CROSS-DISCIPLINARY AND INTERDISCIPLINARY FOCUS

“There is not a more exciting moment in our nation’s history to be involved in legal education than today. Virtually every fundamental issue facing our country is illuminated through the critical thinking developed in traditional and cross-disciplinary legal training.”

Michael A. Fitts
Dean and Bernard G. Segal Professor of Law

Why is a cross-disciplinary or interdisciplinary education so valuable in the study of law at this moment in time?

Since James Wilson first proclaimed the importance of the study of law in his lectures to the College of Philadelphia, our society has highly valued a legal education. The study of law includes the mastery of analysis, of inductive and deductive reasoning, of communicating with clarity and precision. Lawyers see solutions where others see problems and find creative ways of accomplishing the goals of society and of their individual clients.

Today, the boundaries of traditional legal issues blur in our complex world. Indeed, almost all of the important issues facing us are well-considered and addressed by legal reasoning. From the protection of individual rights to the organization of our business environment, our society examines issues in an increasingly multi-faceted fashion. Legal analysis, which develops the distinctive ability to critically evaluate and synthesize divergent perspectives, is the perfect discipline for thoughtful inquiry and decision making about important and complicated questions.

At Penn Law, this fact has been incorporated into our pedagogical approach: exposure to other disciplines enhances law students’ critical thinking and enables them to skillfully navigate our world as leaders and as influential decision-makers. Accordingly, at Penn Law you will experience a cross-disciplinary approach to your legal education both in our own classrooms and through our close alliances with the intellectual centers throughout the University of Pennsylvania.

Read on through these pages to see how a cross-disciplinary and interdisciplinary education enriches and complements the study of law at the University of Pennsylvania Law School.