Developing practice-ready public health lawyers through clinical practice

By its nature, public health law is an interdisciplinary practice, yet public health law is often taught in disciplinary silos, with law and public health students taking separate courses at their respective schools. The Carnegie Report outlines a framework for enhancing legal education and preparing students for practice that includes core competencies in the areas of knowledge, skills, and values. Using the Carnegie framework, this panel is targeted to an audience of faculty who teach public health law in different disciplinary schools, practitioners who supervise students, and others involved with public health and legal education. It will examine innovative methods, benefits, and challenges of teaching public health law in an interdisciplinary manner. I will describe how students can learn public health law practice (skills) in a legal clinic and how students from other disciplines can be integrated into that practice. Hoke directs the Public Health Law Clinic at Maryland Carey Law; students in the Clinic provide technical legal assistance to state and local public health officials and legislators on public health policy. Through the Clinic, students learn how to draft sound public health policy (statutes, regulations, informal policy); to identify potential legal hurdles to passage, implementation and enforcement; and to communicate effectively across disciplines. Students also learn the importance of identifying an evidence base for policy. Hoke will explain how the Clinic operates, limitations on activities particularly for those at public institutions, and how to build collaborations across disciplines, including MPH and MSW programs.