supposed to do. (Again, I recognize that they're not being directly paid for the job, but rather have to pay us; but part of the educational transaction is that they get an education and a credential in exchange for money and class participation.) When fewer students participate in class, other students get less out of the class discussion. When a student is called on and doesn't give a good answer, other students get less out of the class discussion (especially since time is wasted, and the conversation is interrupted).
In my view, the main impetus for the non-laptop policies has not been paternalism towards students who choose to tune out. That may have been part of some professors' concern, but it wasn't the deciding factor for me, and I suspect it wasn't the deciding factor for most other professors who have experimented with these policies. Rather, the concern is about the impact of laptops on others — both (1) the distraction to other students when someone is surfing the Web or (even if Internet access is turned off) is playing solitaire, and, probably more importantly, (2) the perceived decrease in class discussion stemming from laptop use, and the hoped-for increase in the number of participants and the quality of participation when people stop using the laptops.
Now I'm not sure whether class discussion improves as a result of no-laptop policies. I've heard favorable reports from others, but the reason I'm calling this an experiment is precisely because I don't know for sure whether the results will be positive (though I've heard enough to suggest that the results are unlikely to be highly negative). But I don't think they can be faulted — whether on libertarian reasons or others — simply on the grounds that they are paternalistic towards the students, in the sense of stopping each student from doing something because we think that behavior is bad for that particular student. Rather, we're trying to improve class discussion, a discussion through which each student's participation benefits the other students as well as the participant.
That's a familiar policy, as I've said, for seminars, where attendance and participation rules are commonplace. And I think it's also an ethically permissible policy for larger classes that generally rely at least in part on student discussion, and not just on lecturing.
Related Posts (on one page):
For a seminar with 10-30 people, I agree that discussion is crucial and classroom policies intended to promote that (internet bans) are perfectly reasonable.
I am less convinced of the efficacy of student participation in large lecture classes (75-100). In my experience, a lot of student input (not questions for the professor, but commentary and discussion) is tangential at best and often just flat wrong. The result is the professor has to walk back what was just said, wasting time and losing the attention of the other students. The general sentiment I heard from my classmates in law school was that they wanted to hear from the professor, not their classmates about the important issues in a case.
However, this opens the discussion of methods of teaching, and I submit the Lancasterian Monitorial System that prevailed in the United States until the early 20th century, when it was displaced by the lecture system advocated by Horace Mann and inspired by the industrial efficiency teachings of Frederick Taylor. The motto of the Lancasterian method was Qui docet, discit --
He who teaches, learns. The originator of the method, Joseph Lancaster, in 1798, was able to teach as many as a thousand students, using the more advanced ones to help teach the less advanced. My grandfather, who taught public school under both systems, warned that grouping kids by age would cause them to be excessively influenced by their peers and that we would become a nation of adolescents.
I appreciate the effort to be more thoughtful about these policies. But the policy to which you are analogizing here - that lack of attendance and participation may be penalized by lowering of the grade - is entirely different from the policy you are proposing.
Your proposed policy is a flat ban on laptops (and perhaps mandatory participation). The analog to your policy is not the traditional attendance rule (e.g., feel free to miss classes, but recognize that by so doing your grade might be lowered.) The real analog would be a policy that said, "Miss one class and you fail, without exception."
Traditional attendance policies provide students a measure of flexibility. Such policies typically have no penalty for a low number of absences, and usually have a maximum penalty of, say, a full-grade deduction even for a higher number of absences. Even under the harshest attendance policies I ever suffered through, it took a very significant number of absences (as a percentage of the total number of classes) to fail outright.
Your view relies on an overly romanticized notion of legal education. You would like to envision law school as a pedagogical experience in which there is intellectual discourse, the fruitful exchange of ideas, and so on. That's a fine view of legal education, and perhaps is similar to your experience. But it is certainly not what most law students sign up for.
Most law students, I think, would say that their priorities are (in this order): (a) receiving their degree, preferably backed by good grades and awards; (b) maintaining a personal life that is not tied to school; and (c) engaging in intellectual conversation in a limited set of courses. But even for those students who enjoy the intellectual side, surely most only enjoy it in certain select courses, and not in every class they are required (or choose) to take.
And so, to the extent you characterize students as your "employees" (with the rather staggering $150,000+ caveat), you are bundling many, if not most, students' preferred good with your view of the best good. You are imposing the bitter with the sweet; but your only justification is your sense of what is best. Your policy choice is surely suspect on efficiency grounds, but I don't think you fare much better on ethical grounds, either.
1. The only prerequisite for practice of law is to sit for the Bar Exam and pass it.
2. Professors set their own rates and class limits, along with whatever arbitrary rules regarding note-taking, etc.
3. Grant professorship to who can actually draw students to class, regardless of professional certification.
4. Students may attend classes at will and pay ONLY for the class hours of actual attendance.
This is the way to cut student expenditures of time and money for attending boring and useless classes, satisfy the professors happy with arbitrary rules, and attract more interesting law professors like David Friedman, who while teaching law &economics, has never had a formal class in either, but who, unlike most all law professors, is highly skilled in math and science.
