Legal Commentary

In Illinois, at least, one can get CLE credit for "Part-Time Teaching of Law Courses" at "an ABA-accredited law school" -- but only if one is a lawyer who is "not employed full-time by a law school." Illinois MCLE Board Rule 795(d)(6)(i). According to the same rule, "[f]ull-time law teachers who choose to maintain their licenses to practice law are fully subject to the MCLE requirements established herein, and may not earn any credits by their ordinary teaching assignments."

This rule barring "full-time law teachers" from counting their "ordinary teaching assignments" as continuing legal education might strike one as a bit peculiar. After all, how can something be continuously and legally educational when taught by a part-timer but not equally continuously and legally educational if taught by a full-time prawf? But the Illinois rules get downright surreal once one considers Illinois' CLE rule for auditing courses at ABA-accredited law schools. It turns out that, under Illinois MCLE Board Rule 795(d)(2), one can get CLE credit for"[a]ttendance at J.D. or graduate level law courses offered by American Bar Association (?ABA?) accredited law schools" even if the course is "not taken for law school credit towards a degree" but merely audited. (Rule 795(d)(2)(iv)). Moreover, there is no exception for "full-time law teachers" in this rule awarding CLE credit for auditing (as opposed to teaching) a law school course: Full-time profs who audit law school courses apparently are just as eligible for CLE credit as any other lawyer.

It turns out that I have fallen in arrears on my Illinois CLE obligation, because, as a "full-time law teacher," I cannot get credit under Rule 795(d)(6) for any of my "ordinary teaching assignments." (Who knew? Does any other state exclude prawfs from getting CLE credit for their own ordinary teaching duties?) So here's my question for you textualists out there: Can I get CLE credit for auditing my own courses that I taught while a full-time prof at Michigan and NYU? After all, I think that I was a model auditor of my own courses, attending every single session religiously, reading the material assigned pretty carefully, and participating actively in class discussion. I did not always take the examination that I wrote (although I usually prepared a model answer, albeit not under exam conditions) -- but I do not think that Michigan or NYU require auditors to take the exam. So, if I can get my past and present deans to provide some "written certification evincing that [I have] complied with requirements for the course and attended sufficient classes to justify the awarding of course credit if [I was] taking the course for credit," (Rule 795(d)(2)(v)), then am I in the clear with the Illinois CLE rules?

More seriously, what could possibly be the rational basis for barring full-time prawfs from getting CLE credit for "ordinary teaching assignments" when non-academics who co-teach or even audit the same courses can get full CLE credit? Is this asymmetrical treatment of academics and non-academics simply an expression of practitioners' and adjuncts' spite towards prawfs? Or is the idea that the auditors learn more from a law school course than prawf who actually teaches it?