Ep. 14: The Mental Health Pandemic Explained

leader in the space of Academia and mental health David jaffy Dave it’s great to have you here it’s great to be

here Dan thanks so much now you may know this about yourself David but a few words about you for those who don’t know

you um you’re the dean of student at americ University’s Washington College

of Law and remarkably you’ve been there maybe a little bit longer than you might want to admit um since

1997 if I’ve got that right and uh for the better part of this past decade

you’ve been on a mission to shine a bright light on the mental health and wellness issues faced by students and

more specifically law students and uh you know during that time you’ve spoken

widely many different conference suppose you well s sought after speaker I might add and uh you’ve co-authored suffering

in silence a survey of lost student well-being and the reluctance of LW students to seek health help for

substance use and mental health concerns you’re a contributing author to the path to lawyer well-being practical

recommendations for positive change and you’re even a video star not that star

but getting healthy staying healthy and I hear it’s being used by many different universities for their professional

responsibility classes around the country these days so great to have you here and really excited to just dive in

David but thanks for joining again yeah let’s do it well all right I’m going to start with this you may have seen there

was a study from the University of Michigan that was released pretty recently that says roughly 40% of

students experience some level depression 36% screen positive for

anxiety disorders and nearly half of those students reported that they’ve been diagnosed with a mental health

disorder at some point in in their lifetime that’s that’s pretty staggering

are we in the middle of a mental health pandemic what do you think so that’s a great place to start

Dan I I I think we’re in the middle of a of a conflation of two things and they

and they seeming seemingly are contradictory but um what I have seen from my perch is that we have a

generation of kids of students who are largely more self-aware and more

comfortable uh around mental health challenges that they may be having uh they’re willing to speak about it more

openly they’re willing to seek help for it more openly than our generation and

those prior were ever willing to do so on the one hand a good thing I think at the same time though we are not a mental

health pandemic I think we’re suffering from a social atrophy pandemic I think

that we are dealing with again with Generations a generation of of I keep

saying kids of students who are not as well equipped to interact to just just

talk to each other um I was moved I’m not I’m not a big name dropper but I was moved by a uh a recent podcast I was

listening to um Ester Perell I don’t know if you listen to her and Dan Harris from 10% happier and and and and EST was

sharing a recent presentation that she had given where she had and she asked Dan about this she said Dan when you

were young did you play in the streets and he said yeah he said she asked then proceeded to as him do your kids play in

the streets and he said I encourage them to but they don’t she said and that’s that’s the difference she said our

generation we we were we were unfiltered we were un kind of regulated we had to learn how to talk to each other how to

fight with each other how to make up how to communicate and that that’s not that’s not going on anymore and as a

result of it these social skills these interaction are just not taking place they’re they’re being you know kind of

tucked into social media and other places and I’m sure we’ll talk about that but that these the the the the

students we’re working with are just not having these skill sets and that is contributing when not having the ability

to communicate to listen to somebody else to to listen to a point of view and respect it even if one disagrees is

contributing to some of these mental health factors because that that sense of community and connection is just is just not there I mean you’re you’re at

the ground level I hate to use the term Ground Zero but you’re you’re a dean of student at law schools a law school you

see lot of students you’ve been there for multiple Generations have you seen a change in the way people engage with

with each other in the classroom outside the classroom what’s your your observation is that kind of ring true

for you I I I think the classrooms are are pretty much a hold I think our faculty are um are by and large

open-minded they’re they’re considera of dialogue they help promote it I think students are generally um respectful in

the classroom um I happen to work at an institution that um I I think you know is to some degree leads the way in terms

of supporting students and what they do inside and outside the classroom but a lot of law schools are doing that well

you know also I think the outside the classroom is the part that as I was just alluding to I think we still struggle

with a little bit you know the the the the cancel culture I’m not even sure if that’s the current phrase that you know

students are using these days but just kind of this notion of um well since I

don’t agree with you in your opinion you’re clearly wrong the the inability to just kind of listen and of course at law schools it’s critical because the

whole idea is to learn how to Advocate and to argue and certainly to maintain a point of view but also to learn and to

respect that there’s another point of view you’re going to be arguing across the table you know in front of a judge over time you want to be able to have an

appreciation for what another side may be presenting whether or not you’re going to respect it or agree with it

understand it and then be able to engage in that dialogue and and in essence advocate for yourself or or for your

client you know in the courtroom that’s those the skill sets we’re looking to develop I’m G let Me Wind this back for

a second so you know for somebody who’s listening in and saying to themselves

you’re a Dean at a law school you’re not probably and I’m going to make an assumption not specifically trained in

mental health counseling why has this issue of tackling mental health and well-being amongst law students become

so important to you specifically you you’ve been on a crusade for a while about this but why would a law school de

care that much about this yeah yeah that’s a great question Dan so uh I mean I’ll be candid um mental health uh

depression has run in my family um my grandmother who I adored uh experienced

it my father her her uh her son and his sister my favorite aunt also experienced

it um it is trickled in and out perhaps you know in my in my extended family uh

to some degree and so I think I’ve been aware and and around it since a young age and that has certainly informed

formed my my my interests and my thoughts as I developed um into the profession and into the space and then

