My BarStory - 43 Dean Jessica Berg and Dean Michael Scharf

This week’s My BarStory features not one, but two Deans of the Case Western Reserve University School of Law. Dean Jessica Berg and Dean Michael Scharf have worked together in partnership for a decade to build Case Western Reserve’s School of Law into an international leader. CMBA CEO Becky Ruppert McMahon had a chance to sit down with them to learn how these two Deans are making sure that Case Western Reserve law students don’t have to wait for graduation to start changing the world.

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Becky Ruppert McMahon (00:05):
I am C M B A C E O, Becky Rupert McMahon. This week's my bar story features not one but two. Two deans of the case, Western Reserve University School of Law, Dean Jessica Berg and her co dean Michael Scharf, have worked together in partnership for a decade building case Western Reserve School of Law into a national leader in fields including health, law and international law. I had a chance to sit down with the co deans to learn how they agree that case Western Reserve law students don't have to wait for graduation to start changing the world.

Speaker 2 (00:40):
Hi, I'm Jessica Berg. I'm the Co-Dean at Case Western Reserve University School of Law.

Becky Ruppert McMahon (00:45):
And good afternoon to you too, sir.

Speaker 3 (00:47):
Thank you. I'm Michael Scharf, the other Co-Dean and we've been in this position since 2013.

Becky Ruppert McMahon (00:53):
Okay, so if I did my math right, 2013 means 10th anniversary. Yes. Congratulations. Why don't I start with you Jessica, I'm dying to know how did you end up at Case Western Reserve University?

Speaker 2 (01:04):
So I was working at the American Medical Association in Chicago and I was doing some adjunct teaching at Northwestern and University of Chicago. And I decided I wanted to become a full-time academic and I started looking out there on the market and I taught in both medical schools and law schools. So I wasn't exactly sure which direction I was going. Case Western Reserve University called me and said, you know, we have this unique position, it's half law school, half medical school. And I thought perfect. And so I came out here viewed the schools. The health law program is phenomenal here. The Department of Bioethics, which was the other side of the medical side which recruited me was one of the top in the country and it just seemed like a match made in heaven.

Becky Ruppert McMahon (01:42):
Yeah, it sure sounds like it. Now, was Chicago home for you originally?

Speaker 2 (01:46):
No I bounced around a lot. Most of my family is in New York or somewhere along the East Coast, a little bit out in California, a little bit in Houston. So pretty much anything was fair game. I loved Chicago but it was not where I had been.

Becky Ruppert McMahon (02:00):
Well, at least you made it easy by going from a city with a sea and a lot of wind to another city with a sea and a whole lot of wind.

Speaker 2 (02:06):
True. And I have to say that the winters didn't worry me in any way, shape or form. And I think that reassured them here that I might stay for a while. I wasn't gonna get scared off by anything.

Becky Ruppert McMahon (02:14):
That's fabulous. And in contrast, Michael, you're a native originally Shaker Heights, is

Speaker 3 (02:19):
That right? Yeah, yeah. So grew up up the street and my debate partner who is now the director of the law department, Mark Griffin, and I used to come to this law school to prepare our debate research when the topic was America's foreign policy. And I fell in love with international relations. So I went to college and become an international relations major and then went to law school, clerked down for a federal appeals court judge in Jacksonville, Florida. And then got my dream job at the State Department. Worked there for four years and in the evenings I was teaching at Georgetown and I got the teaching bug. I, I couldn't imagine there was a better job than working at the State department until I started teaching. So my first teaching gig was in Boston and I did nine years there and then 21 years ago I got to come back to Cleveland where my roots are and my family is.

Becky Ruppert McMahon (03:10):
I love it. What was it about the opportunity to come back to Cleveland that made you say yes beyond the family? What was it career wise? So, so

Speaker 3 (03:16):
This school has a really amazing international law center and it has currently a $5.6 million endowment, which makes it the second largest of any international law center in the country. So when Sid Picker, who had been teaching here for 30 years was getting ready to retire, I just happened to be giving a speech here and people said, would you ever think about coming back to Cleveland? And I was like in a second. And so I was able to come back and then take over the International Law Center and it has been just a great platform for my career.

Becky Ruppert McMahon (03:48):
And then at what point did the opportunity for this code dean experience come in in your career? And I'll ask you the same Jessica. So we figure out how these two came together.

