Action: Help students develop the skills and knowledge that will prepare them for success in a rapidly changing world.

Objective: Graduates who think critically, act ethically, and adapt confidently.

• Initiative 1.1: Develop a forward-looking Law-in-Action curriculum that integrates legal doctrine with the practical realities of law and prepares students to adapt to future legal, societal, and technological changes.
• Initiative 1.2: Strengthen our teaching of core skills—including interpretation, analysis, research, oral and written communication, ethical judgment, and professional problem solving—through rigorous instruction, experiential learning, and engagement with legal practice.
• Initiative 1.3: Integrate emerging technologies into the curriculum, so students learn how to exercise judgment in using these tools effectively, responsibly, and ethically.
• Initiative 1.4: Communicate our teaching successes—including our outstanding legal writing instruction and clinic-based public service—with external audiences, highlighting our Law-in-Action approach.

Action: Expand opportunities for legal learning and financial support for students to advance access to justice and the Wisconsin Idea.

Objective: New pathways for legal education and manageable levels of law school debt for graduates.

• Initiative 2.1: Expand and deepen partnerships with other UW–Madison schools and colleges to create interdisciplinary learning opportunities that will broaden perspectives, strengthen skill development, and enhance the impact of a UW legal education.
• Initiative 2.2: Work with relevant stakeholders to assist students in pursuing career opportunities in geographic and practice areas with unmet legal needs, including rural, urban, and tribal communities.
• Initiative 2.3: Seek additional resources for need-based financial support for students and help them navigate student loan systems, so that law school debt does not inhibit their ability to pursue their chosen career paths.
• Initiative 2.4: Create new pathways for legal education that will increase access to legal knowledge and enhance Wisconsin’s workforce capacity, while generating additional revenue.

Action: Foster a caring and collaborative environment where people feel connected, are supported, and learn from one another.

Objective: A community in which all students, staff, and faculty treat one another respectfully and contribute to the Law School’s mission.

• Initiative 3.1: Strengthen professional support and career guidance for students and recent graduates through alumni connections and other relationship-building opportunities.
• Initiative 3.2: Modernize the Law School’s physical infrastructure to provide a more welcoming and collaborative professional environment, with a special focus on student-facing spaces.
• Initiative 3.3: Invest in ongoing professional development for faculty and staff.
• Initiative 3.4: Strengthen collaboration among faculty and staff to advance our shared mission, especially the teaching and support of students.

Action: Foster constructive discourse on constitutional democracy and the rule of law among our students, staff, faculty, and external audiences.

Objective: National and international leadership in strengthening democracy, the rule of law, and civil discourse.

• Initiative 4.1: Build on our strengths in democracy at the local, state, national, and global levels through research, teaching, and public education, including the work of the State Democracy Research Initiative, Center for the Study of Liberal Democracy, and Lawyers and Democratic Decline project.
• Initiative 4.2: Create new learning opportunities defined by intellectual challenge and mutual respect, so that our students are prepared to engage in constructive dialogue across political and social differences.
• Initiative 4.3: Create engagement opportunities that bring together lawyers, scholars, judges, policymakers, and other leaders with divergent perspectives to model and advance healthy civil discourse.

Action: Support innovative research and strengthen the visibility and impact of all our scholarly work.

Objective: Rigorous scholarly work and engagement that shapes legal thought, enriches learning, and informs public debate.

• Initiative 5.1: Secure and leverage resources to further support and incentivize high-impact research.
• Initiative 5.2: Strengthen our intellectual community by supporting scholarly workshops, interdisciplinary collaboration, and other opportunities for intellectual engagement.
• Initiative 5.3: Expand opportunities for students to work with faculty on research that develops students’ analytical skills and professional expertise.
• Initiative 5.4: Increase the visibility of our faculty and the impact of their work by pursuing opportunities to share research, exchange ideas, and engage in dialogue with external audiences.