I’ve just had the you’re absolutely right I’m not a licensed clinician um you know it’s old but I you know I slept

at a at a holiday in I’ve counseled I don’t know scores and scores of students over the years who are struggling and

and what I tell them is I’m not a clinician but we can sit and have a pep talk and that pep talk is typically

about acknowledging what a student is going through um talking about some skill sets and ways that the student

might be able to you know work through these things um but it has just been informed time and again I’ve had to you

we’ve had a couple of situations where one famously for me where you know we’ve lost a lost student uh to a to a drug

overdose and another instance to a to a suicide and I remember meeting with students afterwards and some of them

just kind of coming out and expressing some of their own issues to me and it once again reaffirmed for me that these

students need assistance often times are looking for assistance those who are looking for it it’s easier because

they’re partway there they’re like I know I’m struggling with something I could use some assistance from you but we also have this larger role I’m

working at one of the largest you know law schools in terms of student population in the country and a lot of students don’t know that they need the

help Andor are fearful of getting help and so we have to at the same time be

proactive and find ways to get them towards a comfort level of knowing when they’re struggling that it’s okay to

reach out to somebody you know it’s fun it triggers a thought for me um last

month but maybe you saw this that Elmo that that Elmo from Sesame Street he uh

posted a seemingly innocuous question on Twitter or what was Twitter X and asked

how’s everyone doing and I don’t think that our furry red friend was ready for the response it was overwhelming

thousands of replies in fact I wrote down here because there were so many that were just so startling

some someone wrote Every Morning I can’t wait to get back to sleep every Monday I can’t wait for Friday to come every

single day and every single week of my life I mean that’s Elmo like I mean

obviously it’s not Elmo because he doesn’t really exist but I don’t want to be a uh you know kind of a a kill jooy

but uh you know somebody posing as Elmo and sesame stre on Twitter got these type of responses yeah what’s going on

there I mean this is even president pres Biden had to jump in or his staff jumped

in to say there are places where you can get help if people responding to Elmo on Twitter it’s got to say something about

people not feeling like they’re someone to talk to um your thoughts about that yeah I I mean it doubles back a little

bit Dan on on some of the things we we’ve already been touching on you know somebody somebody a lot more famous than

me said that the the um the opposite of depression is not happiness but it’s

connection right and and by extension community and so some of the things again touching

on and I I go back even further our your parents my parents and our grandparents

right they grew up in these communities together right the families were on the same block the same street the Sunday

dinners you know people were coming together on a regular basis and we have over time become diffuse right we know

that we’ve spread across the country we’ve spread overseas and as part of that that that that sense of community

that insul the group whether it’s family whether it’s just you know kind of um friendship connections and things like

that they have also become more more extended social media you know I I I I

kind of alluded to that a couple of minutes ago um folks who are kind of believing that their happiness is going

to be bred or burned by seeing what somebody else is doing this you know this great uh vacation that I just took

or this great sandwich that I just ate and this and that and it’s not it’s not the reality right but we’ve moved out of

this where is my Foundation where is my core where is my happiness and instead

rely Ling on other people to tell them where that happiness should be and ought to be and and and people are just

struggling as a result of that I’m not surprised that you know whether it’s Elmo or anybody else folks are it’s an

opportunity for them to say yeah I’m I’m struggling do you do you your thoughts about covid social media I know they

both have kind of part worth scores if you will contributing but did Co was Co a accelerator or it’s just kind of a

blip in you know there probably other forces I I mean yeah they’re again

they’re smarter folks than me but we are we are still coming out of it to to a large degree I think that it is um it is

going to affect I think you a couple of generations of kids we’ve got you yours and mine had you know gone through High

School a tail end of high school of college having to kind of miss these again these social interactions an opportunity to be away from their family

for the first time and reconnect and all of a sudden you get hit and you’re home and you’re struggling in your distance

um I think that’s going to still be here for a while and to some degree you know we’re talking a lot about about students

but um we’re still dealing with a a society where um employers are you know

in a hybrid modality so individuals are not coming together on a regular basis there’s more and more work from home

there’s a lot of siloing that’s going to be going on as a result of that on a continual basis and so again that you

know the the the water cooler right that’s what we heard growing up the water cooler conversations go find a

water cooler to begin with and then find that somebody’s actually you know standing around and wants to have that conversation we’re just we’re we’re

diffuse and diffuse and diffuse and it’s it’s it’s it’s really contributing to these challenges yeah it’s kind of it’s

a a collective dehydration nobody can find the water cooler or find the conversation it is uh and and while

companies are bringing people back and schools have brought people back I I I think that sense of connection it it is

lost I think you hit on a really important Point um I’m going to ship just for a moment sure the you focus on

on Lost students we’ve talked about kind of the younger generation and students in general but do you feel that law

students are are any more at risk for mental health issues in the general population or is there any research that

would suggest that to be the case yeah well I mean some of the research you you very kindly referenced a uh an article

that I co-authored and that was a result of a survey actually two surveys that I had the the true honor of um assessing

law students at the national level 2014 and again in 2021 um and law students do struggle uh to

some degree a percentages uh greater than the population at that age that is not in law school at the time um couple

