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Denis Binder of Western New England College, who has taught a survey course in environmental law
more than two dozen times, laments its evolution «from a wide-open, free-spirited search for innovative
170 legal answers, into a statutory, administrative law regime». Daniel Farber of the University of Minnesota
believes that the key insight of Sax's study «was that most environmental law teachers find the actual legal
content of the course tedious and wish they didn't have to talk about so many technical statutory issues» -a
175 factor that Farber thinks unfortunately is «just the nature of the beast».
3.Some professors revel in the challenge of teaching such a difficult course. «Let the folks who want to
180 get a course "down" teach trusts and estates», advises Oliver Houck ofTulane University, a veteran
environmental law professor who remains «delighted by the challenge of teaching environmental law».
Houck states that he would «have it no other way but very difficult and always new». Houck's sentiments
185 are echoed by Susan Smith of Willamette University, who has found «teaching environmental law, like
practicing environmental law, to be fun and a constant source of stimulation and growth».
4.There is wide agreement, to be sure, that the breadth and complexity of the field present serious
190 pedagogic problems, particularly for the traditional survey course in environmental law, «Complexity
makes it more of a challenge to teachers and also more work for us», says Frank Grad. «What has also
happened is that environmental law has begun to matter in other fields, as in bankruptcy and insurance
195 law».Another pioneer environmental law teacher, Arnold W. Reitze, Jr., of George Washington
University's National Law Center, notes that lawyers practicing in the field now frequently identify
themselves not as «environmental lawyers» but, rather, as specialists on «air pollution, hazardous waste, or
200 CERCLA [Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act]». These
developments make it extremely difficult to provide comprehensive coverage of environmental law in a
survey course. As John Costonis, the dean of Vanderbilt's law school, says, «The material is too dense, too
complex, and too massive to be contained within any single course».
205
5.Professors who believe that a survey course remains essential have responded to this challenge by
seeking to identify cross-cutting themes that can tie together what otherwise might seem a diverse statutory
210 jumble. An increasingly popular approach is to emphasize theories of regulation and to use particular
statutory schemes to illustrate their application. David A. Wirth of Washington & Lee University finds that
this approach avoids the pitfall of treating environmental law as a series of relatively trivial questions of
215 statutory interpretation. Another approach is to emphasize problem solving. Describing the field as «just
impossibly broad», Zygmunt Plater, a professor at Boston College, emphasizes the «craft oflawyering
rather than the subject matter» of the environmental statutes. Plater believes that it is important to use
220 environmental law to give students a sense of how to analyze problems. But noting that «everyone has to
compromise» in their coverage, he advises that «the compromise avenue that fits the idiosyncracies of the
individual professor is what works best».
6.Some professors who believe that environmental law is too unwieldy to fit in a single survey course
225 have split the subject into two or more course offerings. Robert Fischman reports that Indiana University
has replaced the survey course with an environmental decisionmaking course followed by a separate course
on the law governing toxic and hazardous substances. In similar fashion, Harrison Dunning of the
230 University of California at Davis now reserves hazardous waste and toxics issues for a separate course
called Toxics Law. Alyson Flournoy reports that the University of Florida has split the survey course into
two: one treating water, wetlands, and wildlife issues and a second that covers toxics, wastes, and NEPA.
235 These courses are taught by different faculty members, whose areas of interest and experience are now
more closely tailored to the subjects covered in the courses.
7. Other factors also are cited as reasons for renewed optimism about the teaching of environmental law.
240 Robert Abrams of Wayne State University believes that better teaching materials are available now that a
second generation of environmental law textbooks has been published. He also thinks that the field has
acquired a «feel of stability» as new statutes build upon principles that are already well established.
245 Richard Lazarus of the Washington University School of Law in St. Louis attributes renewed optimism to
the appearance of a new generation of law professors who are less anxious about the field's complexities
because of their substantial experience in environmental practice. Indeed, there has been a substantial
250 influx of new teachers into the environmental field, particularly since 1987 (see Figure 4 on 231 page).
Greater efforts also are being made to assist new teachers. The AALS section on environmental law has
established a mentor program that has enlisted more than 30 experienced teachers of environmental law to
255 provide help to young faculty. It is unclear, however, how much impact this program has had; the only
professor who mentioned the mentor program in the author's survey had volunteered as a mentor but stated