Also, I said it before and I’ll say it again – it would be really poor form to spring this on your students after they had already registered for a course and didn’t have a meaningful chance to sign up for non-laptop banning class instead. If a professor wants to ban laptops in class, then the right way to do it is to make that clear when they sign up for the class.
Case in point: I myself am comfortable taking notes both by-hand and by-laptop. I went to college in the years before laptops were widely available, but began using a laptop consistently for in-class notes years later while in grad school. I switched between the two methods throughout my time at law school.
Generally speaking, I myself received marginally higher grades in classes wherein I took notes via laptop as opposed to handwriting them. I admit, however, that I tended to participate more in classes in which I hand-wrote my notes.
But should that option be taken away from me or from any other student; and in particular, from those students who find--as did I myself--that they perform better (i.e., are better able to cram for finals) in classes when they've taken notes by computer as opposed to by hand?
Two points of disclosure:
(1) my grades were excellent over-all; and
(2) I never took verbatim transcript-style notes, even when typing.
And one final thought:
the best way to improve classroom discussion is for the instructor to make a clear distinction between (a) information questions, and (b) "rhetorical type" questions which are actually an invitation for student back-channeling (e.g. a collective nodding of heads). No one wants to be that student who answers earnestly the latter "question" while his/her classmates snicker and roll their eyes.
I've heard professors complain about this, but I wonder if there's any real evidence to support it. Sure, the stenographic-type note-takers may not have time to raise their hands, but most of the ones I met usually had a good graps on the material, and could respond when called on.
As far as stimulating class discussion goes, the biggest obstacle is not laptops. It's social anxiety. In a class of 100 people, 80% will be uncomfortable talking in front of a large group and view the risks of looking like a jackass as far greater than the benefit of advancing the class discussion. The other 20% will be gunners.
Part of paying for law school, IMHO, is that I receive the benefit of seeing how other people approach the same problem and, in turn, adjust my own approach to reading and considering an issue. If people aren't involved, I'm not getting the benefit of my deal with the school.
Accordingly, I would look at a no-laptop policy - not as paternalism (and pandering to the lowest common denominator) - but ensuring that those people who want to engage have the benefit of their investment with the law school.
I graduated in 2000 from a top-5 law school. After my first year (during which attendance was mandatory), I very rarely attended most of my classes and still received all As and Bs (mostly Bs). My friends even referred to me as the "correspondence student." Most of my classes were, in my opinion, boring, uninformative, and a waste of time. The worst part of the classes was listening to 5 students in a row provide wrong answers to questions posed by the professor.
For example, I took a tax law class and rarely ever attended. I decided to attend one day (I hadn't been attened in 3 weeks or so) to see if I was missing anything. During the class, the professor asked a question, whose answer was blatantly obvious (I hadn't read for the class and had no idea what the tax law stated on the issue). After the 6th student provided the wrong answer, I finally raised my hand and provided the correct answer. Needless to say, that was the last time I attended that class until the final (received a B+ and even helped teach the class to a fellow student that was really struggling).
There were a few classes/professors that I found fascinating, and I never missed those classes. Those classes provided a non-punitive reason for attendance.
I think these no laptop policies, attendance policies, etc. are merely attempts by a producer to eliminate competition for a poor product. If you want students to attend, participate, and learn, improve your product. Don't turn into the RIAA.
That is somewhat contradictory to your preference for a laptop ban, isn't it?
And not everyone learns the same way. Some students need to take things in and mull them over before they can contribute usefully in class. Some think best with their mouths running. Some are hard of hearing and don't even know what the other students across the room are saying. Some are natural debaters and like a verbal sparring match better than anyone.
I don't think there is any way to impose one learning style on a large lecture hall of students. In particular, I don't think it is fair to impose an extroverted learning style on introverts. Some of the best students in my law school were very quiet in class. But if I wanted to know what they thought about something, I could always ask them.
And it is not fair to the students either, especially those with disabilities. You are being a classic technophobe pretending the problem is the technology and not the people using it.
For instance, you want class participation? Rather than these contrivances, how about GRADING PARTICIPATION? A non-paternalistic approach says "I need you to go from A to B. But i don't particularly care how you get there (barring dishonesty, cheating, etc.)." You are trying not only to manage the outcome, but the process, too. In fact, you are ignoring the outcome in favor of the process, so that a slouch who takes notes by hand is treated kindly, but a class leader who engages in a sharp and interesting class discussion, and is always prepared, is punished because he uses a laptop to help him. Its unfair and wrong.
Otherwise you end up with mismatches between ends and means which is bound to create problems. Let's be clear: computers are only one way of taking notes. Complaining that the computer is the problem is like complaining that students use ball point pens, instead of good quill pens. If you think the method of notetaking is the problem, as opposed to the mind involved, you are being technophobic and frankly silly.