of factors for it um and and I don’t like painting with a broad brush I don’t think it’s ever helpful but um law

students as a general rule are um typically type A type personalities right they they’re competitive um

they’ve kind of they they’ve worked hard but they’ve a lot has come natural to them right and they they were at the top

of their class you know even even with the just you know high volume of of law students who enter each year across the

country regardless of a law school you’re going to you were near the top of your class at the college the university

you attended and then all of a sudden you get to law school and you may not be the smartest student in your row let

alone in your classroom right and so you know all the sudden it’s like wow this is you know I’m not I can’t wake up the

night before an exam and just crash for it I can’t write a paper in 24 hours I’ve got to I’ve got to work and so

there’s a there are some added components to it also for only you know only a very small population of law

students are going to go to to have a further education Beyond law school meaning that the vast majority this is

finishing school right they are done which means they’re looking for employment uh law school as a general

rule is also you know tuition is high at most schools and so you’ve got this kind of conflation of I’ve got this debt I

may have debt from undergrad and now I’ve added to it from three years or four years as a part-time student at law

school and I need to have a job to pay this down when I graduated school is over for me so you’ve got this again

this kind of conflation of all of these things that are taking place and it’s it’s really heady now now having said

that I’m gonna I’m gonna maybe jump a little bit beyond the question um because I find this part uh fascinating

to a degree um we have we’re fortunate to have a a an embedded clinician

meaning somebody who’s working exclusively with law students here a lot of law schools have to rely on their University you know for clinicians this

and that and the clinician of course is is is barred from speaking about any particular student you know um furpa and

Hippa and everything else and whatnot but can provide general information my clinician has come back and told me time

after time that the issues the students are presenting um have very little to do

with law school okay the what they’re talking about are these deep-seated issues family relationship issues um

relationship issues just with others with a significant other in this and that and they’re coming forward and then

you know we are maybe to some degree the you know the gas on the on on the fire right because you do have this High

burden of reading and these students have moved from another part of the country and uh the tuition again is a big issue and the concern about a summer

job building towards you know postgrad and everything else those are certainly components that are adding to it but at

the core what I find is that and what I hear from the clinicians that the students the issues are struggling with

have have preceded law school and they’re just they’re coming to the four and coming to a head when they’re with us do you do you think uh you have a

unique perspective and you know you look you look very plenty young for for a person who’s worked for three decades in

this role but um enough of the flattery let me let me be direct three decades is

a long time David it’s a long time but it also gives you that longitudinal

perspective that people often don’t have what do you see is changed um um you

know you mentioned that that the embedded um you know psychologist has

been able to to kind of observe and give you some root cause things that that they see but it’s a point in time pre

911 you were there pre 911 you’ve been there through covid into today a lot of

things have happened in between has anything changed it’s the same thing or yeah what’s different yeah so so to the

good and I I I may have touched on this a little bit or you have touched on my intro which I appreciated um if we were

having this conversation Dan 2013 or prior um we would well we probably

wouldn’t be having the conversation because it wasn’t there this notion of of of looking at of addressing

well-being issues uh at law schools and quite frankly in the in the legal profession was virtually non-existent

okay law students ways of coping um you know prior to to and and I’ll explain it

in a sec but prior to 2013 or whatever was to go out drinking right was to go out you know they would go to what they

called Bar reviews um which was kind of a play on the bar exam you take when you graduate but you’d go and review a bar

on a Thursday night everybody would gather and drink and rail against the law school and everything they were doing and that was their way of kind of

you know coming together um so Along Comes 2014 there are these there are these two surveys on on well-being one

is in the on the uh law student side and I was proud to be a part of it but there was a similar one Hazelton Betty Ford

had put out on the legal profession and there was a lot of news and kind of hay about this within the academic setting

to be sure a little bit outside as well and that really started a little bit of kind of a firestorm of okay well what do

we want to do right so we have these surveys we have the results those of us who were working inside to your point

knew that our students were struggling we knew that the legal profession had its own hazing going on and we can talk

about that in terms of what were expected with Associates to make partner and the and the burnout and everything else but nobody was really doing

anything about it and so these results of these surveys begat an interest of individuals around the country to talk

about it that created a task force on lawyer well-being a group of volunteers who wanted to say okay the surveys is

that’s great and we can write about it but what’s but the so what what are we going to do so this task force that you

reference then developed in 2017 this this uh lengthy report that basically called on every stakeholder in the

profession the law firms the the the Judiciary the law schools the lawyer assistance program who help the lawyers

the judges the law students and Conor said here’s what you ought to be doing here are the spots where the bullet

points where you could be making a difference the personal the spiritual the financial and really time to start

stop talking about it and start making some some changes at the law school level we didn’t talk at orientation

about well-being we didn’t talk about the chance that a percentage of you or or the the the knowledge that a

percentage of you were going to be dealing with depression or anxiety and having these because we were pretty much

told don’t don’t say that the students will go you know running off the weight list to another law school perceiving

that your law school must have the issue so nobody wanted to talk about it that has changed that I I I would be dare say

that there’s a law school in the country that is not touching on this in one way or another starting at orientation and

