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WHAT WE'RE WATCHING

MADE THE GRADE – The Diversity Lab is scheduled to release its second batch of Mansfield certified law firms later today. Mansfield certified firms are those that have revamped their recruiting and promotion processes to ensure that 30% of potential candidates for "significant" leadership roles are minorities, women, or—new this year—identify as LGBTQ+. For firms, the certification is considered a major accomplishment, especially as clients have increasingly begun to factor diversity into their legal spend.

GOING PUBLIC – The inaugural semester of Chicago's first-ever public law school is underway, as John Marshall Law School has completed its transition from private, stand-alone institution to part of a large public university. Karen Sloan reports that administrators at what's now the University of Illinois Chicago John Marshall Law School say that joining forces will strengthen both entities and make legal education in the Windy City more affordable.

1979 – Forty years ago, law firms didn't want to disclose their compensation models or dare to name their clients. Given the option, many still don't. But as Law.com affiliate The American Lawyer celebrates its 40th anniversary this month, we look at how the publication launched by Steven Brill and led today by editor-in-chief Gina Passarella has cracked open Big Law and tracked the profession's highs and the lows.

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EDITOR'S PICKS

Texas Judge Who Protested Kavanaugh Confirmation Receives Judicial Reprimand

Labor Appointee Eugene Scalia Earned $6.2M as Gibson Dunn Partner

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WHILE YOU WERE SLEEPING

TROUBLES – Facing potential sanctions stemming from a U.N. report last month, the Kanbawza Bank of Myanmar has hired Williams & Connolly partner David Aufhauser, a former GC for the U.S. Treasury Department. As Phillip Bantz reports, The U.N.'s Human Rights Council report said that KBZ Bank's parent company, KBZ Group, was one of two firms that allegedly helped finance the construction of a fence along the Myanmar-Bangladesh border, a structure that the report found "would contribute to the suffering and anguish associated with preventing the displaced Rohingya population from returning to their homes and land."

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WHAT YOU SAID

"Having the highest price in the group of schools from which we compete really doesn't make us look like the access school we are."

—  JAMES MCGRATH, PRESIDENT AND DEAN OF WESTERN MICHIGAN UNIVERSITY COOLEY LAW SCHOOL, ON THE LOWER-TIER LAW SCHOOL'S MOVE TO CLOSE A SATELLITE CAMPUS AND CUT TUITION BY 21%.

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