Speaker 3 (03:57):
So I directed the International Law Center and taught international law and then they made me associate Dean for Global Legal Studies. And then our dean, you know, had a series of mishaps and they asked us if we would be interested in being code deans. And it seemed like moments later we were up before the faculty introducing ourselves in a whole new light.

Becky Ruppert McMahon (04:20):
So who was it that had the first idea of this code? Deanan leadership model. Professor

Speaker 2 (04:25):
Sharona Hoffman

Becky Ruppert McMahon (04:25):
<Laugh>. Okay.

Speaker 2 (04:26):
So the provost at the time had come to talk to the faculty and the senior staff and asked, what do you think we should do? We knew we were in November, it's the middle of a semester, everybody has full teaching loads and actually full teaching loads into the spring. As Michael pointed out, things were in a bit of an awkward situation given the prior dean and we didn't know if we were looking at a few months, a longer period of time. So it was a little hard to figure out what we were going to do and we knew we needed people to step in what happened for us first as acting and then as interim. And she said, you know, Minnesota actually had had codeine for a while and it worked well. And in fact, case Western had had codeine and a number of decades ago and just suggested maybe that would be the way to do it. And he came back and asked everybody, you know, if you were going to suggest people who could step in as code deans, who would those people be? And that's how we wound up in this situation.

Becky Ruppert McMahon (05:19):
So I'm dying to know how did you begin that negotiation? Because I'm sure it was friendly negotiation, but you had to figure out who was going to do what within the dean universe. So how did that dialogue and that alignment of responsibilities come about? So

Speaker 2 (05:33):
The first thing that's important to understand is when we were given the position, the president at the time said, I'm not making any decisions on how you split things up. It's all each of yours. So you guys figure it out. You know, we've worked together on different kinds of things. I think we both tend to be fairly collaborative generally. I think we started pretty much with, alright, let's try everything and then let's see where things fall most naturally. So

Becky Ruppert McMahon (05:54):
Michael, I would typically say, why do you think people talk wanted you in this role? Except I think it's hard to talk about yourself. So let me ask you this, why do you think they wanted Jessica in this role as a code? Dean Jessica

Speaker 3 (06:05):
Was the rising star at the law school and she had just completed chairing our faculty committee that re reviewed our curriculum and came up with a completely brand new model for the law school. And if you look out the window here, it says a national leader in experiential education. What Jessica did is came up with a way for the law school to transform from a doctrinal general regular law school to something really special. And so at the time everybody was really excited about the change. We knew that this was gonna be the, the future direction of our school. And so I think everybody just thought, well, Jessica was so successful at that, she's gonna be a great leader.

Becky Ruppert McMahon (06:44):
Yep. That makes sense to me. Okay. Jessica, I'm gonna ask you the flip side. Why do you think everyone was so eager to see Michael take the other half of this coin? Yeah,

Speaker 2 (06:51):
I think Michael has the national visibility. Certainly at that time he was probably one of the most prominent faculty members. International law is a huge area of this school, so it made a lot of sense to pull somebody who knew a lot about that area already. It meant that a good portion of this job was something that he already had in his wheelhouse. And generally speaking, you know, I think this was for him, you know, a point in his career where this was a really good next step. And made a lot of sense then for the school to be pulling from him.

Becky Ruppert McMahon (07:22):
There's certainly an awful lot of administrative responsibility that comes along with a deanship, whether it's co or solo. I'm curious about how in those early days you balanced your love of teaching, your passion for teaching and the adoption of now these new administrative responsibilities. Michael, any early insights for you?

Speaker 3 (07:39):
Well, so first of all, when you talk about the responsibilities of Deaning, one of the biggest ones is fundraising. And the nice thing is that a a lot of people who are thrown into the role, you know, are not great fundraisers or, you know, just don't have the natural inclination to do it. Jessica and I were energetic and enthusiastic about it, and I think our greatest success as code deans is that we've been able to see twice as many alums have twice as many visits. And in the 10 years we've now raised $70 million for the law school, which is what, wait,

Becky Ruppert McMahon (08:12):
You have to pause and say that number again. It's

Speaker 3 (08:14):
It's a lot.