then finding other ways to kind of you know roll it out and continue to reinforce that their resources and

opportunities and and places to get help the legal profession huge boat turning ever slowly um I’m not as well steeped

in there but I’ve spent time I’ve presented to I met with certainly met with attorneys I got a number of classmates who are you know in the

profession they are struggling mightily as well but we’re seeing law firms that are also taking some leads they’re

hiring professional counselors in the area they’re looking for ways to address the work life balance um the

billable hour again we could spend an hour on that it’s probably a bottom line issue that’s going to continue to plague

certainly the larger law firms but we’re seeing this big boat that is taking care

to look more at what they’re doing internally at what other law firms are doing at what law schools are doing

because these students are feeding into the ranks of these law firms and really trying to start to to model and slowly

assess and and I think that obviously all all bodess well for the for the hopefully not too distant future you

know you just going back to something that you you started with was 2013 2014

was this Watershed um if you will moment where people came together and said we

need to work together as a community to address these issues I I know you’re not an epidemiologist but any statistics or

even anecdotes off the top of your mind of why did it happen in 2013 was there

something that was bubbling to the surface that that law firms and judges and the community said we have to do

something now it seems like it’s pretty dire and it’s hard to get people as a community to come together yeah I I it’s

a really good question Dan the the the the two and I’m always try to be careful here because it sounds like it’s self-

serving but the the the the the student survey and lawyer the national survey on

student well-being which was co-piloted by you know my colleague Jerry Oregon by Kate Bender Who is part of a Dave knee

Foundation organization at fora and myself that itself had been a couple years in the making where a couple of

individuals those the three of us and and some others were just talking about

how do we get Society how do we get the legal Community to appreciate these issues are here well the way you do it is to survey you’ve got then you’ve got

data right something to point to uh if if my colleague and friend Jerry were on this call he would hear me say and smile

that Jerry to me was always the data guy and I was always the so what guy so and the data is here but we knew what we

knew what the data was going to tell us the question was why aren’t we doing anything about it I think what happened

really Dan was pure um uh Confluence of circumstances the the the survey that I

referenced the other one and and and and Patrick Krill and some mothers were the ones who kind of P piloted that survey

uh at out of Hazelton Betty Ford we weren’t talking to each other at the time but the results we saw were that

you know the lawyers were the product of of law school of the students and so the issues the percentages around anxiety

depression were as high they were significant um that Confluence was was

purely coincidental and but it was the results of those surveys coming out where folks are like we should be

talking about this this should not be a 24-hour news cycle and you know some of the media picked up again it wasn’t

above thefold New York Times they’re focused on other things but the people in the academic in the legal circles

were like this is time so so it was uh I don’t know if we could point to anyone

to thing I think those surveys really started things off I think the task force as I referenced were a bunch of folks were like we can’t just let the

surveys and the results die let’s figure out what we want to do the lawyer Assistance programs and and Folks At Law

Firms who did care and folks like myself but certainly other deans of students and other Deans quite frankly of law

schools are like yeah why do we need to be doing this let’s find a better way and a and a stronger way of supporting

those in the profession and it just it it coalesced it really just coalesced sometimes there’s just a need to

actually quantify as you said before what people already know but we are reluctant to see and then when you see

those numbers and say wow 80% 60% 70% are struggling with this it becomes

almost a nuclear event if you will we got to do something it’s going to take us all in so I I think that that it it

certainly can’t be minimized I I want to come back to something that you mentioned it’s a small point but it’s

one that that personally interests me which is this idea of of hazing and uh

anybody who’s worked in a consulting firm or the big six big four uh

accounting firms law firms know when you when you leave the the Comfort the bosom

of of safety in your University or grad school everything’s great more or less

and then you go to a firm where it’s militaristic inherently hierarchical um

you mentioned that that point yeah does that contribute or or or how does that contribute to the mental health issues

of the professionals later on who might be struggling yeah so so I’m smiling as

I’m listening to Dan there is a um I don’t want to say a story because the story sounds like I’m making it up there was a a a situation I was in a number of

years ago I I let me do this succinctly there was a conference taking place of lawyers and the the then president of

the American Bar Association which kind of governs you know around lawyers law schools this and that um called for a

subset of Partners at those firms to get together for a couple of hours like many within the conference to sit around

tables and talk about what’s going on the law firms around well-being what are the challenges how are law firms trying

to overcome them and what are the hiccups to those to those you know trying to overcome and I was invited among some others to moderate the tables

and I was basic specifically to me they said we know you’re from New York we know you’re going to want to jump in this stuff your job is to just kind of

take this stuff in and kind of let things flow so I’m at a table and the question comes up it’s like you know what are you do in the law firms partner

across from me says well let me tell you what what we just did and this was according to the to the story being told

to me it was like a week two weeks ago we announced that there’s going to be a happy hour coming up the following week at the law firm now I had to already

stop there and say you know wellbeing happy hour are not always the best thing but that’s that’s what not what my job was so I

so there’s a happy hour going I reach out to the two Associates working on this case and I say you’re going to beat

the happy hour right right yeah yeah we’ll be there we’ll be there happy hour goes the next day one of the associates shows up one of the other ones doesn’t

