Dear Elder Law Colleagues...
This memo, written for students, describes my course... A two unit, once a week seminar. As you will see, I have grown weary of law (and can’t spell worth a damn.) At some place I have included a “Teaching note” which describes the assignment in greater detail. Anyway,
Confused in Tucson, Kenney Hegland
Elder Law: Spring 2007 Goals
If you, like Shylock, “grave the law,” don’t make the mistake he did, change forums.
This will not be an intense “law” seminar, what with cases to analyze, statutes to parse. While you will get a general overview as to the legal problems the elderly may face, the emphasis is on lawyering skills and on giving you a hands on-experience in working with the elderly, channeling your marvelous talents into community projects where it will do good.
As to the legal overview, you will read Alive and Kicking: Legal Advice for Boomers.
As to lawyering skills that cut across areas of practice, in class role plays you will interview clients, draft statutes, and make legislative, as opposed to judicial, arguments. You will also prepare a Living Will for an acquaintance.
As to getting to know the elderly, you will read an outside book raising some of the issues. More importantly you will do two community service projects, one in a group, the other individually.
There is also a course paper required, but no exam. Now some details: The books
Frolik, Elder Law in a Nutsehll, 3rd ed. One of these four:
Albom, Tuesdays with Morrie Tolstoy, The Death of Ivan Ilyich Roth, Everyman
Chen: Final Exam
Note: The Nutshell is a backup for those of you crave the law. We will read Alive and Kicking - parts will be assigned as we go along but you might want to simply sit down and read it all. (It’s quite readable; at least that’s what the blurbs say.)
Morrie and Ivan, and Everyman all have somewhat different experiences with approaching death. Final Exam approaches it from the doctor’s viewpoint. You are to read one of these and towards the end of the semester, you will post your reactions. I may also, as we ride those miles before we sleep, give you some poems to consider.
Field Work: Group and Individual Projects Group Projects
Lawyers often work in teams; here you’ll practice. A lot of implicit and explicit bargaining goes on (who does what, who decides what to do, what about free riders, and hurt feelings?) Working in groups of 3 or 4, you are to plan and execute a community project. This may be a presentation (or performance) at a nursing home or something at an elementary or middle school on the general topic of aging. In past classes students have done some wonderful things for the community and now it’s your turn.
One possible project: Presenting something like our Juvenile Teaching Program in Senior Centers. You could even have the participants put on a trial. Everyone loves being a lawyer.
Individual Projects
You will do an individual field project for 10-12 hours. You might work at a local law elder hotline, deliver meals on wheels, or hang out with an elderly neighbor. You will have the opportunity to discuss, one-on-one, some of the issues we will discuss in class, e.g. is age segregation in retirement communities a good idea?
Living Wills
You will prepare a Living Will of someone not in this class. This will be an opportunity to do a little lawyering.
Toward the end of the semester, we will have a class where each of your will report on the Living Will exercise and on your individual and group projects. Class Stuff: Attendance, Forums, and Role plays
Attendance You bet. Forums
On several occasions you will be asked to post things on the Forum. Please read, before class, what everyone else has to say.
Role plays
Working in small groups you will present one two-hour class role play on one of the following topics:
1. Should age discrimination in employment be made unlawful?
2. Should Arizona pass a “Death with Dignity (Assisted Suicide)” statute? 3. Interviewing elderly clients.
Papers/Presentations
Alums tell us that many of our graduates are not particularly adept in making oral presentations. We’ll practice. Toward the end of the semester each of you will make a 15 to 20 minute presentation. I want to spend some time thinking about “What makes for a good presentation?” Developing, testing, and then applying criteria is an excellent learning approach.
Course papers should be between seven and ten pages. They can be research (library) or empirical, preferably a combination of the two. Some possible topics: Retirement Communities (restrictive zoning)
Funerals - what elder lawyers should know
Pain Medication
Grandparent Rights
Sports (what elders watch and do) Nursing Homes (regulation or tort)
Ageing Population (economic, voting block etc.)
Elders and Guns
Aging Criminals – problems in prisons Hospice
Special problems of given segments: gay/lesbian; minorities; women Medicaid Planning - impact on program and families
Tort issues (special elderly standard of care; evaluation loss of life; the goal of compensation versus controlling behavior)
Attitudes toward elderly - cross-cultural, historic, today - and what can be done about it
Education public re end-of-life decisions and treatments The concept of old age: medical, psychological, philosophic
Long term care
What elder lawyers should know about the elderly Grades
They will be based on all of the activities, including class participation.
First Tentative Syllabus Week 1: Introduction
Forum Posting: Why teach Elder Law?
Most lawyers who practice elder law didn’t have a course in elder law; most students who take Elder Law do not practice it. So, why should there be an elder law course? If you were prof, what would your goals be?
