INTEREST IN CLINIC SPURS BRAZILIAN EXCHANGE

International visits benefit schools in both countries

Gonzaga professors Larry Weiser and Gail Hammer flank Jose Ghirardi of Brazil's Direito Getulio Vargas law school.

Two years ago, professor José Garcez Ghirardi of the Direito Getulio Vargas (GV) law school in São Paulo, Brazil, visited Gonzaga University School of Law to coordinate an informal faculty exchange based on teaching methodology. He wanted to update the GV curriculum to reflect the changing times and provide students there with a more progressive legal education.

At Ghirardi's request, the following March professors Gail Hammer and Larry Weiser traveled to São Paulo to present their own opinions and experiences at a conference for law professors from all over Latin America.

The response from the attendees was so favorable that Ghirardi arranged for Weiser and Hammer, who are both involved with Gonzaga's long-established legal clinic, to return to GV this past June and teach a student workshop on legal education. Meanwhile, Ghirardi would return to Gonzaga to teach a summer session course on jurisprudence and the arts.

"Everything started because we were interested in clinical education. That's when Gonzaga enters the picture," Ghirardi says. "It's a new experience in Brazil, breaking away from traditional methodology, which is seminar- or lecture-based, and using more participative methods. Because we think the way we teach law bespeaks the way we think about law and its function. That's why Gail's and Larry's presence was so important there."

Gonzaga's new curriculum key

Hammer notes that they had "a number of articulated purposes" when developing the workshop. "One was to improve teaching generally. To use active methods in our workshop. To demonstrate ourselves different methods of teaching. And to engage people in metacognition, thinking about what they're learning, making choices about how to teach."

The changes Ghirardi sought to bring to GV have some roots in the new curriculum that was being developed by Gonzaga Law at that time — a bold pedagogical shift implemented this past autumn.

"There aren't many schools that have taken their curriculum and remolded it like Gonzaga has," says Weiser. "Mandatory clinic in the third year, introductions to legal skills in the first year, different transactional skills such as writing contracts. We've reoriented ourselves tremendously, and that's why we're in sync with GV in terms of our legal educational philosophies and how we want to prepare our students to practice law."

Clinics the "frontier between practice and critique"

Ghirardi agrees. "Clinical education is a frontier between practice and critique, because students may experience practice in real life, but if they don't have someone to help them make sense of what's going on, then a major part of the educational purpose is lost.

"It challenges students to bring together theory and practice. But to have a good clinical program, you have to have faculty who are open in a number of ways. It's not only the student who's learning; we're learning at the same time."

"The faculty is the main thing," adds Hammer. "Faculty members who are willing to think seriously about what our purposes are and how to best accomplish them instead of thinking about what's most convenient. To think in a very real and focused way about what matters."

The larger idea of what matters is another area in which the three professors and the institutions they represent find themselves in sync.

Shared values resonate

"This sense of responsibility is something they feel very strongly here at Gonzaga," says Ghirardi. "There are certain broader philosophical issues of moral responsibility to society, the clear understanding that dealing with justice is a major social function in any society and that we have to be capable of doing so. We want lawyers who can make an impact and work to make a better society. This is a very important shared value between our institutions."

Like last year's conference, the student workshop was a hit with the participants.

"After the first day, I went there to see if the students needed anything. And they waved me off," Ghirardi laughs. "'We don't want to talk to you, we want them!' That's how successful it was. They felt very comfortable and at the same time they felt challenged."

"That's why we hope to continue the relationship between GV and GU," says Weiser. "One of the goals is to have some student exchanges. GV has just created a global law program that's taught in English. Some of our students could go over there and take this course, and some of their students could come here and take our courses.

"The ability for students to interact or work on projects - for example, case studies that involve both American and Brazilian enterprises, or doing comparative research on environmental issues - has tremendous potential. There's nothing but equal benefits for GV students and Gonzaga students in this relationship."

"Another thing our two institutions have in common is that they are very creative in their approach to methodology," adds Ghirardi, "and there's no reason for us not to be creative in designing our exchange opportunities.”

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