so I email that associate and say Hey you know with the happy hour he said you’re G to be there you know what happened why weren’t you there and the

associate writes back to me I forgot that my daughter had a soccer game so I left at the end of the day to go to the

soccer game and the partner then leans back and looks at me across the table Dan and says and there you go

and her there you go was look what we did we put together this event to to support well-being and this and that and

this associate had the audacity to leave work it’s it’s it’s actually it’s a it’s

a great story because it really does bring to life this idea of hey I think I’m helping you but they’re actually

doing exactly the opposite as you’re pointing out like I don’t give a crap about your work life balance it’s it’s

irrelevant to me you should have been out there drinks right right now right

so drinking is certainly a part of it the part that I and I’m an optimist ultimately the part and this was a

handful of years ago I’m not saying that things have changed I’m not saying that conversation could not be held exactly

again were we in the same circles but as part of this what I hope is a positive

trend towards better well-being right so you now have uh any way you want to look at it

law students who are coming through the ranks who are going to be asking during interviews what is the law firm doing

around well-being right this is now a question question that is starting to be okay more and more in the open whereas

forly they would have been like afraid to ask as if they had an issue and so they needed to know that the law firm

was going to take care of them the more law students who are asking those questions the firms are going to have to turn around and say what are we doing

because now it’s not it’s not not selecting Dan for David because Dan raised mental health and you know and

David didn’t we also are going to have these same individuals who were working their way into the law firms and I I

don’t want to age out I’m not saying that it’s older you know older attorneys but if we talk about the timeline you and I were discussing the more senior

Associates Partners we used to you know the understanding was you put in the hours you got if you got a call as an

associate on a Friday afternoon I’m sorry but you’re staying if you got a call on a during your your child’s

birthday party on a Saturday that you have to come into the office you’re expected to do it and I’m not saying that’s all gone but I think what I’m

hopeful that we’re going to start to see is this trend towards this doesn’t cut it anymore and it’s not enough I’ve had

thrown back at me I mean to be fair I’ve had you know partners that say well you know jaffy as long as you keep having

this you know huge volume of law students that you accept into your school you’re going to keep turning out

lawyers we don’t need to do anything other than what we’re doing because if Dan wants to step aside and do something

else because isn’t right for him Sally can come in and take that spot I’m like well that’s not that’s not the you know

the thinking you want and even from a business model I mean look at it inside the amount of money you’re going to spend to on board another individual I

mean set aside even the community side it’s not even good for the bottom line so these conversations again are being

held more and more they’re rising to those levels and and I want to be fair for any senior Associates Partners who

listening to this I’m not criticizing a lot of you are taking care I’ve met with some of you we need to see more of that

on a on an ongoing basis let me I’m gonna lean in for a moment and I’m gonna

play the role of the contrarian just to build on this I’ve had more than a few people who’ve worked in the legal or

still work in the legal profession friends and family who’ve said um you

know the resources and responses that they’re seeing now to the Mental Health crisis it’s nice it’s important but it’s

overdone meditation yoga safe spaces it’s too much we’re pandering to a

weaker more fragile generation and what they need is tough love what do you say

to that because that is being said that is a an undercurrent people are saying

it in uh in in back room conversations they may be embarrassed to share it more

broadly but they’re saying it what do you think I I I you know my mind jumps

to I don’t know if this will be directly responsive Dan but my mind if so I’m a

let’s pick on a partner I’m a partner working down the hallway and I see a colleague of mine who must have broken

their leg or something because they’re they’re in a cast and they’re doing their best to come across I’m going to

be thoughtful about that individual I’m gonna you know how are you doing is there anything I do to support you know that’s you know that sucks I’m sorry you

had to go through it um mental health issue you know hidden issue but if we

were able to if that person was walking down and they you know somebody with the mental health challenges challenge somehow had a sign or indicator that

they were there partner’s going to keep walking wow that’s not me and boy that person’s got to have some problems this

that what not I don’t I don’t believe I I believe that you’re hearing what you’re

hearing I don’t think being you know attentive sensitive to these issues is a

match for you know being being you know light on individuals I think it’s just a matter of really everything we’ve been

talking about it’s it’s having conversations it’s being part of community it’s being supportive individuals look we all have mental

health challenges right every person working the Earth has it it’s a it’s on a Continuum it’s a matter of you know

how challenged we are um and and and the resources we support have it so yeah do

you need to be is is should a law firm be reviewing itself at the end of the year and saying well we did yoga once a

month and we provided mindfulness meditation those who did it so we’ve done our job no that’s not what it’s

about it’s about building Community it’s about maybe looking at the billable hour and finding ways to adjust it’s about

providing support for families that are in development so that mothers or fathers aren’t leaving because they have

care and concern about raising a family but they can’t do it in the face of what’s going on there is space to work

without having to feel like you’re turn turning into some kind of you know soft organization because it’s not what

you’re doing you’re actually supporting and quite honestly supporting the individuals is making them stronger and

allowing them to attend to the clients and to needs that are there by helping to minimize these distractions that you

know otherwise creating these issues now let me uh let me kind of drill down this a little bit further when you think

about who’s getting it right I’m sure there might be some some great exemplars out there of like who’s doing this

