Legislators this session are taking a marked interest in creating new professional schools in Texas.
So far, bills have been filed to create a law school at the University of North Texas in downtown Dallas, a law school at UT-Brownsville and a medical school in the Rio Grande Valley.
The authors of the bills cite drastically underserved populations as the key reasons behind the creation of new schools.
“In terms of client or lawyer-to-citizen ratio in the [Rio Grande] Valley, we are three times at a disadvantage compared to the national average and 2 1/2 times the state average,” said Rep. Eddie Lucio, author of legislation to create a law school at UT-Brownsville. “We have far fewer lawyers per potential client than in other parts of the state.”
Sen. Royce West, D-Dallas, who is sponsoring similar legislation for UNT, says Dallas is one of the largest metropolitan areas in the country without a public law school. The $40 million UNT requested from the state Legislature was legitimate because of the need for a public law school in the area, West said at the bill’s committee hearing earlier this month.
“The costs are really dependent on whether there is a demand for a law school,” West said.
According to the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board, however, applications to law schools have declined by 7 percent since 2004 and by 13 percent in Texas.
“There is no conclusive evidence to suggest that Texas is in immediate need of more lawyers now or in the near future,” the board said in a report published in October. “Texas appears to be producing or importing enough lawyers to meet the state’s current employment demands, and over the next seven years, the number of lawyers is projected to grow at a faster rate than the increase in population.”
The report acknowledges that Texas graduates fewer lawyers than most other states, and that the Rio Grande Valley sends fewer students to Texas law schools than any other region. If a law school were to be established, the report says, the Valley and the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex are both viable options.
UT law student Arturo Villarreal said the Rio Grande Valley has a unique population that would be interested in attending law school close to home.
“A considerable portion of the student body of UT-Brownsville are non-traditional students who are working while attending college. If you also factor in that many of these students are hesitant to leave the region to attend a school, it seems rather obvious that a local law school would have some number of the local population who want to attend,” Villarreal said. “I, myself, would have rather attended a school within commuting distance of my home in Harlingen, if you had asked me then.”
Second-year law student Belinda Garcia said she’s not sure Texas has enough positions to accommodate the current class of law graduates.
“Even for summer associate positions, a lot of firms have cut back on the students they’re hiring over the summer,” Garcia said. “Cutting back on those positions — it’s a sign they’ll probably be cutting back on permanent associate positions. There’s a fear, especially among [third- and second-year law students] about getting a job.”