Becky Ruppert McMahon (08:15):
It's

Speaker 3 (08:15):
A lot. It's about three times more than any single dean had ever raised. And so it's really been able to make transformative differences for the school. So, so that was the first thing we had to, you know, figure out how are we gonna do fundraising? And that is one of the most important things when it comes to other roles. Jessica was originally a math major. She's really good at finance. That is not my strength. If it was my strength, I would've been a veterinarian and not a lawyer. 'cause That's my real love. But I just couldn't cut those classes like many lawyers. So Jessica's taken over the HR and the finance portfolios. What I really love though is communications and marketing. My dad was the general manager of the Cleveland Jewish News. He had a marketing background and by osmosis, you know, I just caught the bug. And so I've been really throwing myself into that area. But as far as, you know, strategic thinking working with the faculty, working with the staff, those things we share evenly and one or the other of us can take any particular project and we're more or less interchangeable.

Becky Ruppert McMahon (09:18):
So Jessica, so I'm interested in those early days that finding that right balance between the administrative role and still teaching, which is clearly a passion.

Speaker 2 (09:26):
It was pretty crazy in the beginning. It's almost hard to remember how crazy it was in the beginning. We definitely were still teaching. We were on the road a lot and a little worse. We were on the road based on schedules that had been determined prior to us stepping in. So there were a bunch of things already planned by the former dean and we just had to fill in, which meant we were doing a little bit of a scramble to just try to figure out what works and what doesn't work at that time. The other thing was we had a our finance and administration person had, she left about a week after we came, not because of us. She'd already announced that she'd taken another job in another state prior to the dean stepping down before us. So we were left with just a, a complete kind of figure out how to be dean, figure out how to also run the finance and administration pieces of everything. And I'm trying to think if we had anything else open at the time. I wouldn't have been surprised

Speaker 3 (10:20):
From time to time over the 10 years people have left and the nice thing about having the two of us is that one or the other of us will just jump in and fill that role. And so we've been without our Associate Dean for Global Legal Studies for I think five years now. So I've been doing that in addition to the deaning.

Speaker 2 (10:36):
I love teaching, but realistically we are not in the same place at the same time every week through the course of a semester, which makes it not just challenging for us, but I think unfair to students when you, you know, put us into a more typical classroom. But we do a lot of really innovative things with teaching. So we have short intensive courses, we have courses that run for half of a semester. We have summer courses and we've managed to sort of slot ourselves into the areas so that we are teaching consistently, but not necessarily in a more traditional classroom setting.

Speaker 3 (11:06):
And, and I'll tell you what I really love. I mean, I, I like the classroom and I teach international law every spring. I do the Journal of International Law, but what really gets me is I coach the Jessup International Law Mood Court team and there's a lot of teaching involved in that. I do that in the evenings, I do that on the weekends. But our Jessup team has won the world championship. We've been the regional national champion 10 times in 21 years. There's a whole wall behind the mood courtroom of all the plaques we've gotten. And so I guess my type A personality, you know, vicariously enjoys that. But I just love, you know, being able to take these often one Ls and teach them everything they need to know about being successful in moot court.

Becky Ruppert McMahon (11:49):
Tremendous. Jessica, I'm interested about some of, as you look back on the last 10 years, what are some of the accomplishments that you're most proud of?

Speaker 2 (11:56):
So as Michael pointed out in the beginning, the rollout of a very different and new curriculum has been phenomenal. So I think that's probably the biggest deal. And we've certainly garnered national recognition for a lot of that, including on the experiential education side. We've done quite a bit in updating the building, right? So just some of the basics, making it a more comfortable space for our students, for faculty, for staff. We're just finishing up the, the final pieces of projects I think that pointed when you renovated your house where you start to look back at the first thing you did and realize that you have to go back and do something else. We've built a really phenomenal faculty and we did that through a pandemic. So that's another piece of it that I think has been great. And then we have a phenomenal staff right now. You know, we've really had, we have some long-term people who've been with the school for decades now, and we have some newer people and I think we have some real potential to just be an amazing place. What

Becky Ruppert McMahon (12:55):
Have you seen in terms of how the students have changed? Or maybe they're the same in the last decade with Covid stuck in the middle. I don't know how they could be the same, but, but what was it like as you were first stepping into the role of code Deans in terms of what the student body felt like, what the, you were coming out of the 2008, 2009 timeframe where law school class sizes had gotten much smaller and you were working to build back, and then Covid got, and now we are three years post covid, thank God maybe we never go back. So talk a little bit about the students in all of this. Yeah, our students