really well universities organizations that you would point to as models that

that are worth copying who would you point to if somebody were to ask you David I we’re working on building this

ourselves yeah who should we copy what would you point to yeah I I um I mean I

love to brag about our law school but I’m never going to say we’re the best law school in the country that’s doing all all the right things there there are

other law schools that are that I’m modeling occasionally things after we’ve got a list Ser aans of students who get

talk to each other on a regular basis and look for Best Practices um there are

in the legal space because I don’t I don’t think I’m going to I don’t know if you’re asking me I don’t know I’m going to name names per se um there’s a

there’s a well-being pledge that the American Bar Association or through the American Bar Association has been a foot

for a number of years and this has allowed signatories to um show that they are modeling good behavior around these

pillar pillars of well-being of spiritual support financial support you know physical kind of support whatever

it might be there are about 200 125 signatories to it so that that number is actually kind of blowing up to a point

where those who are working at the back end want to ensure that this isn’t just another kind of like a a rubber stamp

and then it’s actually taking place but there are law firms there are schools certainly you know Beyond hours that are

are making contributions um I mean I would say for anybody who’s looking a model if they’re really interested follow up with me

offline and if you’re a law firm I’ll put you in this direction if you’re a law school I’ll talk to you put you in another Direction um there’s a lot of I

again I’m an optimist and and the trend I think is going well there’s a lot of lot of good work going on in that regard

now I I’ve got one more question for you and then I’ve got a a quick game I’d like to for us to play together and I’ll

tell you about that game in a moment but something in a previous conversation that that you had mentioned to me um

before a prospective lawyer can be admitted to the bar they have to answer a question some something along the

lines of do you have any condition or impairment that might affect your ability to practice law and mental

health conditions are specifically included in this question first of all

clarify if I you know misstated this at all but is this a problem or a deterrent for people uh becoming lawyers and uh

maybe elaborate a little bit more about this thought this was an interesting issue yeah well well thank you for for

re-raising it um if we find another hour to do a session together I think I could probably spend the entire hour on this

this is is actually an area that I’ve devoted a lot of vacy over the last again probably 10 years or so but let me

try to Nutshell it um law students when they graduate sit for the bar exam licensing exam part of that is a

character and fitness component uh applicants need to answer a series of questions those questions are uh derived

from each jurisdiction so every state in the country DC you know American Samo can decide what questions they want to

ask some of them pull from a certain a centralized service so there’s the same questions and others can any of them can

choose to form their own uh there are a number of jurisdictions that continue to ask questions around mental health and

condition or impairment the question that you kind of quoted do you have any condition or impairment uh including but not limited to mental health or

substance use which uh is sometimes if left untreated sometimes not put in there might affect your ability to

practice law in a competent Manner and it’s a compound question it’s a difficult question but it is a question

that we know from the results of the surveys that we um that we that we assess the law students on that a

significant number of law students believe that their mental health that they’re they have a better far better

chance of getting admitted to the bar if their mental health Andor their substance use issue is hidden and so as

a result of that often times their notion is I’m not going to get help while in law school for these issues

because I’m gonna have to answer this question and if I answer it in the affirmative I may get delayed or denied

admission to the bar now the bar examiners will say the numbers are infantes small we’re not going to delay

or deny and I’m like well okay then why ask the question allow us to double down in law school and say to the students

you should not fear this question get help in school the bar examiners will say of course we want the students to

get help in school and I’ll say yeah but you’re asking this question and they don’t know what the results of that

question are going to be and so we’ve gone round and round to the credit of a number of states and jurisdictions they

have seen this this this problem they’ve seen the results of the survey they’ve seen some of the articles that have been

written and many of them have been rolling back these questions they’ve either removed the questions all

together kind of the a state is we call it or in some cases and I support this they focus on conduct and behavior so

have you exhibited any conduct or behavior that might reflect upon your ability to practice law in a competent

manner now if you have exhibited some kind of conduct or behavior and as part

of that it was might have been a mental health challenge you were going through or a substance use issue if you choose

to as kind of mitigation or defense not only respond because you have to in the affirmative but kind of say here’s what

was going on I will support that the through the bar examiners that there’s maybe further appropriate inquiry in

terms of we want to know a little bit more are you presently getting help for it and if you haven’t gotten help for it

and it’s a first- Time acknowledgement there may be space in a need for some

either provisional admission what we call conditional admission having that individual get some of the further help

they need so that they can properly represent the clients in the jurisdiction any precedent of of people

being denied from the bar for simply admitting they had a substance abuse or mental health there have been so so with

the with the jurisdictions the jurisdiction has two options um they can well three they can either up or down

just thumbs up thumb down if that’s two the other one is that they can have what’s called conditional admission

where they can say on the basis of what you’ve provided to us we’re we we think you ultimately can be you we think

you’re competent as a lawyer but there’s some concerns we have we’re going to conditionally admit you into our jurisdiction the public doesn’t know you

don’t have an ask risk on it but you are going to be getting monitoring in the background for a period of time could be

up to you know year and a half some say five years this is something that’s actually currently also being debated

but you’re going to be going through support and and and and and counseling and some monitoring in some cases at the

end of which we hope at the at the time designated that you’re in essence cleared and that that conditional

admission is lifted and you’re fully admitted to the bar at that point in time but that’s a lot of information for a law student to be look ahead and

saying I don’t want to go through all this and so I’m going to put my head down I’m not going to get any help for

this this potentially growing Mental Health Challenge and I’ll just wait until I gets a profession and hope that

