South Texas College of Law Annotations (Houston, Tex.), Vol. 18, No. 3, Ed. 1, September, 1989 Page: 4 of 12
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Page 4
ANNOTATIONS
SEPTEMBER 1989
W ilks Continued from page 3
ANNOTATIONS: And (hat's really the system that you think is better than the old
honor code we had here, which obviously had some problems?
WILKS: I'm not so sure it is. I don't want to pass judgment on it because I haven't
really seen the honor code and the honor court operate. I really can't judge it. Maybe it
would work here, I don't know. I'm happy to listen to arguments both ways on that
one.
ANNOTATIONS: Those are the big areas I wanted to ask you about. Like I said,
this is going to come out about the middle of September, so we will have gone through
a third or fourth of the semester, and the question I wanted to ask, what advice have
you got? At that point, the first-year students have got their feet in the water, you've got
the old guys like me who know we're going to get there and take the bar - what's your
advice to people at that point - to all these different levels of experience?
WILKS: I think you've got to remember that this is a professional school, it is not a
trade school, that you should be treated here as professionals and that you should treat
your colleagues and your professors as professionals. That to become a good lawyer
takes a 100% commitment to learning. You know, it's awfully corny, but I like to tell
the first-year people that you shouldn't miss class, because there's a rule about missing
class - you want to come to class for fear you might miss something that's going to help
you help somebody some day, not just so you can pass the bar, but hey, I've got to train
myself in this best profession of all to be able to help people with problems. That's the
whole thing I'm doing, and I don't want to miss any little tip or thing that's going to
help me help people, and it takes that kind of dedication, I think, to be a good lawyer-
not "I'm coming to law school because I don't know what else to do", or "The Army
wouldn't take me" or something. There should be a strong motivation, and if you just
put your mind to it, everybody that's admitted to this school should be able to make it
through and should be able to pass the bar. It just takes dedication and commitment. I
think we've just got to think what a wonderful profession this is.
Unfortunately, we're going to find in the real world that because it's so big now and
society is so complex that lawyers are tending to become business people, with
advertising and bottom-line net-net kind of figures, billable hours and all that thing,
and it's too bad I think we've got to do w hat we can to bring professionalism back in it.
Now, that's pretty corny flag-waving stuff, but to me that's the whole heart of it. It's
professionalism, through and through - from the faculty who should be devoting full
time to the education of these people to help them become good lawyers, to the
students who should be devoting as much time as they can to this commitment of
theirs.
ANNOTATIONS: A visionary question In five years, or a shorter period of time,
whatever seems likely - say a three-year snapshot - where will South Texas be, what
will it be like?
WILKS: O.K. I think you're going to find that our bar results are going to move up to
at least third place in the state. I think we're going to have more applications than we
can possibly handle. I think Jerry Treece & Company will still have us doing the
advocacy contests all over the country. And, I think within three years we will be
admitted into the AALS. I think we will no longer be considered by anybody to be less
than a top-rate law school. I think the prestige of this school, and so the worth of your
degree, is going to soar. I'm ready to take off with this school. I mean, God, we've got
the physical plant that Garland Walker built, we've got the faculty, the young faculty
here which Joe W illiamson gets credit for. W e really have everything going for us now.
There's no reason why this place shouldn't just lake off and be a leader in legal
education.
Incidentally, and the AALS people get a little nervous about that, when I talk about
AALS - is that going to turn us into some Harvard on the Bayou? All AALS is, really, is
a recognition pretty much of the scholarly nature of the works of the faculty - basically
is where we are. In other words, the ABA inspection is coming up this spring. If wedo
well in that inspection, AALS won't be any problem at all, because your faculty is
writing now. You've got some pretty good young people who are writing a lot and
producing some good stuff, you've got the Law Review here. I have no question but
that we meet the AALS requirements - if we get ABA accreditation inspection. As I
indicated to the students earlier, they will have some questions about our scheduling
for full-time people. That, I think we've started to remedy. They will ask some
questions about seating in the library, they're going to raise a little cane with that, we
won't have enough chairs in the library. You're supposed to be able to seat 60or 65%of
your student body at any one time in the library. That is, I mean, have you ever even
seen 65% of the student body walking into the library at the same time? I mean, it's
ridicqlous, particularly with the part-time program that we have, although we're
talking full-time equivalent, so we are lacking space in the library. Library's run out of
space, and even with the expansion, they don't have shelf space that's really going to
accommodate them for the next decade, so we're going to have to do some remodeling,
if we have the money todo it, which allows the library to expand One possibility is to
take the two floors that are left in the tower, put the faculty there, and have the library
move into where the faculty is now. And, another possibility - I'd like to do something
with the Student Lounge. That needs dressing up a little bit, a little modernization
done in that, and maybe that could be moved somewhere that's, uh, I don't know - it's
just going to take a lot of thought and a lot of work.
