Osler's Razor

A few years ago, Baylor Law lost two great profs-- Bill Underwood became the President of Mercer University, and Melissa Essary became the Dean of Campbell University's Law School.

Dean Essary was an important influence on me at a difficult time. One thing about becoming a law professor is that you don't really get training for what it is that you are going to do-- teach. Instead, you just walk into that first class and do it the best you can. I suspect that those first few weeks, my best was not very good.

Dispirited, I felt like perhaps it had been a real mistake to have moved to Texas to become a law teacher-- that I should have stayed a prosecutor in Detroit, where I had grown up, and which seemed very far away. But then, at exactly that point, I sat in on one of Dean Essary's classes.

Those of you who have been in her classes know what it was that I saw. She was passionate and engaged and warm and funny-- you could tell that she really cared about her students, and though she clearly expected a lot from them, it was just as clear that she was on their side. That's what I wanted to do-- I wanted to teach like that.

I'm still not there, I'm sure. However, it was a turning point for me, in knowing what might be possible, what I could aspire to. It made me want to do this thing well, and that made me want to keep going.

Last week, I got to give the Professionalism Lecture at Campbell and catch up with Dean Essary and her family. She is doing remarkable things there. The school has a focus similar to Baylor's (practical lawyering) and similar results (the highest bar passage rate in the state). As we walked down the hall, she was greeting the students by name, and it was clear she takes the same attitude to her role as Dean as she did as a professor at Baylor. Next year, she will take Campbell Law to new places, literally. The school is moving from rural Buie's Creek to Raleigh, the state capital. They are moving to a wonderful building just a block and a half away from the State Capitol building, and right in the midsts of the Research Triangle of Raleigh, Durham, and Chapel Hill.

Probably, we all expected Melissa to do such great things, but that doesn't make it any less impressive.