Drexel University School of Law will be named the Thomas
R. Kline School of Law in honor of a $50 million donation — the largest single
gift in the university’s 123-year history — from the Philadelphia plaintiffs
personal injury litigator.
The donation includes a large bequest, plus the former
Beneficial Savings Bank Building at 12th and Chestnut streets that will house
the Thomas R. Kline Institute of Trial Advocacy of the Kline School of Law.
Drexel hopes the new trial advocacy program, which includes programming for law
students and an LLM program for practicing litigators, will enhance the
8-year-old law school’s reputation in what has become an exceptionally
challenging legal education market in the post-recession world.
“The gift will allow Drexel to attract the best students
and faculty and give the school a chance to distinguish itself in what has
become very competitive market,” Kline said.
In 2013, Kline bought the 24,000-square-foot building,
which, was designed by Horace Trumbauer and was constructed about 80 years ago
for Beneficial Bank. It boasts ornate high ceilings and other fine detailing
from another era and still retains the Beneficial board room but needs a
complete renovation. After it had been unoccupied for four years, Beneficial
sold the building in 2005 when it relocated its headquarters to the Penn Mutual
building. (Beneficial is now based at 1818 Market St.).
Kline had worked across the street from the building for
15 years and said he “couldn’t resist” buying it. It was going to be used as a
pool hall but Kline had a higher purpose in mind for it. He hopes it's open for
students by 2016.
Drexel officials believe the trial advocacy institute
will dramatically change the entire range of the law school’s activities —
advancing courtroom simulation for the juris doctor program and co-curricular
programming and will enhance faculty interaction with students who undertake
advocacy-based co-ops and clinical work. Additionally, it will support the
development of post-graduate LLM and continuing legal education trial and
appellate advocacy programs.
Drexel President John Fry said the remaining portion of
Kline’s gift will be divided into three pools.
- General-operating fund such as faculty, financial aid and the use of technology in law.
- Renovations of 1200 Chestnut, for which Drexel has already hired an architect.
- Enhancements to curriculum and other programs.
Kline is actually the second person to have Drexel’s law
school named after him. But last December, five years after his $15 million
donation led the school to name its fledgling law school in his honor, Fry and
Drexel board of trustees Chairman Richard A. Greenawalt announced that
philanthropist Earle Mack had “graciously stepped aside as naming benefactor of
Drexel’s law school. This decision will clear the way for us to seek additional
benefactors to further advance the school in what has become a very challenging
legal education climate.”
So the school received a much larger donation, which is
not only the largest gift the university has ever received but also the fourth
largest gift ever received by any U.S. law school behind University of Arizona
($130 million in 1999), Ave Maria School of Law ($100 million in 1999) and
Chapman University ($55 million in 2013), according to Drexel officials.
As a basis of comparison, Kline’s mentor, James Beasley
Sr., donated $20 million in 1998 to have Temple University rename its law
school in his honor. Beasley’s generosity was not lost on Kline.
“I was in awe of Jim Beasley and the fact that he made
that donation, to his alma mater no less, and thought it was a wonderful
tribute by the university to rename the school,” Kline said. “So yes, it was in
my mind.”
Temple has one of the top trial advocacy programs in the
country. Kline used to teach there. But he still sees trial advocacy as an
underserved need and with Drexel’s program based just a few blocks from where
many Philadelphia lawyers work in Center City, it could be an attractive
option.
Drexel Law’s main building will remain on Market Street
between 33rd and 34th streets. Dean Roger Dennis said the 8-year-old building,
the law school’s home since four months into its first year, is a tight fit
“but we make it work.” The school’s law library is located in a connected
building but trial practice classes are conducted in rooms not designed for
that purpose. So the new space at 1200 Chestnut will create not just more space
but better quality space specifically designed for specialty classes.
When asked if the school considered using the money to
build a new main law school facility, Kline noted that he wanted the 1200
Chestnut building to be dedicated toward trial advocacy.
Dennis said there are no plans to increase the size of
the law school’s students. Drexel Law opened in September 2006 with 167 students
in its first class and hoped to have even larger classes. But then the
recession hit and — like virtually every other law school in the country —
Drexel has cut back on class sizes. (Dennis said the goal is about 135 students
per class) as job opportunities and applications have shrunk drastically. The
number of applicants nationwide has fallen from about 100,000 in 2004 to 54,000
this fall.
In addition to the trial advocacy program, Drexel Law is
also starting an LLM program for foreign law students seeking an education on
U.S. law — similar to the programs already offered at Temple and University of
Pennsylvania Law School — and a master's in corporate compliance designed for
nonlawyer students that will be taught largely online. Those programs are geared
to help Drexel Law meet its fiscal goals while offering more educational value
— something that has become more common as law schools deal with fewer
students.
Kline, 67, is chair of the law school’s board of advisers
and a member of the university’s board of trustees. Along with longtime
colleague Shanin Specter, Kline is a co-founder and partner at Kline &
Specter, perhaps the city’s best-known plaintiffs personal injury firm. He is a
native of Hazleton, Pa., who graduated from Albright College, earned a master’s
degree and a Ph.D. in American history form Lehigh University and Duquesne
University School of Law. He taught sixth grade for a time before decided to
attend law school. After a judicial clerkship, he joined the Beasley Firm in
1980, where he worked for legendary trial lawyer James Beasley Sr. He and
Specter left in 1995 to start their own firm and soon built up the most
powerful plaintiffs firm in the city, with more than 30 lawyers.
Kline has handled some of the was a lead plaintiffs lawyer
in the Vioxx litigation which resulted in a $4.85 billion settlement paid by
Merck & Co. He secured a $51 million verdict against SEPTA on behalf of a
boy whose foot was torn off in a subway escalator. And he represented 11 of the
12 plaintiffs in settlements totaling $40.5 million in a case that involved a
June 2001 fire at a Hatboro apartment building that killed six and injured six
mostly elderly residents. He also represented a victim in the Jerry Sandusky
child sex abuse civil case.
Source: Philadelphia
Business Journal
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