Speaker 2 (13:25):
Are pretty different. So I can't speak a lot on the individual level, whether, you know, any particular student is that different now from before. But the student body as a whole, it's a much more diverse student body. Both in the demographic makeup, but also because we have a number of new programs now. So we made a very strategic decision that we were not going to be as large of a school as we were. We wanted to make sure that we were holding higher criteria, that we were able to place all of our students and that we were engaged with our student body in a way that I think is very important for us. So we know our students the faculty know our students. We do a lot of different things with them. They have a lot of different opportunities. You are not here anonymously. That decrease in our JD student body meant we had to be thinking very strategically about what else we offer as a school. So we grew parts of our international student body. We also added in a variety of master's programs, which looked very, very different. So the people here in the building are different, but I think that makes us more exciting. That also makes the class discussions very interesting. And I, overall, it makes us a stronger institution.

Speaker 3 (14:31):
There's been a, a huge evolution of students across the nation in the last 10 years. So when we first started, the reason that applications were down in law schools is because jobs were down in law firms. And the students at that time didn't have sort of the excitement and confidence that they were gonna get jobs by 2021, the opposite had happened. There was more hiring than ever before, and our hiring hit the highest level ever. And that corresponded with our bar exam pass rate, hitting its highest level ever. So that was an amazing year for us. We had a 95% bar pass rate in 2020, which was 20th best in the whole country. So just that, you know, meant that the students were more confident and excited. But then of course you've got C O V I D and we had to teach for a year remotely.

Speaker 3 (15:24):
And that I, I don't think it was fun for anybody, but we, we did it and we learned a lot about remote teaching. Which, you know, as, as we'll talk about later, has opened some doors for us. And then I think that people talk about the zoom generation. It is just kind of a different group of students than before. There's some really exciting features about it and some challenging features about it, but it's not special to our school as opposed to just having seen it over 10 years. The, the other thing I wanted to answer is you asked, you know, like what are the exciting things that we're most proud of that, that we've accomplished? Our credentials for the students have gotten up and up and up. So when we first started, we were at a 1 58 median LSAT and we're now at a one 60 and our G P A was a 3.5, and then it crept up to 3.6 and then 3.65 this year. It's a 3.7 highest in our history. And we're, we're so proud of that because it means that we're like hot law school people want to come here and the kids are wicked smart and they're, they're hard workers and it's really fun to teach them.

Becky Ruppert McMahon (16:30):
Yeah. How could it not be? So I'm interested in the 10 years that you've been co deans. There have been some other law schools that have tried a co deanan ship more, I think have not succeeded than succeeded in the coroll. And I'm interested in what, what do you think the secret sauce is between the two of you in terms of why you've been so successful for a decade?

Speaker 2 (16:49):
So, I, I've told people this before, it's a partnership. Lots of people have partnerships, but I think they forget that there's work that goes into a partnership. Communication is key. We spend a lot of time communicating both in the building and outside the building. We actually live fairly near each other. And so at periods of time we've gone for walks or driven back and forth together. So that we have time to be able to keep in touch with on everything that's going on. You have to be willing to compromise on things. You have to be willing to really hear what somebody else is saying, not just pretend to be listening, but actually hear the perspective they're bringing to you. But I tell people consistently, the thing about partnerships is you are absolutely more stronger and more powerful together than you are apart. And that's what makes it worth it. So it's worth all of that energy and effort you put into it. And,

Speaker 3 (17:35):
You know, over 10 years we've really developed a lot of trust. We've never let each other down. And I think we've gotten really comfortable with each other's judgment. And so over time there are different spheres that, you know, know Jessica has taken and I have taken, and I don't have to be involved in those decision making 'cause I know that she'll make the right decisions. She was mentioning all the building renovations here. Jessica has the most amazing aesthetic tastes and, and abilities and skills. And so I'm just so pleased with all the choices that she's made when I walk around the law school and see how different this place is now than it was 10 years ago.

Becky Ruppert McMahon (18:16):
So I, are there other things, Michael, that beyond Jessica's aesthetic that the average person doesn't know about her?

Speaker 3 (18:22):
About Jessica? Yeah. Oh, there's so many things. <Laugh>.