Your students are adults. Some might be older than you. They don't need instructions on how to learn, and if participation is so important as to avoid those kinds of third party effects, then deal with the effects, not some proxy for them.
As for the canard about playing solitare, I can say as a relatively recent student in a very tech-friendly law school, that when i saw my fellow students goofing off during class, somehow amazingly i picked up the pieces and moved on. /sarcasm. Really, if you are motivated, seeing someone who is not doesn't hurt you at all. and if you are not motivated, well, then that is your own problem, and let's be blunt, that is paternalistic--to say that gosh, if i see someone playing Half-Life 2 on school time, my brain will just wilt!
Its pretty remarkable for a so-called libertarian to make this argument. Well, then, i guess in greater society, we can ban drugs, sodomy/adultry, anti-Obama or anti-McCain speech, and so on, because our poor brains cannot even function having seen such things. Now we know how to paralyze these young lawyers into thoughtlessness: solitare. I suppose the ABA will step in and label the viscious use of solitare an unfair courtroom tactic.
But again, the problem isn't the technology but the people using it. i suppose pen and paper should be banned, too, because my gosh, someone might doodle, or even play tic-tac-toe with their neighbor, and that will crush the spirits of their fellow lawyers-to-be.
Really, the concern of the busy body is not good logical basis for your proposed policy. If someone says if Janey says "i can't concentrate because Bobby is goofing off" the proper answer is "play through the pain, Janey." Sheesh.
Further, I would allow internet access to Lexis and Westlaw. I injured myself during 1L, and could not haul all of my casebooks around with me. Being able to pull up the cases electronically was a godsend.
Sure there will be people playing solitaire. There will also be people doing the crossword puzzle, or thinking about the hot classmate two students down. There is no way to mandate attention in the class.
True that tapping on keys can distract fellow students. Having worked in cubicle land, however, I believe being able to tune out distractions is an essential work skill.
And it still misses the point, anyway. The ban on laptops isn't to keep an individual student from passing when called upon; it's to keep as many students engaged in the class as possible.
Banning laptops in class is not anti-libertarian. At worst, it is paternalistic.
A government banning drugs on the other hand, is anti-libertarian, because you do not voluntarily agree to it. This point is hardly complicated.
Libertarianism is primarily about opposition to coercion. Since the government is the only entity that has the legal right to coerce, the proper scope of libertarianism is limitation of government power.
You're taking classes from a particular school, from a particular set of professors, in order to gain whatever educational benefit you believe they are able to impart to you. If you buck their methods, then I must question why you bother at all.
Personally, I have found my "success" in my career to be unaffected by my lack of a degree. If you must, or you feel you can gain something from the experience, you ought to enter it with the idea that you are going to learn something from these professors that you could not otherwise learn on your own. That you are paying for their expertise in teaching, and that possibly their methods might work if you give in to them. As always it is your choice to do it or not.
This is an inaccurate characterization of many of the criticisms of this policy.
To the extent you are suggesting that critics of Eugene's policy are ignoring the externalities issue, you are mistaken. The point is, first, that the supposed externalities are speculative; and second, it is unclear why people with poor attention-spans should be subsidized at the expense of people who learn better with laptops. (Are you advocating for an increase in the number of lawyers with poor attention spans?)
And once you set aside the externalities question, there remain only paternalistic (or self-aggrandizing) justifications for the policy. And I don't think Eugene would deny that his approach is paternalistic in the sense that he believes he knows what works best, and he is willing to follow that belief over the beliefs of his students, many of whom are likely to disagree with him.
I am the customer; Prof. Volokh is the vendor. In a free market, if he doesn't meet my needs I am free to seek another vendor. Once I enter his law school, am I free to select classes that meet my needs? Otherwise his law school is not a free market.
My eyes have a focusing problem. When I frequently switch focus between near (notes) and far (the professor, other students, the class) I lose concentration and get headaches.
I suffered through high school and the first half of college until I switched to taking notes on my computer. My grades improved substantially and I started actually learning from lectures because I stopped getting splitting headaches and losing focus.
Using a computer to take notes allows me to work around my disability because I don't have to look at my notes while I'm typing. I can keep my eyes focused at a distance on the professor and other students and only occasionally have to glance down and change focus to the computer.
If I'm writing notes by I hand I have to look down at what I'm writing and that cycle of changing focus from far to near is what causes problems for me.
If Prof. Volokh's new policy were thrust on me, instead of being visually engaged in the lecture, I would stop making eye contact with the professor and other students and just stare at my notes trying to listen without looking.
Surprising how much speculation, custom & ritual {..learning "theory"} is so heavily embedded in the formal education process.
Despite our 21st Century hi-tech information society, the commonplace daily instructional/educational process has not been objectively evaluated with scientific tools -- statistics, data collection, control groups, random assignment, etc.
Basic education processes haven't changed in many centuries. It's assumed that a person standing in front of and 'controlling' a group of seated persons is absolutely the best way to transfer knowledge.
Any failures in this ancient system are automatically attributed to deficiencies in the individual seated persons.
