Law school takes on its detractors

Four years after its attempt to become the state’s first public law school faltered amid acrimony, the 235-student institution is once again finding itself in the crossfire. The battle is being waged by high-powered lobbyists, influential legislators, and esteemed academicians on Beacon Hill, but the brunt is being felt here, at the school itself.

“My students and faculty have been maligned,’’ the school’s dean, Robert Ward, said during a recent tour of campus, a 75,000-square-foot three-story building next to an outlet mall in North Dartmouth.

Ward acknowledged his school has a way to go to meet national accreditation standards, but said it is far from the crumbling, financially destitute failure critics portray it to be.

He noted a retired appeals court judge - a Harvard Law graduate, no less - among his 13-member faculty.

He showed off a new portrait display of 18 carefully culled alumni - prosecutors, a police chief, attorneys specializing in immigration law and legal services for the poor - who have submitted statements to the school vouching for the quality of their education there.

And in the library, Ward motioned toward a darkened office that houses the law review, which he said he started four years ago to demonstrate to students that they had the “intellectual firepower’’ despite critics’ claims to the contrary.

Under a plan announced last month, Southern New England School of Law would become part of the University of Massachusetts at Dartmouth and offer a lower-cost legal education in a state with eight other private law schools. Opposing the idea are rival law schools in the region.

Both sides are girding for a high-stakes fight over the future of Ward’s school. They have retained prominent public relations firms, begun behind-the-scenes lobbying of politicians and education boards, and penned letters to the editor - all in preparation for a Nov. 18 UMass trustees’ meeting about the proposal. Members are expected to receive the merger application today.

Opponents say Southern New England’s offer to donate its facilities and assets to UMass-Dartmouth will turn into a “taxpayer-funded bailout of a failing law school.’’ They dismiss the faculty’s qualifications, allude to subpar facilities, and say bringing the school up to national standards would cost the state tens of millions of dollars, money the Commonwealth does not have.

But Ward counters that the naysayers, including Suffolk University and New England School of Law in Boston, are threatened by the potential competition.

Ward, a Suffolk Law grad, and other proponents say a quality public law school would broaden the opportunity for working-class students and train more lawyers to go into public service.

“I certainly applaud the idea of Massachusetts having a major public law school,’’ said Charles Ogletree, a Harvard Law School professor who directs the school’s Institute for Race and Justice.

“The interest here is to find more people who are eager to engage in public service. The needs have never been greater, given the number of poor clients who lack access to legal services,’’ he said.

The 28-year-old school is not accredited by the American Bar Association - a predicament Ward vowed would be remedied under UMass-Dartmouth’s plans to acquire the law school, which offered itself to the state as a $22.6 million donation last month.

The only stipulation is that the school remain in Southeastern Massachusetts and continue to provide an affordable law education for a diverse group of students; minorities currently make up 35 percent of its students.

While the school makes slightly more than it spends each year, it does not have enough in reserve to stock its library with the research-related law volumes and technology to meet national accreditation standards. Nor is the rate at which its graduates pass the bar exam - a three-year average of 43 percent for first-time test takers - up to snuff.

“We can’t get above a ceiling,’’ Ward said.

“I’m a realist. We can continue this operation the way it is probably forever, but it would mean not being able to create the opportunities for our students that I’d like to create.’’

With limited financial means, Southern New England cannot afford to provide the amount of intensive academic support many of its students need to pass the bar. Outside evaluators also have raised concerns that if the school continues independently it could face growing pressure to admit underqualified students to generate enough revenue to remain open.

“A public school would greatly improve our resources to expand our faculty and allow us to appeal to a broader potential audience,’’ said George Jacobs, a Southern New England professor and retired appeals court judge.

Jean MacCormack - a UMass-Dartmouth chancellor who advocates having the law school become part of the UMass system - said the merger would not cost taxpayers a cent as she outlined the financial plans during an interview at the law school, 3 miles from the UMass-Dartmouth campus.

“It is not a bailout,’’ MacCormack said. “I’m the chancellor of a campus facing financial difficulties. I’m not going to take on something that’s going to be a burden.’’

Under the plan, MacCormack said, enrollment would gradually grow to 278 in fall 2010 and reach a maximum of 550 students by 2017.

The increase would provide new tuition revenue to help pay for $13.8 million worth of investments in additional faculty, library acquisitions, and staff, and academic support that the school needs to achieve ABA standards - which it plans to begin seeking in 2011.

Tuition and fees, currently $22,175, would be raised slightly to $23,500, still nearly half the cost of Suffolk and New England School of Law. State education officials say the public connection would allow the law school to build upon the strengths of UMass-Dartmouth - public policy, environment, and marine studies.

MacCormack said the budget projections for the school show a tuition remittance of more than $670,000 to the state in the first year. A public law school would generate $1.3 million in tuition revenue for the state by 2017-18, she said. In addition, law school revenue would enable UMass-Dartmouth to add $10.2 million to its reserves by 2018.

But John O’Brien, dean of New England School of Law, questioned the feasibility of UMass’s plan to generate enough revenue to prepare the school for national accreditation. Other new law schools have had to significantly discount tuition in their initial years of operation to entice talented students to enroll, he said.

“You can’t expect good students to come who could otherwise go to an accredited school,’’ O’Brien said.

MacCormack said tough times demand bold plans.

“Critics are taking the argument that when you’re in a fiscal crisis, it’s not the time to do anything new,’’ MacCormack said.

“To me, we should be saying, ‘Why not?’ This is a way to build what the community needs and be entrepreneurial in a climate of declining state support.’’

Tracy Jan can be reached at tjan@globe.com.