Becky Ruppert McMahon (18:26):
Anything you can

Speaker 2 (18:26):
Share can share all of them.

Speaker 3 (18:27):
Let's start when she was a kid. So I think she spent from age six to 16 playing classical music and getting really good at that. And then I think she gave that up when she became a, she started flying airplanes working toward her pilot's license. And then she was kind of like Doogie Hauser and she graduated early and took college classes and then went to Cornell a year early. And then I think she started as a math major as I mentioned before. And then did you end up in psychology? Is that what your, that's major

Speaker 2 (18:56):
Was a strange story and yes, without many psychology courses, but yes.

Speaker 3 (19:00):
So, so there's that. Then, you know, by the time she gets to Cleveland, she was a ski patrol. I saw her once, we had Hillary Clinton come here and speak and we were sitting on the front row and someone next to us fainted. And I'm sitting there thinking, what do I do? Like I'm trying to process this. And by the time I, I was like thinking about it, Jessica was already down, cleared it out, propped her up, you know, was doing all the right things that she learned from ski patrol and I was like, that's who I want next to me in the foxhole. <Laugh>.

Becky Ruppert McMahon (19:29):
Absolutely. So

Speaker 3 (19:30):
That's Jessica.

Becky Ruppert McMahon (19:30):
That is fantastic. Okay, we get to turn the table. So what do people not know about Michael? Some

Speaker 2 (19:35):
Of these things people might know about, but not everybody. So he loves Siberian Huskies. He's had a series of them. His current one, Luna is adorable. He runs with these dogs every single morning, rain, snow slash a couple times we've had discussions about making sure you don't get run up by cars while

Speaker 3 (19:53):
Doing that. And Jeff just got me lights so I don't get good. Mm-Hmm. <Affirmative>.

Speaker 2 (19:55):
Yep. And those of you who've heard him play I think, you know, he says his first love would've been a veterinarian. I don't believe that he would've been a rockstar <laugh>. If he had anything that he could do, he would be playing his guitar and singing. That's clearly, without a doubt, one of his favorite things to do in all settings. You love skiing and you do a lot of skiing in interesting places. Love traveling and do a lot of traveling in interesting places. And I get a lot of very cool photographs from those places.

Becky Ruppert McMahon (20:22):
I was fortunate to come visit Michael a few days ago and he gave me the tour of his new office. So he walked around and I saw these amazing photographs from just a lifetime of incredible trips. But you have a few of your No, they're not

Speaker 2 (20:33):
Mine. I they're

Becky Ruppert McMahon (20:34):
Not yours.

Speaker 2 (20:36):
<Laugh>. It was funny because when Michael we've swapped offices and he is like, should I take the llama and the the alpacas? And I was like, no, think

Becky Ruppert McMahon (20:44):
They're yours. They're theirs. I love it. Well, what a great way to share. You know, we've spent some time thinking about what you have accomplished in the past and I'm as wonderful as that is, as tremendous as it is, I'm actually more excited about what do you see on the horizon as you look forward in the next five to 10 plus years? What are you excited about? Mark? Michael, let's start with you.

Speaker 3 (21:03):
Well, I'm going to tee this up for Jessica, but just this week we announced the launch of our new online part-time program and Jessica's been working on that for over a year and a half. So why don't you tell us about it?

Speaker 2 (21:16):
Sure. I've actually wanted something like this for a really long time. And pre pandemic there was sort of mixed feelings about online education and what it could do and whether it would work. And I joke with people that the spring of 2020 was the greatest natural experiment on the face of the earth. Everybody had to teach remotely. And so it really forced people to think about how you could use this modality to reach students in different ways. And while I strongly believe in in-person education, and I strongly believe we will continue to have in-person JD programs, I think there's a population out there that does, does not have access. They are living in areas that do not have law schools with part-time evening programs. They have life circumstances either for themselves, for, with issues or disabilities that prevent them from more easily attending classes on a regular basis.

Speaker 2 (22:04):
They have childcare or elder care responsibilities that also make it very hard for them to be doing these things, for whom an online part-time program would be ideal. And our goal has been that we develop this program, build into the program, a lot of the academic support elements that we think are so very crucial build into the program, ways to interact with their cohorts. So they're getting all of those pieces. And also maintain sort of the same high standards in terms of the students that are coming in. And I'm really excited to see this launched a launch in the fall and I am pretty, pretty thrilled to see where we'll go with it.