But obviously, the 'system' has many components: teacher, students, syllabus, textbooks, prior learning/preparation, schedules, classrooms, visual aids, test & evaluation processes, chairs/desks, location, physical environment, noise/distractions, financial &social incentives, etc etc. These other system components can well cause 'failures' in the learning system... not directly attributable to individual student malfunctions.
Are student laptops really one of the primary problems in this complex learning system... nope, doesn't even make the Top-10 list.
Since the school faculty/administrators are the system 'managers', all system failures are directly attributable to deficiencies in their design & management of that system
The sky is not going to fall. All those bright young students will be just fine, just like they were before laptops.
Besides, the really interesting subject that has not yet been addressed is enforcement. What happens when 30 students stage an "LCD-in" and break out laptops for class?
But... what if someone isn't paying attention because he's writing frantically to take in every word on his hand-written notes? What if she isn't paying attention because she isn't feeling well? What if he's daydreaming about a cute girl or planning his evening? In all of those cases, you would penalize the student by (1) in-class shaming, or (2) lowering the grade for poor class participation. You wouldn't forbid the student from taking hand-written notes, being sick, or daydreaming. I see no reason why the supposed attention problem from laptops can't be handled the same way. Students who cannot focus if they bring their laptop will stop bringing it if they want to pass, but students who have no problem with them and find them beneficial will continue bringing them.
Similarly, problems with other students being distracted by what's on another's screen can be solved by having "laptop zones", where the easily distracted sit in the first few rows. Those who want to bring laptops or just don't care will sit further back.
I think that a no-laptop policy is just amputating the leg for a sprained ankle. There are other solutions that will fix the concerns being raised without taking away a tool that many, many students find beneficial. Why not explore those first before taking the more extreme option?
2) Perhaps that's why E.V. explicitly denominated it as an "experiment."
That's like complaining that once you enter the Ford dealership, you aren't free to select a Chrysler. His law school is not a free market; it's just a "vendor" in that market. You get to choose which vendor to deal with, but not what that vendor's product line is.
Once you are accepted and are taking classes, that free market concept goes out the door. Do you pay the Professor or the school? There is your customer and vendor relationship.
This is question-begging. At issue is why professors are or should be "the one[s] to speculate." Eugene is attempting to offer a defense. I disagree with his argument. You are assuming his argument to be correct.
I also think students will learn from having to detach themselves from their laptops every now and then. You can't always use them in practice. And most (all?) bar exams are hand-written.
Changing laptop policies after I've enrolled is bait and switch, then. They have my money, and count on my unwillingness to go to the trouble of transferring.
That's like complaining that once you enter the Ford dealership, you aren't free to select a Chrysler.
No, it's like complaining that once I've bought the car, I'm forced to sit still as the back room person tries to sell me an extended warranty, undercoating, paint protection, etc. I wanted the car, not to be subjected to this extraneous bs that primarily serves the vendor and not me, the customer.
Do you pay the Professor or the school? There is your customer and vendor relationship.
Schools will not willingly pay professors shunned by students. One professor at my school had only a handful of students in his upperclass courses. They actually rejiggered the 1L curriculum so he would get more work to do -- 1Ls had no choice over the profs they got.
Except that Professor Volokh apparently didn’t disclose this new requirement to students when they registered for his class. He apparently decided to announce it only after they had already registered for his class and after it became impractical for them to register for a different class instead.
Again if he wants a no laptop policy in his class, he should announce it when students sign up for his class so that they can make an informed choice and opt for a different class. Now that the students have relied to their detriment, he should be barred from changing the rules.
What are the conditions of matriculation at UCLA? I would imagine that UCLA policy allow professors, not students, to set classroom-level regulations and policies. Did anyone who accepted an offer of admission there think otherwise?
If UCLA policy gives rule-making authority to its faculty, how in the world can anyone Prof. Volokh's exercise of this power as "anti-libertarian"? Assume it is the official UCLA policy, arguendo. Then, the "anti-libertarian" agent is UCLA, not Prof. Volokh. By stripping students of their right to set their own classroom rules, UCLA refuses to respect the "natural rights" of the students to use laptops. Right?
Maybe one of the sour grapes here can find out the official UCLA policy, and perhaps lead a campaign to curtail "professorial discretion" in the classroom. Good luck!
OK, beginning this term, all students will incise their notes on palimpsests. Palimpsests and styli are available in the school bookstore. We have found that incision focuses the mind, prevents distraction, and makes simultaneously solving today's Jumble impossible.
There's only a bait and switch if there was a bait. Are you claiming that UCLA puts in its application materials a promise that one can use laptops in class?
Same error as the previous poster. Detrimental reliance requires that one demonstrate reliance. First you'd have to find a student who claimed to have signed up for the class because it allowed laptops.
Why not remove the chairs and make the students stand during the entire class? Any student who wanted to complain would first have to claim s/he signed up for the class because it allowed sitting.
> The benefits of lots of things about law school, including law school itself, are "speculative."