I can get some help while I’m there and that’s just not not the way that this you know ought to be operating speaking of purely theoretical if I were in those

those shoes I probably would say you know what plausible deniability I wasn’t sure that that I fit this so I’m just

gonna say no why why invite a a hail storm of problems well I I think great

great topic great issue um maybe for another hour we will go a lot deeper into that but for now first off thank

you for for a great conversation you’re not done yet though okay because the second round is uh a little bit of a

game I like to play called myth or reality now what I’m going to do is I’m going to present you a statement I’m

going to ask you to think about it and then tell me do you think it’s a myth or

is it a reality and I’ll ask you to elaborate a little bit on your answers so um in no particular order I’m going

to throw out some questions or statements that is to you you ready go for it y all right number one mental

health issues are a result of Personality weakness or character flaws and people can just snap out of it if

they try hard enough is that a myth or reality yeah that’s a myth that’s an easy one um these are that was a little

bit of a of a I mean not a not a dumb question

because there are perceptions out there and I have been party to them you know people very close to me why can’t that

person just get out of bed just get out of bed I’m like really and do you think the person wants to be in bed all day do

you think that person wants to live a life that way these are these are again deep-seated you know oftentimes just you

know genetically based and and and and it’s a disease at the end of the day and yeah absolutely I’m going to go into

maybe a little bit more of one that dub tals to something you said before binge drinking binge drinking is a big problem

for law students and it’s a canary in the coal mine or in other words not simply a write a passage for students is

blowing off a little steam is it a big problem get a reality yeah um uh I’m

gonna go with meity on that one I’m gonna go somewhere in between you’re off you’re off tell me tell me why why is it

a meity the there are um are surveys had indicated that there are significant

number of students who were reporting that they had been bin shrinking right we kind of broke broke it out for men or women the kind of the amount of drinking

how recently that you know the prior month how much they’ve been drinking and the numbers were at the time were fairly

significant we actually interesting as a parenthetical the survey in 2021 showed

a decrease in bins drinking but we actually had to account for covid where bin drinking is oftentimes being done in

group settings and that really wasn’t taking place so on the one hand we wanted to say the results of the 2014

survey and folks starting to think about you know best practices and educating students in they we be helpful but we

really had to couch that in terms of you know is it was it actually a case or was it co that was was putting this on it so

yes on the one hand there is bins drinking that is still a serious issue the so-called Canary and the coal mine I

also think that students sometimes are looking for something to come together and they don’t go bowling or they may go

to bowling where they’ve got drinking as well students aren’t typically coalescing around a a Panera or you know

ice skating or something that doesn’t have drinking at it because it’s still you know you know it’s part of society and and I also should say I

I folks would have to know me better but I’m not I I I support drinking like

anything else in moderation I support adult drinking I support responsible drinking it’s just when these issues are spilling over either conflating with

mental health issues are really giving way to substance use disorders and challenges and not simply something that

is entirely within the individual’s control now good good clarification all right I’m going to throw out one that’s

going to hit at your core the legal Prof profession disproportionately attracts people with underlying mental health

conditions is that a myth or a reality yeah I I

disproportionately no I I I think I think it’s a admittedly a very tricky one yeah I I think it’s a myth but I

think we touched on this in a different way earlier I think that that the

um that the type of individuals who oftentimes graduate to law school and then the profession oftentimes bring out

some of these um attributes about the individuals that can give way to mental

health challenges I don’t think that’s their lawyers per se I think it’s that that type personality the kind of competitiveness that runs in you know

kind of into something else oftentimes the I learned how to go it alone I was able to do this all on my own and I was

a achiever I was a superstar never needed any help and all of a sudden I’m like I’m struggling over something and

this notion of getting help of reaching out is entirely new and then being compounded by some of the other things

that we talked about so we may we may attract individuals into the legal profession who

um have have found a new the space or the desire or potentially the need to address some of these challenges but I

don’t I don’t think the legal profession is kind of alone in that regard and I don’t yeah I don’t think we’re doing the the single fair fair fair point um all

right keeping a job like being a lawyer is too stressful for individuals with

mental illness issues yeah and that’s just a that’s just a flat out myth where where where

where where jobs are are attainable with anybody with mental health challenges obviously they can get extreme and

that’s why the eaps right the the employ the the assistance programs are important the community the support and

all those type of things are important but the um yeah no I’m gonna move to to the next one

which is law firms today um are good at accommodating employees who have

underlying mental health issues is that a meth or a reality I so we spent the bulk of time

talking on it I think it I think it’s a I think it’s a I want that in between

again Dan I’m sorry I know it’s supposed to be one or the other but but I think because we’re trending again if you’d ask me a question number years ago I’d

say a we’re we’re doing a poor job we’re doing a poor job at law schools not just blaming law firms um but it’s been

