A comprehensive strategic plan for Lewis & Clark Law School, defining aspirations for the next three years, was adopted by the faculty in Spring 2026.
“Every generation faces defining challenges,” said Dean Alicia Ouellette. “Ours are significant—rapid technological change, a shifting global economy, pressing environmental questions, and evolving demands on our legal institutions. In every generation, it is lawyers and advocates who help society navigate them. This plan addresses those challenges with concrete steps to ensure that Lewis & Clark thrives, ensuring excellence and resilience in a fast-changing world.”
The 2026 Strategic Plan, which was developed over the course of a year by dozens of faculty and staff, presents a revised mission statement and is organized around four pillars.
The school’s new mission is clear: Lewis & Clark Law School educates exceptional lawyers, drives legal innovation, and trains advocates for a better world. An updated vision statement and set of values were also developed along with the new mission statement.
The first pillar of the plan, “Future Proofing Legal Education,” outlines ways in which the school will be recognized for adept problem solving, the ingenuity to effect change, and academic excellence on a national scale. It details three initiatives:
- Make AI literacy mandatory. Every Lewis & Clark student, faculty member, and staff member will achieve AI literacy. That means not just knowing the tools, but understanding when and how to use them responsibly in legal practice. In addition, we will integrate emerging legal technologies across the curriculum under clear, ethical governance.
- Increase online and hybrid access for our students. A Lewis & Clark legal education should be within reach for anyone with the drive to earn it. Leveraging our status as a top-ranked part-time program, we are expanding online and hybrid options so that geography, work, and family obligations are not barriers to a rigorous, respected degree.
- Build two to three specialty programs. While maintaining excellence in our top-tier Environmental Law and Animal Law programs, we will expand our specialty curriculum by identifying and scaling two to three additional programs to elevate to national prominence.
The second pillar, “Scaling Experiential Learning” recognizes that real world experience along with rigorous training will ensure that L&C is a “law school of choice for aspiring lawyers.” We will scale experiential learning by the following:
- Guarantee real-world experience. Every Lewis & Clark graduate will have logged more than 12 credits of real-world legal experience before they walk across the stage. By doubling our current experiential requirement, we position Lewis & Clark as a national leader in practice-ready training.
- Expand clinics, externships, and practica. We will expand opportunities for law students to gain real-world experience exercising judgment, working with clients, and navigating complexity. Our actions will be tied to employment pipelines so that our practical training opportunities offer an on-ramp to postgraduate employment.
- Stabilize clinic funding. Lewis & Clark initiated its first legal clinic in 1971, making us a leader in experiential learning, but we have never been able to provide secure funding to support our clinics, until now. We will create a strong financial base for our clinics so that our faculty can continue to provide extraordinary hands-on training to our students.
The third pillar of the plan addresses how the school is “Designing for Student Success,” so that L&C graduates are equipped to lead, with a clear path to meaningful careers, and be skilled, profession-ready leaders, innovators, and advocates. “Student success is not assumed here,” said Dean Ouellette. “It is intentionally designed and measured.” The plan outlines three main areas of focus:
- Catch challenges early, and respond. We will use data analytics to ensure academic progress and identify students needing assistance. We will create support pathways for at-risk students and implement a mini-bar exam to assess competency in legal concepts during students’ first year.
- Align curriculum with NextGen Bar and employer expectations. The bar exam is changing. Employer expectations are changing. Our curriculum will change with them. We will ensure that every Lewis & Clark graduate has the knowledge and skills to pass the bar and walk into their first job ready to work.
- Expand national employment networks. We will launch alumni chapters in key geographic markets to engage our alumni with Lewis & Clark and develop a structured alumni-student network that will create pathways to meaningful externships and full time employment opportunities across the country.
A final pillar, “Strengthening Our Collaborative Community” notes the importance of alumni, as well as faculty, staff, and students. “Great lawyers are not made in isolation,” notes Dean Ouellette. “They are shaped by the people around them: the professors who challenge them, the classmates who push them, the practitioners who show them what the work actually looks like. And that community does not end at graduation. Our alumni carry Lewis & Clark into courtrooms, legislatures, boardrooms, and communities around the world—and we intend to bring them back into ours.” Over the next three years, the plan notes how L&C will deepen and extend that community:
- Connect across difference. Lewis & Clark is a place where people with different backgrounds, beliefs, and identities learn to work together—and to disagree well. We will adopt community guidelines that reinforce respectful engagement, because the ability to communicate across difference is not just a community value; it is a professional skill.
- Open our doors wider. Our lectures, symposia, and events will be made accessible virtually so that alumni, practitioners, and law friends anywhere in the world can learn alongside our students from our faculty and alumni experts.
- Invest in well-being. We will strengthen our well-being programs, because we know that the work we do is hard, and that the best outcomes come when people feel supported.
- Grow our alumni community with purpose. We are launching alumni chapters in key markets, building structured mentorship networks, and creating real pathways between our students and the people who came before them. Our alumni do not just remember this place fondly—they come back, they give back, and they open doors.
- Use our expertise to serve. Our students, faculty, and alumni bring hard-won knowledge to some of the most pressing challenges of our time. We will continue to direct that knowledge to benefit our communities, our region, and the world.
Implementation of the plan’s initiatives is underway. Metrics for success and accountability have been identified to ensure that the initiatives are realized. “We are working together to build a stronger, more resilient law school,” said Dean Ouellette. ““I am grateful to all our faculty and staff who worked so hard to reach alignment on this path for the future.”
