Supporting Law School DEI Initiatives through Library Guides: Building a Better Experience for Implementing an Anti-Racist 1L Curriculum

Abstract

This research investigated the anti-racist research guides of several law schools to determine whether they included pedagogical, faculty training and mental health resources for their law school populations. These issues are important to law schools that are altering their curriculum due to recent ABA-mandated changes. The findings suggest that many schools are providing material for pedagogical resources but not including mental health resources that may be helpful to law faculty, administrators, staff, and students who may need support through these changes. There is also an opportunity to improve the selection of training resources provided.

Keywords:

• anti-racist research guides
• law school mental health resources

Acknowledgements

Thank you to all the DEI and Law Librarians Symposium workshop discussants, especially Anna Russell and Ariel Scotese, for their additional comments, and to all of the symposium attendees who shared additional feedback that I have incorporated into the final article.

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 Paul Caron, 150 Deans Ask ABA to Require Law Schools to Provide Anti-Bias Training to Students, TaxProf Blog, https://taxprof.typepad.com/taxprof_blog/2020/08/150-deans-ask-aba-to-require-law-schools-to-provide anti-bias-training-to-students.html (last visited 2 Mar. 2023). Black Law Students Association and other student organizations at various law schools also issued statements in support of changing the law school environment in response to the movements that started in the summer of 2020.

2 Am. Bar Ass’n, ABA STANDARDS AND RULES OF PROCEDURE FOR APPROVAL OF LAW SCHOOLS 2023–2024 18 (2023). See also Karen Sloan, U.S. Law Students to Receive Anti-bias Training after ABA Passes New Rule Reuters, www.reuters.com/legal/legalindustry/us-law-students-receive-anti-bias-training-after aba-passes-new-rule-2022-02-14/ (last visited 2 Mar. 2023).

3 Gaudion, Amy C., Exploring Race and Racism in the Law School Curriculum: An Administrator’s View on Adopting an Anti-racist Curriculum, 23 Rutgers Race & L. Rev. 131 (2021).

4 Association of American Law SCHOOLS, Law Deans Antiracist Clearinghouse Project www.aals.org/about/publications/antiracist-clearinghouse/ (last visited 7 Feb. 2024) [hereinafter AALS].

5 Ingrid A. Mattson, Untapped Potential: A Study of Academic Online Legal Research Guides, 32 Ref. Servs. Rev. Q. 247, 248 (2013).

6 Id.

7 Id. at 259.

8 Id. at 259–60.

9 Deborah L. Lauseng et al., Assessing Online Library Guide Use and Open Educational Resource (OER) Potential: An Evidence-Based Decision-Making Approach, 15 J. Web Libr. 1 (2021).

10 Susan Conrad & Christy Stevens, “Am I on the Library Website?”: A LibGuides Usability Study, 38 Info. Tech. & Libs. (Online) 69 (2019).

11 Lauseng, supra note 10, at 137.

12 University of California College of the Law, San Francisco, Libguides: Race, Racism & American Law: Research/Resource Guides Prepared by Other Institutions, https://libguides.uclawsf.edu/c.php?g=1258499&p=9223792 (last visited 7 Feb. 2024).

13 Lauseng, at 139.

14 Id.

15 Id.

16 Castro Gessner et al., Are You Reaching Your Audience? 43 Ref. Servs. Rev. Q. 497, 497–98 (2015).

17 Id. at 498.

18 Lauseng at 139.

19 Gessner, at 498–99.

20 Id. at 499.

21 See AALS, supra note 5.

22 “By creating a space for our collective voices as leaders of law schools to engage our institutions in the fight for justice and equality, we strive to focus our teaching, scholarship, service, activism, programming, and initiatives on strategies to eradicate racism.” Id.

23 Libguides is a product of Springshare, which is a major content management system in the library space that many libraries utilize to host their guides. See www.springshare.com.

24 Rutgers Law, Anti-Racism Resource List (2023), https://law.rutgers.edu/anti-racism-resource-list (last visited 7 Feb.2024).

25 See Meera E. Deo, Unequal profession: race and gender in Legal Academia (2019).

26 See Vulnerable populations and transformative law teaching: A critical reader (Society of American Law Teachers et al. eds., 2011).

27 See Gaudion, supra note 4.

28 Gemmicka Piper et al., An Investigation of Anti-Black Racism Libguides at ARL Member Institutions, 15 Comms. Info. Lit. 188, 196 & 199 (2021) (discovering that, of the 5,698 guides they examined, those that failed to emphasize the interdisciplinary nature of social justice or meet their instructional goals received considerably lower scores in the pedagogy category. The pedagogical best practices identified learning outcomes and clearly stated the guide’s purpose).

