Law school: 2 years or 4?

Here's an interesting article regarding the necessity of three years of law school. I put off some of my required classes -- mainly Evidence and Trust & Estates -- until my last year, so I could take some of the more specialized seminar classes when they were being offered second year. So I can't vouch for the lackadaisical approach to the final year of classes.

Plus, I had been out of school working for more than (not over! :) 10 years, and had not secured a full time law job until after I graduated, so my perspective may be skewed. For a student, I was an oldster, though I like to think I could still pass and blend in with the crowd. Still, I could see if you pretty much went from undergrad straight through, or just with a few years off to live some, how you might be chomping at the bit as a 3L, with higher priorities such as family planning. Still, I'm inclined to agree with Dean Levmore here. Slow down the merry-go-round, and let me take even more in-depth classes with professors who are available that term. CLEs are not the same as a semester long class. ... What do you think?

Besides, many third-year law students do work hard. Increasingly, they are getting hands-on training in legal clinics. In the classroom, some educators say third year is when students learn the law they most need to know. University of Chicago Law Dean Saul Levmore says students there are more likely to suggest adding a fourth year than dropping the third.

Jeff Lewis, dean at St. Louis University, says he's pushing for more rigor and specialization in the third-year curriculum. He also says the final-year course he teaches is packed with attentive students — though that may be unusual.

David Wilkins, a Harvard Law professor, recalls struggling to conduct a survey of third-year law students because so few showed up to class. In a paper about the third year titled "The Happy Charade," three scholars, including prominent UCLA professor Richard Sander, estimated that the 1,100 third-years he surveyed attended no more than 60 percent of their large classes.

About two in five agreed with the statement "the third year of law school is largely superfluous."