getting better and so I think we’re somewhere in the middle you know the eips are there um I I had referenced

earlier and I said professional counselor what I really meant were individuals I mean they’ve got counseling but also individuals who are

being hired to um to to develop well-being programs like just have the

programming because the associates the lawyers the HR departments are are are saddled with other things they need to

do but to have somebody who’s in scons and kind of thinking about how do we go beyond yoga Beyond mindfulness

meditation I mean I ideally when I’ve been asked at law firms what can be doing I’m like here’s a simple one survey your Law Firm ask them do it

iously but ask them what could we be doing better you’re going to have to move past the billable as the bottom line because that’s what most of them

are going to say but they’re going to move towards work life balance and and listen to what they’re saying if they’re

allowing you if they’re suggesting fold in some pro bono hours that can be counted towards my billable or community

service so that I’m taking care of a little bit myself do that listen to what they’re doing don’t just pay lip service

to it are do employers have a right to know if a future employee suffers from

mental health issues that can affect their job performance guess it’s a myth of reality but it’s maybe a little bit

that’s a yes no question the answer is no no employers don’t have right to know the American Americans with Disabilities

acts will spe specifically kind of indicate as you know Under The Heading of disabilities a perspective employer

does not have the right to know about that last question for you yeah most

universities don’t have the staff or resources to meaningfully deal with these mental health issues that are

faced by students most universities would you say that’s a meth

reality the reason I’m hesitating Dan is that the the um we have seen an

explosion it’s almost coming full circle so kudos to you for that full circle to this conversation we have seen an

explosion in um uh desire support for services for resources right both both

owing to potentially to the self-awareness hey now I recognize this is something I can be okay about it’s not stigmatizing I think it’s a time in

the conversation we’re using stigma but I can move past the stigma now what I do about getting help and also those who

are just just struggling and maybe not self-aware but getting dragged towards those resources the resources are in

place for most universities what a lot of universities are struggling with now is catching up with this explosion in

the sport needed so you might be offering four sessions per student maybe per year and the student needs six or

needs eight but you’re like we need to have you we need to refer you out or provide something else because we need

to create space for the next student coming in so the core is in place the question is whether this is becoming a

priority in the universities right exactly as how much are they leveling up in what they’re doing exactly exactly

very great great clarifications not easy myth reality questions they were someone intentionally dichotomous um first of

all thank you for playing along great great insights I really learned so much from this conversation just hearing from

you David um I’m gonna ask you last thought yeah if you were to get give advice whether it’s to students or let’s

think about a future student um that’s thinking about law school maybe they struggle or have struggled with mental

health issues what would you recommend what advice would you give to that kind of hypothetical person that’s yeah

listening or could be listening in a year’s time they want to to get your advice sure uh well the first one you

just said if they want to get my advice have them come find me I mean I don’t I don’t care where they’re applying to law school I don’t care where they’re at law

school I don’t want to denigrate my fellow deans of students because there are tons of them who are doing wonderful work and they they ought to go to that

individual as well but I am happy you know anytime that I could support a student who’s moving into that space um

the other one and we threaded this during the conversation Dan is start talking about it right you don’t have to

be a billboard you don’t have to be blasting it but talk to the people who are close to you connect with other

individuals and start to have that conversation because that connection the absence of that con

connection is what’s feeding into some of the mental health challenges in many instances not across the board the

ability then to overcome that is sometimes simply talking about it among other things you’re actually going to

pale with somebody I I might be a family member those some sometimes are a little bit more difficult but somebody you’re close to who would be like you know I

didn’t know you were struggling I had a classmate Dan I’ll share this real quick a classmate I graduated in 93 from this

law school I had a classmate come to me two years ago who’s been an on off again

friend in and out and he said I want to meet with you we came we met at the law school he was um he had retired he was

sharing that he retired he said I want to do some work in this space he said I got to tell you David he said I

struggled with anxiety and depression more than anybody I knew while I was in

law school and I looked at him and my eyes went wide I said you’re kidding me I said how did I not know this he said

well we didn’t talk about it and so this you know it’s it’s the talking about it and we’re getting there I know I keep

saying that but the more individuals are talking about it are saying this is not if I had a broken leg and I needed help

I would reach out for it why would I not reach out around a mental health challenge that I’m having let’s move

past this let’s find it acceptable to be talking about these issues so it’s

connecting it’s finding somebody to connect with I mean ultimately if it’s a if it’s a deeper issue you want to find a professional counselor you want to get

connected you want to find the resources for that but start it with a conversation find out that you’re not

alone in that and even with kind of feeling that kind of the the support the this the symbiotic nature kind of

pairing with somebody is going to is going to do strides for you great words of wisdom David thank you for for

sharing being on the program and we’re going to link in here um some resources

that that maybe you’ve recommended couple of things that that you’ve worked on that would be great resources for

other people so be on the lookout folks for for those things that are going to be linked right to this podcast and also

to our videos uh David for me and from you know from all the work that we’ve done with you thank you very much again

for being on here it’s a real pleasure and an honor to have you on well Dan I really appreciate the space that you’re

working in and the folks that you”ve been been bringing together so so thank you in turn I appreciate the opportunity