I suspect runape is just being polite. Bull---- is more like it. Or if I don’t speak for runape, then I certainly speak for myself. Just how hard is it to concentrate when you know someone, somewhere in the class is playing solitare? Sheesh. If you are that distractible, then maybe the law isn’t for you.
As for participation, the bull---- comes in when you suppose that changing the method of note-taking has an impact on attention, or that making taking notes easier somehow makes people pay less attention in class. In either case, rather than get at a hoped-for underlying cause and hope for a beneficial result, why not instead put the incentive where it belongs—on the result—and then deal with it that way? A libertarian approach to life says set up incentives to encourage the correct results, and then sit back and watch how they do it. The innovation of students themselves might surprise you. So, the bull---- is pretending that there is a better way of ensuring attention in class rather than incentivizing attention itself.
And none of you paternalism defenders have explained how you deal with people with disabilities, as both I and the recent grad have brought up repeatedly.
Its amazing that we should live in this technological age, and there are some luddites who want to resist the obvious progress. I suppose next quill pens will be required?
You can talk about a free market in law schools, but the fact remains that in most states, they've been granted an exclusive license by the government, and their credential is necessary to legally practice law.
It's good to see EV willing to critically examine whether his proposed changes to his teaching practice would be beneficial or not; the key to a successful experiment is for the one running it to be open to it unfolding in ways they didn't expect.
What do you expect EV to do? Personally phone every student after they register for his class to tell them about his laptop policy? At every school I've ever taught at, all classroom policies are announced in the first week of classes. Heck, EV gave them more notice that most professors would.
I agree that students should not be forced to attend classes and that participation should not be graded. But I found very few professors in law school asked black and white questions; rather, they sought shades of gray. And if professors find that the presence of a laptop in the room leads to greater discourse, then it only makes sense that such would become a necessity (to ensure performance under the educational contract).
I find it hard to understand the pro-laptop phenomenon, given that no one in my class (graduating in 2007) had used laptops in their college courses; accordingly, no one "knew" whether it was the most effective form of studying for them. I recognize that some people from the working world may be familiar with taking notes on laptops during meetings, but do not know anyone in my class who came to law school with such an experience.
Include it in the course description.
There's no paternalism, but the answer to this question is simple because, by law, E.V. has no choice: people with relevant disabilities will have to be allowed laptops if necessary. That's a requirement imposed from Washington DC., and as such is irrelevant to the question of what policies E.V. should voluntarily establish.
Sorry, YOU are THEIR employee, not the other way around. They pay you a lot of money, remember?
No, it's a conventional marketplace transaction in which you have assumed the risk of a change in policy unless you negotiated otherwise.
There's no detrimental reliance because it is a required course. But let's consider the analogy. If all the chairs were removed, I trust the students would protest en masse to the Dean, and the policy will be changed. We'll see if they do that with the laptops.
At every university I've taught at, course descriptions for basic courses (and even some advanced ones) were written years ago as boilerplate in order to cover every faculty member who might teach the course in the future.
> No, that's an economic approach, an entirely separate question from a libertarian approach.
Now you are just arguing over the meaning of words, rather than whether I am right. And I am.
> A libertarian approach to life is the non-initiation of force
Ah, so how exactly does he plan to ban laptops without the initiation of force?
By the way, that is not how I have understood libertarianism; it is instead an extreme version of the idea that should be able to do whatever you want, so long as you do not harm anyone else. But clearly that doctrine is meaningless, if the mental papercuts imagined here are enough to limit your freedom. So a true libertarianism doesn’t count bull---- like hurt feelings as an externality.
> There's no paternalism
Nah, you are just treating grown men and women like drooling idiots who can’t stand to see someone else play solitaire, and as though they are too stupid to be able to type and listen at the same time. Nothing paternalistic about that.
> but the answer to this question is simple because, by law, E.V. has no choice: people with relevant disabilities will have to be allowed laptops if necessary. That's a requirement imposed from Washington DC., and as such is irrelevant to the question of what policies E.V. should voluntarily establish.
But then, OMG, they will create all these externalities! So what will he gain. Indeed, one laptop can be more distracting than 10, or 100, because of the white noise effect.
The point is his policy won’t work if he has to accommodate. And he has to accommodate—no choice in the matter. But then it also has the effect of singling out those with disabilities. People with disabilities have a right to privacy about those disabilities, too, at least to the extent that this is possible. So what was EV say when they ask “why does HE get to use a laptop and I don’t?”
What will they do when they go to court some day? How will they refocus their eyes? How will they find the right case? How will they remember what the opponent said? It's a harsh world out here without laptops...
It's the bait-and-switch paternalism that bugs me. EV could've made this new policy apparent before students enrolled in his class. Instead, he chose to change things at the last minute in a way that will inevitably favor certain students over others, and in a way that restricts individual choice.
Just because an authority figure has the power to do something doesn't mean they should do it. I would think self-professed libertarians would understand that.
Those who get special accomadation are always singled out, it is the nature of the special accomodation rule, from elementary school on. You don't know it wont work if one or two are so accomodated -- the policy, as it stands now, has one person taking computer notes, anyway.
