Volume 5 Winter 2011 Number 2 - Charleston Law Review

SCHULZE FINAL.doc1/20/2011 6:14PM2011] Law School Academic Supportmodern practice requires mastery of other modes of disputeresolution, such as mediation, settlement, and negotiation, noneof these skills are rewarded in the traditional law school. 104Thus, “law schools neglect cognitive skills traditionallyassociated with women, including contextual reasoning,relational skills, and narrative intelligence.” 105Furthermore, Professor Carole J. Buckner notes that:Most African American students are highly parent and teachermotivated, and [they] prefer collegial authority figures presentwhile learning. The academic achievement of African Americanstudents improves when teachers use cooperative rather thancompetitive learning strategies because such approachesparallel the context for learning found in their cultures. Withcooperative learning groups and more symmetrical teacherstudentinteraction, classroom discussions increase in degreeand intensity. 106She further states that:The Hispanic cultural emphasis on cooperation in theaccomplishment of goals can leave Hispanic students feelinguncomfortable in a traditionally competitive style classroom.Hispanic students benefit from instructional methods includingcooperative or group learning, and through techniques ofhumanizing the curriculum through use of humor, fantasy, ordrama, personalized rewards, modeling, informal classdiscussion, and global emphasis on concepts rather thanattention to details. Both Hispanic and African Americanlearners prefer a highly emotive, dramatic style of instructionwhich may result from the prominence of storytelling and theuse of affective expressions and communal values of theirtraditional cultures. Hispanic learners benefit from deemphasison the question and answer format and the104. Id. at 435.105. Id. at 435–36.106. Carole J. Buckner, Realizing Grutter v. Bollinger’s “CompellingEducational Benefits of Diversity”—Transforming Aspirational Rhetoric intoExperience, 72 UMKC L. REV. 877, 911 (2004) (footnotes omitted) (internalquotation marks omitted).299