Becky Ruppert McMahon (22:41):
Is there built into this online program, is there opportunity for the students to come on campus at any point?

Speaker 2 (22:46):
Yeah, so there actually are optional in-person residencies. And those are built around the idea that while it might be very hard for you to come for a whole semester or even for a whole summer, you might be able to come for a one week time period. So the idea is that we might offer you some short courses. We might offer you mo quarter mock trial competitions during that time period and on the weekends around it, we wanna wrap around both some social services and some professional development pieces. So some networking and other kinds of things. Those should be pretty exciting too. And hopefully those are things that we're gonna encourage students to come to about one a year. But we recognize, again, people may have other life needs. We didn't wanna make them mandatory, we just wanted to make them accessible. Mm-Hmm.

Becky Ruppert McMahon (23:28):
<Affirmative>, what a great new innovation that's gonna be transformative and yet another way for the school. Michael, anything you are excited about for the future?

Speaker 3 (23:35):
You know, if you look at Ohio State and its success, it was, when it got the Moritz Family Endowment, we decided to launch a $20 million scholarship drive. And we're already, we just launched it, but we're already at seven and a half million. And I would love us by the end of the year to be very close to 20 million. 'cause I think that will be transformative to the school in the way that it was for Ohio State

Becky Ruppert McMahon (23:58):
And how thrilling for our region. There

Speaker 3 (24:00):
Are some new partnerships that we're negotiating with institutions abroad and I'm hoping that a couple of those are going to pay off by the end of the year.

Becky Ruppert McMahon (24:09):
Michael, I'm dying to know, I can't wait any longer. When we were talking about music earlier, I was gonna jump in, but I, I tried to refrain myself. I'm dying to talk a little bit about your radio show on Idea Stream. Oh yeah. I know you're busy as a dean, I know you're busy in the academic arena, but you make time for a radio show. Can you talk a little bit about that?

Speaker 3 (24:25):
Sure. Well, it's quarterly, so it's not every week or every day. So I'm the host and I get people from all over the world to beam in and the technology is such, now that it sounds like they're right in the studio with me, it's called Talking Foreign Policy and it's about international relations issues. Interestingly, when I first pitched this to Idea Stream, they said, oh yeah, come on in and we'll do a pilot. So I did a pilot and I said, so what'd you think? I was so excited. They said, well, you're a little bit too much talk radio and not enough N P R. And I was like, what does that mean? Just too much enthusiasm. And they said, watch a whole lot of N P R or listen to a whole lot of N P r episodes and you'll, you'll see what we mean. So I did a second pilot, they said, you nailed it. And then I've been doing it all these years. And then I asked them recently if they noticed that I kind of shifted back to my enthusiastic way and they said, oh yeah, we, we caught that. But they said that their polls and everything that they take indicate that the listening audience really likes it. So they didn't make me change that. That's

Becky Ruppert McMahon (25:27):
Fabulous. I think it is anyone who knows, you knows, it is impossible to take that out of you. It's just fundamentally who you are.

Speaker 2 (25:33):
I feel like I wanna go back and listen to one of those first episodes. I don't believe you can take enthusiasm out. Well, <laugh>.

Speaker 3 (25:38):
So. Yeah.

Becky Ruppert McMahon (25:39):
Well, the other piece that we all know is that you're an incredible per performer. So I would love to talk a little bit more about your band. And I know several people who've been involved in, in your band, including most recently at the Legal Aid Jam for Justice. Melanie Farrell, who attended her very first Jam for Justice jumped up on stage. I understand it with a cowbell at some point. But I would love to talk about your band how that got started and what it means to you at this point.