I don't understand the one-notetaker idea. It goes beyond a blanket restriction on free choice. EV is admitting that computerized notetaking is valuable, yet is STILL not letting the rest of the class enjoy the option. Again, disappointing.
EV, if you want to do it right, try this "experiment" in an optional class and make it widely known before the registration period. Then all the students are at least consenting participants.
To characterize this debate as a bunch of whiny law students is overly dismissive, in my view.
If accommodating doesn't ruin it, then it probably wasn't doing much in the first place.
If computers are such a bane to education, then even accommodating a few will ruin it.
As for the point that accommodations single people out, you are absolutely right. Sometimes singling out is unavoidable. But this is not an unavoidable situation. This situation is easily avoided--just let everyone bring in laptops and grade for participatin. Then laptop, no laptop, whatever works for you.
Not a libertarian objection. A contract objection, without merit for the multiple reasons set forth above, not the least of which it does not apply to the whole class, it only applies to the exceedingly rare students who wouldn't take his course without laptop. None of whom had a reasonble expectation to begin with.
its "paternalistic"
It is pedagogy. Are you honestly saying that true libertarians cannot distinguish between paternalism and pedagogy. If so, than it is both weak in analysis and unreasonable in practice.
This seems to be a whole hell of a lot simpler than the subject of laptops today. "It interferes with what I'm trying to teach you. Therefore, it is forbidden." Seems easy enough.
Of course, law school classes might be easier today, and so be manageable while surfing the web, than the liberal arts undergrad courses were forty years ago. Nobody ever thought he dared try the radio thing. He'd be lost for sure.
Not so certain today.
So your proposing we give educational accomodations to everyone, whether they need them or not. All based on your probably analysis. But we don't do that because, as a matter of educational policy, it makes no sense.
"EV is admitting that computerized notetaking is valuable"
No such admission is made or even implied.
Mmmm, right, pedagogy never veers into paternalism. Good to know.
Sorry, but we are talking about people who have have been in school a minimum of 17 years of their life if they never skipped any grades. I think by now they know how to learn and how to type and participate. Really, the notion that making it easier to take notes makes it harder to participate in class discussion is just silly. The issue is making them want to participate. incentivise participation, and let them figure out if a laptop helps them or hinders them, in meeting that incentive.
Anything else is rank paternalism, and frankly a silly imposition of needless conformity.
EV set up a policy so that one student per day brings in a laptop, takes notes, and then distributes those notes to the entire class. He turned one student a day into a scrivener. Of course that implies that computerized notetaking is beneficial.
I think the problem is that professors can't tell, just by looking, which students are thinking furiously about the course content behind their laptop screens and which are surfing the net. The two activities look similar, in a way that writing notes by hand and listening to the radio do not. A professor who bans laptops is really trying to get at the net surfers, but inadvertently causes problems for people who are trying to be serious students but happen to prefer grappling with the material in other ways.
For the record, I enjoyed active participation in many law school classes. What I did not enjoy was sitting there while professors tormented students who clearly hated the process, or while students who took too much pleasure in holding the floor wasted everyone's time. My goal was to learn the material, and stuff like that didn't help.
I think you're confusing two different things. In a seminar, the goal is active discussion of the material among the participants. In fact, the best seminars I took were ones where the material was either much too difficult to be tested with a single final exam (and thus better approached collectively by the class as an exercise in group problem solving) or was policy-based, and thus inappropriate for straight lecture. In both types of seminars, discussion is absolutely necessary to move the class along.
On the other hand, while the Socratic method is useful for bringing out fine points in a lecture, by the second year of law school, every student realizes that a 120-person lecture on an introductory topic is not the appropriate place for an in-depth discussion of legal issues. My first year of law school, I was a "participator." By my last year, I realized that my main goal assimilating the structure of a subject, and that goal was better satisfied by diligently taking notes.
Unfortunately, it's tough to diligently take notes that are useful to me if I'm handicapped by a silly rule against laptops. The fact is, nobody handwrites anymore and in fact I find it quite physically painful.
> So your proposing we give educational accomodations to everyone, whether they need them or not.
What I think, and I said this two threads ago, is that we shouldn’t discriminate against the non-disabled either, if we have a choice in the matter.
> But we don't do that because, as a matter of educational policy, it makes no sense.
It makes no sense to allow everyone to use a laptop?
Admittedly sometimes you can’t avoid creating different treatment between a disabled person and a non-disabled person. Putting materials into Braille is one very obvious example. But in a surprising amount of the time, you can treat everyone the same without disadvantaging the handicapped person. For instance, every tv sold after a certain year is closed captioned. Thus the deaf have access to most TVs. My uncle who is fully deaf enjoys that, and my mother probably isn’t deaf enough to be disabled, but she likes it. And I am not deaf at all, and sometimes I just prefer it, for instance when trying to translate from British English to American English (try watching MP and the Holy Grail with captions—its like a whole new movie!). And for that matter, every building built after a certain year is wheelchair-accessible. The ramps can be used by everyone, but are only actually needed by some.
