Wednesday was a busy day spent in a series of meetings and following up on necessary correspondence. The highlight of the day was lunch with—and those of you who follow the blog will understand—the Mysterious Myra McKenzie. Three other members of the Wal-Mart legal department joined us, Susan Klooz, Sonya Dodson, Jan Sturner, and I’m grateful to them for taking time out of their busy days to come for an informal lunch.

We chatted about what’s going on at the law school and ways in which we might work together in the future. During our lunch at Ella’s at Carnall Hall we also talked about the new thinking in legal education, including the Best Practices in Legal Education book and the Carnegie Report. I updated them on the law school’s strategic planning process and how we are responding to those reports,and thinking about the notion of creating more experiential opportunities for students. I shared with them our excitement about adding an immigration law clinic and the growth of our pro bono program. I also expressed my gratitude to them for the fact that Wal-Mart has graciously agreed to sponsor–along with SBA, BLSA, APALSA, and the Hispanic Student Bar Association—our Student Networking Event. This is our first annual networking activity on April 17 during which our students will be able to network informally with members of the Bar. Many thanks to Wal-Mart for sponsoring this event for us.

We also visited a little bit about our internal competitions and the need for judges. Sonya Dodson graciously agreed to pass this need on to Wal-Mart lawyers and also to follow up during the course of the year with the competition schedule as we need judges. Thanks again to Susan Klooz, Sonya Dodson, Jan Sturner, and Myra McKenzie for lunching with me, and I look forward to our future collaborations and appreciate the support.

After a busy day, I was able to have a quiet dinner at Bordinos with Henry McLeish, a visiting professor and former First Minister of Scotland. He spoke to the Arkansas Committee on Foreign Relations on Wednesday at the Little Rock Club in Little Rock earlier that day [Arkansas Busniess Article]. Henry was the second minister of Scotland from 2000 to 2001, was in the British Parliament from 1987 to 2001 and in the Scottish Parliament from 1999 to 2003. He has a visiting professorship here at the University, and lectures in both the Fulbright College of Arts and Sciences and the Law School. As you might imagine, he’s quite an interesting person and it was good to be able to take time to relax with him.