Speaker 3 (26:03):
So the law school had a band going back 30 years and Ken Margolis, who had then been a clinical professor, actually had a top 10 hit years and years ago called it not the Law School Band, not when he was at

Speaker 2 (26:17):
The law school band. He had that and then he had the band,

Speaker 3 (26:19):
Right. And so they, they invited me to join the band and they would basically play the B side of records 'cause they were like a really classy group. But I'm an A side guy. <Laugh> pop through and through songs everybody knows by heart. So over time I started introducing more and more of my songs and more and more of the old crowd started dropping outta the band. I don't know if it corresponded, but we started bringing students in. So now there are amazing students who are so much better singers and performers than, than any of the faculty really. Although, let me mention a couple of the faculty that are in the band, Charlie Cosmo, who was a famous Hollywood child actor. He is our keyboardist and he especially plays Beatles songs and he's got this amazing voice. And whenever he does, hey Jude, everybody in the audience lights up their phone and goes back and forth as they did at The Jam for Justice. The director of our law library is our bass player, Katie Mercer, who's a writing professor, and Andrew Pollis, who's a clinical professor. They do background harmonies. And then we have some alums that have stuck with us. One of them, Liz Safier is at Squire Pat and Bogg, she has an electric violin. And then Chuck Halberg, who's literally a billionaire and he's a member of the board of trustees. He plays an amazing guitar. And so he's on the band as well.

Becky Ruppert McMahon (27:38):
That's fabulous. I can't think there are too many directors of library around the law, libraries around the country who also play bass guitar.

Speaker 3 (27:46):
Yeah. And there's this one song Jimmy well van Morrison's Brown-Eyed Girl, where there's this amazing bass solo. And I just love when we get to that. And I say, and there's Joe Custer on the base, and it's really great.

Becky Ruppert McMahon (27:59):
That's awesome. That's great. So one of the things that I know that, that you both believe in is that you have an obligation and a commitment to the law school, to your faculty, to your students and your staff here, but you also see the law school as playing a critical role in the broader community. Jessica, maybe you could talk a little bit about the law school's role in the broader Cleveland community.

Speaker 2 (28:19):
One of the key pieces for us has been our law clinic. So we serve primarily the East Cleveland and Cleveland population, and we serve indigent population who can't afford for legal services in other contexts, so they don't have access. And that's where we spend our time and focus in making sure we offer those legal services more broadly than that. We do expect, and we have certainly seen our faculty and even our staff become involved in the Cleveland legal community in a wide variety of ways. Sometimes they're on task force, sometimes they're part of other working groups, they're part of the C M B A and then part of the Ohio State Bar Association also in this kind of goal that schools are successful universities generally to the extent that they work with their communities in terms of where they're going, what they can offer, and how they can play a role in the things that are really important to the community. And so we try to encourage that in all of our faculty and our staff, and we try to encourage our students likewise, to become

Becky Ruppert McMahon (29:18):
Involved. And so Michael, then I'll ask you, as the international man of mystery, what do you think the law school's role is in the broader globe? You know, the global community, when we're

Speaker 3 (29:26):
Recruiting students for the International law program, I tell them, I know that you want to go to a law school that will make it so that you can have an impact on the world, but if you come here, you don't have to wait till you graduate. You'll start having an impact as a one L in our school. And so I think that goes back to the time when I used to teach this course called the War Crimes Research Lab, and we were doing work to help the prosecutors of these international tribunals and the special court for Sir Leone actually nominated our students and program for the Nobel Peace Prize. Then the same prosecutor ends up joining our faculty and he now teaches that class. And he also created this thing called the Yemen Accountability Project. And over 70 of our one L students, about half the class are in this project. Yemen Civil War people aren't focusing on, but it's a horrible civil war. So the only place there's documentation and legal work being done right now is at our law school. And someday, and I'm absolutely positive about this, this will go to an international prosecution and it'll be Case Western that made the difference.

Becky Ruppert McMahon (30:31):
Wow. What a game changer. I'm, I'm curious, we've spent at the Bar Association, we're celebrating our 150th anniversary and we've spent a lot of time talking about legacy, what the legacy of our bar is, what the legacy of our individual members are. Jessica, what do you, what do you hope your legacy is down the road when people look back on what you contributed to Case Western Western Reserve University? Hmm.

Speaker 2 (30:52):
I'd like people to think about it as a, at least the time period, I hope they think about it as a time of stability and growth and then going forward into the future. I hope they see all the amazing things that this school can do. I hope we raise the visibility enough that people realize that we have some incredible things we can offer here. And they're not the same things that you can see other places and, you know, take advantage of them. Come here and enjoy that. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative>.