So on the same principle, forget this flakey concern about externalities. Grade them for participation, and then say “bring a laptop, or don’t. your call.” Then if you need one for your disability, you can bring it, and if your disability is hidden, it will remain so. Everyone wins.
Not relevant, in the least. The point is, is that it makes sense to EV to teach the class in the way he chooses. If you don't trust him to teach in the way he chooses, than fire him.
"paternalistic" "non-libertarian"
It is interesting how many responses are little more that arguments by slogan or by name-calling with little objective basis. For example what is the bait - the course syllabus, instructional method, and grading basis - and what is the switch - the same course syllabus, the same instructional method, and grading basis. Hmmm. Paternalistic? EV this this will make for a better class experience for all. He never claims he is doing for the students what they can't do for themselves. Libertarianism is simply irrelevant to this issue.
As for those who can't read their own writing, learn to write so you and others can (assuming you are not disabled).
I don't recalling anyone complaining about the noise, but I finding the "click-click-click" of people typing rather distracting. I know others with the same opinion. I claim such an environment detracts especially from a seminar class. (Nope its not as bad as the jackhammer the university has going outside the building.
Regarding the suggestion of simply disabling the WiFi yet allowing laptops, that is the option that I choose whenever possible. But its is each professor's choice.
As EV told my class, 'Most speech is restricted by social convention, not by the First Amendment.' I say that classroom speech is restricted by social convention, as well, and not formal classroom rules or procedures.
Not relevant. We are talking about fairness, that's all.
It's a terrible, anti-intellectual ethos, but it is pervasive and hard to break. I think this has far more to do with the perceived lack of classroom discussion than laptops.
t applies to everyone, who is able, equally. It will make a better class for all in the teacher's pedagogical judgment. It sounds not only fair but is the only truly just arrangement.
Given the amount of criticism, I doubt this will make for a better classroom experience "for all." That sentiment goes to the heart of paternalism -- I know what's good for you, so I'll restrict your choice to make things better for you.
Law students have been in school for at least 15 years. They're adults. Why shouldn't they be able to choose what method works for them? And if EV is so sold on the no-laptops idea, at least tell students before they sign up. Hence the bait-and-switch.
But it's not a transcription necessarily. It's one law student's attempt at notes, which will likely approximate a transcription given the pressure on that student. If EV wanted to encourage transcription, he'd record each class and make that available.
Why would EV mandate a classwide notetaker with a laptop if he didn't think that laptop would aid the notetaker? EV's being both paternalistic and hypocritical at the same time.
> Now its "all" about 'unfairness,' after anti-libertarianism and bait and switch don't work.
Now you are just putting words in my mouth. Fairness matters to most people, but no it is not the only thing. Second, I am not being anti-libertarian, if that is what you are attempting to say. Third, I am not accusing him of a bait and switch. Dropping a class probably isn’t that difficult, presuming we are talking about an elective.
And “now?” I said exactly this in the first thread, as well as pointing out how unlibertarian it was, right from the beginning.
> It applies to everyone, who is able, equally.
And if we let everyone use laptops, it would apply equally without the qualification. Doesn’t that seem fairer?
> the teacher's pedagogical judgment.
You guys act like as if the average law professor has a lot of knowledge on the subject. Here’s a hint: they don’t. They know the substantive subject of discussion, but very few of them have any of the training we normally associate with a teacher. If Volokh has any special training he is the exception, not the rule.
> It sounds not only fair but is the only truly just arrangement.
Well, I didn’t realize you had cornered the market on justice. But actually it seems more just to allow for the maximum freedom within reasonable pedagogical limits, namely by grading for participation. Go after the issue itself, rather than hope that going after the proxy will work instead. That way, if computers can actually enhance participation (they can, and I did), the students will almost certainly figure out how to do so.
Why don't they teach themselves? They don't because they place thier faith in another whom they think can.
Why don't they teach themselves?
Because the bar associations of most states require this form of instruction. Believe you me, if i could have skipped law school entirely, I probably would have. I only say probably because I went to a very good school, and there is a value to that that has nothing to do with what i actually learned there. If i had not been admitted to a top law school, I would almost certainly have ditched the law school route entirely.
"Fairness matters to most people, but no it is not the only thing."
Your the one who said:
"We are talking about fairness, that's all."
Then there is this, astounding statement:
". . .it seems more just to allow for the maximum freedom within reasonable pedagogical limits . . ."
You would decide the "reasonable pedagogical limits" for EV? How paternalistic.
California, where EV teaches, does not.
> Your the one who said:
> "We are talking about fairness, that's all."
Um, “that’s all” doesn’t mean that this is the only subject on our plate. Its called an idiom.
> You would decide the "reasonable pedagogical limits" for EV? How paternalistic.
A person not in authority over another making a suggestion to that other person, cannot be paternalistic. I am not forcing him to do anything. I am not his boss. I am arguing for the wisdom of one policy over another. And if you think that is paternalism, you need to look the word up.
