Ain’t nothing like the real thing. So said R&B hitmakers Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell.

In legal education, the closest thing to the real thing — a job — is a clinic.

“They are the gold standard in experiential learning,” said Loyola University Chicago School of Law clinical professor Bruce A. Boyer.

“Experiential learning” is among the most popular buzzwords in legal education today, marching hand-in-hand with its close cousin “practice-ready.”

The former is intended to create the latter. That’s the idea, anyway.

Contained in “experiential learning” are three teaching modules: field placements (externships and internships); simulations (doctrinal courses which present students with a fact pattern they must solve); and clinics.

These clinics are nothing new. The University of Chicago Law School launched its clinical program in the late 1950s. They became more prevalent in 1968 with a series of grants from the Ford Foundation. Among the automaker’s funded clinics was Northwestern’s, established in 1968 by Gary S. Laser.

Read more at Chicago Daily Law Bulletin