Becky Ruppert McMahon (31:16):
Michael, what about your legacy? Well,

Speaker 3 (31:18):
So we used to be the best kept secret, and I've really spent a lot of energy getting the world and the country to know about Case Western Reserve. But I remember when we put the flag out front that says it's a banner that says a national leader in experiential education. That was us sort of celebrating our future. But in the last three years we've been ranked in the top 10 in practical training. So we achieved that and we've also been ranked as a top school in 12 specialty areas. And that's something, you know, I think we were always strong in those areas, but now we're getting the recognition. The other thing is Jessica and I, we just brought a very positive approach to Deaning. And this is a school, like many law schools that used to have fractious relationships and I think the last 10 years have really seen a community develop. And it's been a really friendly time. And when you have that kind of culture, the school can produce and be more successful by leaps and bounds than without it. And so I think that's part of our legacy as well. Sure.

Becky Ruppert McMahon (32:21):
I think there's another component to your legacy, which is just getting started and that Michael, I, I gotta look at you when I say this. You have been since 2016 when the earliest supporters of an initiative that the Bar association's just getting off the ground. And that's the Cleveland Legal Collaborative. When we first started talking about this opportunity to bring a next generation of lawyers, train them with the senior lawyers to serve the underserved, you are at the front, at the table, front of the line saying, we're in, tell us how we can help and how we can be a part of

Speaker 3 (32:48):
This. I'm the biggest cheerleader for this project. I hope that I, I can't wait to see it roll out. I hope it's a huge success and I'm, I'm confident that it will be. But basically it means that, you know, some percentage of law students who, you know, aren't ready to go into big law firm practice or get government jobs will be able to start their careers rather than waiting a, a period of time under the tutelage of really good lawyers that are at the end of their careers and have the time and energy and interest to help them along. And they'll have a facility and they'll have the resources and it's gonna make a difference for a lot of people in Cleveland.

Becky Ruppert McMahon (33:25):
And Jessica, I'm curious about what would you say to somebody who's thinking about going to law Stu Law School? We see a lot of students who are sort of like, what do I do? I come outta college. Where should I go? Why should a student today say yes to law school?

Speaker 2 (33:39):
Law still remains one of the most flexible degrees that you can get. It trains you how to think. It trains you how to communicate. It opens a wide array of doors. I think it is still a good bet for a student who's thinking, I wanna make an impact on the world. You know, I, I I guess I'll borrow from Michael's. If you really wanna make an impact on the world, consider us. Because I think you can make that impact right from day one. We give you a lot of those opportunities. We allow you to explore a lot of things that you maybe didn't get a chance to explore otherwise. We're one of the few law schools in the country that is a study abroad program, right? We give you some things that I don't know that all other law schools give you. And we give it to you in an atmosphere where you're on a vibrant university campus, you're in what I am as a Cleveland transplant, a phenomenal city that has a lot to offer, and we give it to you in a community that's gonna care about you and be engaged with you while you're here.

Speaker 3 (34:33):
One of the things I tell law firms when I do my law firm visits is you're gonna see that our law school's a national law school. Over half our students come from other states, but they all are interested. There are, many of them are interested in practicing law in Cleveland. They fall in love with the city. So we are one of those places that are bringing people into Cleveland and helping to grow it. And what I tell the law firms is give them a chance. You know, you may think that they're not really serious about Cleveland, but they are. And a lot of them, you know, end up thriving and becoming the leaders of the, the bar in the city of Cleveland. I was

Becky Ruppert McMahon (35:07):
Gonna say the C N B A is a testament to that. We have many, many, many inc case graduates who are very active in our bar association, including this year's Bar Foundation President Meredith Chupe, who is a very proud graduate of the Case law school. Well, it's crystal clear to me your impact individually and collectively is tremendous, both locally, across the state, and now across the globe. I couldn't be more excited to see where both of you go next and where the law school follows, because the, the opportunities I think are just unlimited. So thank you for making time for us to sit down and have this conversation. We're so grateful for you to tell your own stories with our bar, and I can't wait for the rest of the world to hear it. It's been a

Speaker 4 (35:45):
Pleasure. Thanks, Becky.

Becky Ruppert McMahon (35:45):
Yeah, thank you so much. Thank you Dean Berg and Dean Scharf for your inspiring stories. We're building an oral history of the bar through podcasts that are marking our 150th birthday with Legacy one 50. Hit the subscribe button in your favorite podcast app to hear more of our stories. See you next week.