Class: Discuss Postings; watch “I Never Sang for My Father” Week 2: Family Conversations; Volunteer Opportunities
ForumPosting: Would a Family Conversation work in your family? What might be the obstacles and how might they be overcome?
Class: Discussion of reading and Postings. Discussion of volunteer opportunities Week 3: Retirement: Money, Housing, Medical Care
Assign: Alive and Kicking Part 2
ForumPosting:
1. Put yourself back in the days of FDR. You are in Congress. Would you vote to create Social Security? Explain your vote (preferably not in sound bites.)
2. A portion of elder law is what is known as “Medicaid Planning.” Middle class clients are helped to arrange their assets so that they appear poor: if the situation arises and they need nursing home care, they will be eligible to have it paid by Medicaid. Congress passed a law prohibiting lawyers from doing this but the law was held unconstitutional and the Clinton administration did not appeal. Do you think that lawyers should be prevented from Medicaid Planning assuming that it is constitutional to do so.
Class: Discussion of Reading and Postings
Note: We will meet individually this and next week to discuss field placements, group projects, and paper topics.
Week 4: Disability in the Family
Assign: Alive and Kicking Part 5
Forum Posting: Three impossible questions
1. Your mother (father, aunt, uncle) is 70. About a year ago, she suffered a stroke and has since been living in a nursing home. She has difficulties talking and you do not believe that she is mentally competent. You are, under a Health Care Power of
Appointment, or under the relevant state law, her surrogate.
Due to an infection on her arm, she has been transferred to a local hospital.
Doctors tell you that unless her arm is amputated, she will die in the near future. They do not know how long she might otherwise live. She was incoherent when asked what she
wanted done. What are you going to do? (In thinking about this, think of a real person.) 2. The doctor tells you someone you are close to (a sibling, a spouse) has
pancreatic cancer and has only a short time to live. “Should I tell them?” asks the doctor? How would you answer? If it were you, would you want to know?
Week 5: Interviewing and Counseling Elderly Clients
Assign: Materials on Interviewing tba
Class: Role play. (Teaching note: In this role play, daughter brings in elder dad and says that Dad wants to give her the house ... she is his caregiver. There is a son but the father rejects his lifestyle, – he is gay. Some of the issue we discuss: how to get the daughter out of the room (who is the client?), competency, the best way to pass on the house, the dilemma of an elderly person’s reliance of a care-giver, and the role of the lawyer: should the lawyer raise the issue that cutting out the son might not be a good idea – any legal or moral issues?)
Week 6. Age Discrimination in Employment; Legal Ethics; Drafting
Assign: Alive and Kicking Part 3
Forum Posting: As a lawyer for the State Bar, you have been asked to draft a rule which would prohibit lawyers from advising clients on how to avoid the law, using, as an example of what is to be prohibited, the letter in the Materials. Draft such a rule. (Teaching note: I pass out a hypothetical letter sent to a CEO
indicating that, while age discrimination is illegal, the enforcement is quite weak and there are ways to cover you tracks – “but, of course, you should follow the law.”)
Class
Part One: We go back in time and play Congress considering the proposed AEDA.
Part Three: We will consider an ethical rule that would prohibit lawyers from sending such letters (whether we agree the rule or not - this is a drafting exercise.)
Week Seven: Assisted Suicide
Assign: Alive and Kicking Part 6 (Death in the Family); Oregon Death with Dignity statute.
Class: We will role play an Legislative Committee considering passing a similar statute. Students will be assigned roles before class and may want to invite outside experts – folks from hospice, the Hemlock Society, and religious leaders. Week Eight: The Practice of Elder Law
Assign: Alive and Kicking Part 4 (In case “Something Happens”)
Forum Posting: What would you like to know about the practice of elder law?
Class: We will visit an elder law firm Week Nine: Elder Abuse and Bad Times
Assign: State Statutes on Elder Abuse and Financial Exploitation
Forum Posting: What should lawyers do if they suspect abuse? How can they approach the subject? What steps should they take?
Class: Role play (Teaching note: I play the client and I suspect that my Mom’s handyman and sometime care-giver has taken advantage of her. She gave him her car and has written checks to him in the total amount of $20,000. The class
reviews the statutes and conducts an interview. Many issue arise: Has the statute been violated and, if not, how should it be redrafted? If we take the case, how much will it cost us to litigate – depo costs etc. How much would we need the bill the client? How do we plan the case? How should we first contact the potential client? Are there ethical problems is what we say or threaten? How do we know the mom isn’t competent? Why shouldn’t she give the money to her care-giver than her son?
Week Ten: Book Reports
Weeks 11, 12 and 13: Student paper presentations
Week 14: Living Wills, Field Work and Group Placements
Forum Posting: Ruminations on advising living wills, field work and group projects