ANNOTATIONS: Do you foresee any problems with the ABA accreditation
inspection?
WILKS: No. I'll say this: I've been on so many inspections as an inspector, they will
find something wrong. They're supposed to, and I don't care if you're Harvard - it
always gets a negative report and they have to fix something - your water fountains are
too low, or something - there'll be something they'll have to fix and to respond to.
We'll get that, but we're going to have no real basic problems with the ABA now, I
don't think. I continue to kind of be in touch with them and tell them what we're
doing here, and I think we'll be fine.
Delts Plan Active Semester
The Delta Theta Phi Legal
Fraternity held a "welcome
back to school" beer and pizza
party on August 31, 1989. Over
100 students, faculty, STCL
staff and Delt Alumni partici-
pated in the event.
Winners of the Delt raffle
contest were Sandra Wilson
and Anthony Lopez, who won
a $25 gift certificate from the
Bookshelf II; Katrina Wedig,
who won lunch for two at Jose-
phines; and Bill Burkholder,
who was the winner of a "Har-
vard on the Bayou" T-shirt.
The Delts are busy planning
the annual off-campus Board-
walk Beach Club "Best Briefs"
rush party. The date is tenta-
tively scheduled for late Sep-
tember or early October. All
students are encouraged to
attend. It is traditionally a
memorable event.
The Delts recently re-elected
officers for the 1989-1990 school
year and they are as follows-
: Jack Carroll will serve as
Dean; Carrie Ludlam was voted
Vice-Dean; Fran Zomper was
elected Tribune; Larry Cham-
pion will serve as Exchecker;
Holly Fuller was appointed
Master of Ritual, and Jack
Terry was elected Bailiff. Pro-
fessor Neil McCabewill serve as
the Delt faculty sponsor.
The student Delt chapter has
been actively participating
with the Houston Alumni
Senate. Several student
members are planning to
attend the Founders Day party
on September 16, which will be
held at the home of Dick Ellis,
Dean of the Houston Alumni
Senate. The annual alumni-
student Christmas party is
already scheduled for December
2nd. Interested members
should plan to attend.
The Delts held their biennial
convention in Houston this
past August. Carrie Ludlam
attended as the representative
from South Texas. The conven-
tion was a huge success. Over 80
student members from Senates
all over the world attneded,
including Australia, Iceland
and Canada. The International
Senate at the convention
approved a merger with the
Sigma Nu Phi Legal Frater-
nity. The merger resulted in
approximately 20,000 new
members of Delta Theta Phi,
thus making the Delts the larg-
est legal fraternity in the
country.
The Delts also acquired the
rights to publish the Adelphia
Law Journal. This law journal
is nationally recognized, and
was recently cited by the U.S.
Supreme Court. The journal
operates like the STCL Law
Journal, however students are
not required to become a
member of a law review.
Rather, any Delt member may
submit an article for publica-
tion. The editor-in-chief of the
Journal encourages all students
to submit their work. The Jour-
nal is an excellent opportunity
for students to obtain recogni-
tion through an official publi-
cation. The Delta Theta Phis
are now the only professional
organization with its own Law
Journal. For further informa-
tion please contact Carrie
Ludlam.
The Delts will award another
James E. Carmody Scholarship
this fall. The scholarship is
given to Delt members only,
who demonstrate active partici-
pation in the fraternity. All
members are encouraged to
apply Please pick-up an appli-
cation outside the office, Room
330, or see one of the officers.
ANNOTATIONS
Needs Your Letters to the Editor!
ANNOTATIONS
Room 324
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Cantrell, Greg. South Texas College of Law Annotations (Houston, Tex.), Vol. 18, No. 3, Ed. 1, September, 1989, newspaper, September 1989; (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth144463/m1/4/?q=Lamar+University: accessed June 3, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting South Texas College of Law.