Valda
> California, where EV teaches, does not.
A decent point, but do you really think they are all going to stay in California, or want to limit themselves solely to California for the rest of their lives?
Depending on the course and the instructor, that’s sometimes the case.
Almost all will. And after passing the California bar, almost all will stay . . . don't want to go through that again.
You had a very different experience than me, taking the bar. After all the build-up, it was a pussy cat. And i took what is reputed to be the 3rd hardest bar in america. (NY and Cali are reputed to be first and second.) I said after the first day to my family, "after this, I have no respect for anyone who fails the bar, unless they have a good excuse." That's not to say you don't have to work hard and study, but if you are reasonably dilligent, it is not bad at all.
Also, I'm sorry to say that the amount of attention I paid to the professor has VERY little relation to the actual grade in the course. If I can ignore 2/3 of what is said in class and get the same grade (since, lets be honest, most of the learning I'm going to be doing will be on my own with casebooks and outlines), why should I waste my time listening to some student recite the facts of a case I already read and know? Even in classes with "participation" credit, they are distributed so inconsistently and subjectively (at least in my classes, no one even knew if they'd gotten any participation points until grades came out) that there's really not much incentive to participate.
Anony, if you are this angry about a professor setting particular rules of conduct for his classroom, how ever will you manage when judges set particular rules of conduct for their courtrooms?
On the basis that it is "unfair" to the disabled, when it's not. And on the basis it's anti-libertarian, which it's not. Care to try again.
I disagree that professors are paid to "make the material as interesting or engaging as possible." Where did you get that idea?
. . . or share a secretary, or comply with securities regs that make no sense, or . . .
Just because the alleged purpose of classroom discussion is to promote learning does not in any way mean that students who are not paying attention are affecting their classmates.
It remains to be demonstrated that classroom discussion actually promotes learning.
Some of the reason that students compete to get into top-flight universities, and why employers (and others) regard the graduates of those schools so highly, is because of the learning that takes place between students. The summa graduate of a lesser-ranked institution may be as talented as the graduate of a university that is held in higher regard, but has not had the opportunity to be pushed by his fellow students.
You will learn the same material anywhere, but it is the other students and professors that distinguish a top school from others.
Perhaps the better way to deal with this would be for law school administrators to make it a part of the school's code of conduct, to which the students agree as a condition of applying to the university. My alma mater required us to agree to abide by the honour system if admitted, then attend a orientation session about it, receive our books with it, and sign off on more stuff (IIRC). The benefits of that system were explained pretty clearly: the ability to take our exams without proctors, anywhere in the school; the ability to have take-home exams that we could hand in weeks later, on our honour that we only spent the alloted amount of time on them, etc. The same could be done to foster an environment of intellectual engagement (or, at the very least, not active disengagement). If students, before applying to UCLA, were made aware of the system, if later required to sign on to it, and if it were administered by students - the primary beneficiaries of such a system - it would seem less paternalistic and could be presented as a feature, not a bug, of the law school.
I can't write more than a paragraph before my handwriting gets to a point where even I can't read it. Can I record Prof Volokh's lectures and the accompanying class discussions directly to my laptop, or must I buy a digital voice recorder?
How about video recording? I want to see EV's body language to determine if his words and behavior match or if he's being sarcastic in cases not necessarily reflected in his tone of voice.
Just asking
And though I have no problem with his decision, for what it's worth, you have no choice about classes or professors your first year at UCLA.
The bait: Law schools have recommended laptops for their students for many years, and UCLA is no exception. Laptop use in the classroom, during the exam, and on the bar exam, has become the default condition, the expectation, reinforced by the schools' propaganda pages -- like having chairs in the classroom.
Here's where it all began, little more than a decade ago. I forget who the original culprit was:
On-line classroom technology: Kent College of Law puts course material on laptop computers.
Ebony April 1, 1995(?!?) COPYRIGHT 1995 Johnson Publishing
Chicago-Kent College of Law is the first law school in the country to use on-line student-teacher connections and to put most course material on laptops. The phone line hookup enables students to reach teachers or the library 24-hours a day. The advantages are discussed.
For Edmund Greenidge and the other students at Chicago-Kent College of Law, the library never closes, help from classmates and professors is never far away and book bags are never crammed with bulky legal briefs.
That's because they are the first law students in the country to have most of their class materials on laptop computers. The school is also the first to get on-line with telephone technology that lets them ...
The switch: Leave that >$1K piece of hardware we recommended you buy at home.
Now, Professor V. was a techie before he was a lawyer, so I hope and expect that he will analyze the data carefully.
Problem: Lack of attention in class hampers discussion. (Class discussion assumed to be desirable; let's not go there.)
Solution: Ban laptops except for one backup.
Results: Measure increased attention and quality of class discussion -- metrics to be selected by Professor V.
You can hallucinate paternalism all you want, but I am not issuing commands, but arguments. If you can’t grasp the difference, I can’t help you with it.