29 Gaudion, supra note 4, at 23.

30 Id. at 26.

31 Texas A&M University School of Law Library, Research guides: Antiracism, diversity, equity, and Inclusion Resources, https://law.tamu.libguides.com/c.php?g=1054092 (last visited 2 Mar.2023).

32 See Teri A. McMurtry-Chubb, Strategies and techniques for integrating diversity, equity and inclusion into the core law curriculum: Comprehensive guide to DEI pedagogy, Course Planning, and classroom practice (2022).

33 Georgia State University College of Law Library, Libguides: Racial Justice Resources Introduction − Racial Justice Resources https://libguides.law.gsu.edu/c.php?g=1085749&p=7916052 (last visited Mar. 2, 2023).

34 Fordham Law School Library, Libguides: Race and the Law School Curriculum: Getting Started Getting Started − Race and the Law School Curriculum, https://researchguides.lawnet.fordham.edu/c.php?g=1145478 (last visited Mar. 2, 2023).

35 University of Miami Law Library, Libguides: Race across the curriculum: Selected readings: First year subjects First-Year Subjects − Race Across the Curriculum: Selected Readings, https://law.miami.libguides.com/race-across-the-curriculum/1L-subjects (last visited Mar. 2, 2023). 

36 Derald Wing Sue et al., Racial Microaggressions As Instigators of Difficult Dialogues on Race: Implications for Student Affairs Educators and Students, 26 Coll. Stu. Aff. J., 137 (2007).

37 Derald Wing Sue et al., How White Faculty Perceive and React to Difficult Dialogues on Race, 37 Couns. Psych. 1090 (2009).

38 See University of Tennessee College of Law Library, Libguides: Inclusive teaching in the law school classroom: Classroom Management, Classroom Management − Inclusive Teaching in the Law School Classroom, https://guides.lawlib.utk.edu/c.php?g=1054190&p=7694423 (last visited Feb. 7, 2024).

39 ICYMI: Using LibGuides to Support Racial Justice & Create Inclusive Communities,

https://blog.springshare.com/2020/08/07/using-libguides-to-support-racial-justice-create-inclusive-communities/ (last visited 1 Mar. 2024).

40 See Stephanie Porrata, LibGuides for Social Justice: Limitations and Opportunities, in Practicing Social Justice in Libraries, 42 (Alyssa Brissett & Diana Moronta eds., 2022). See also Fordham Law School Library, Libguides: Race and the Law School Curriculum: Race and the classroom, Race and the Classroom − Race and the Law School Curriculum, https://researchguides.lawnet.fordham.edu/c.php?g=1145478&p=8360665 (last visited 7 Feb. 2024) (“videos on ‘creating an equitable law school experience for first generation law students’ and ‘creating a law school orientation for everyone.’”). 

41 See Rebecca J. Moran et al., Understanding the Vicarious Trauma and Emotional Labour of Criminological Research, 13 METHODOLOGICAL INNOVATIONS (2020).

42 See AALS, supra note 5 (the audit-reporting phase suggested that law deans conduct audits of the programs of their respective institutions and asked if mental health resources available for students, staff, and faculty who experience racism).

43 Texas A&M University School of Law Library, Research guides: Antiracism, diversity, equity, and Inclusion Resources: Introduction—Antiracism, Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Resources, https://law.tamu.libguides.com/c.php?g=1054092 (last visited 2 Mar. 2023).

44 Maya Bergamasco et al., HLSL Anti-Racist Resource Guide, https://etseq.law.harvard.edu/2020/06/hlsl-anti-racist-resource-guide/ (last visited 2 Mar. 2023).

45 See Meera E. Deo, Unequal profession race and gender in Legal Academia (2019).

46 Gaudion, supra note 4, at 34.

47 See Kerry Ann O’Meara et al., Undoing Disparities in Faculty Workloads: A Randomized Trial Experiment, 13 PLOS ONE 1 (2018); Richard Reddick et al., “I Don’t Want to Work in a World of Whiteness:” White Faculty and

Their Mentoring Relationships with Black Students, 8 J. Profes. 54–84 (2015).

48 See AALS, supra note 5.

49 The University of Arizona’s Daniel F. Cracchiolo Law Library also has an Antiracist and Social Justice Resource guide: https://law-arizona.libguides.com/c.php?g=1275901&p=9361292; this link was shared after the symposium.