Duquesne’s Kline Center to provide education for judges

Thanks to a $7.5 million donation from a law school alumnus, Duquesne University will collaborate in a first-of-its-kind partnership to provide continuing education courses for judges in the Pennsylvania court system.

The university on Tuesday announced the creation of the Thomas R. Kline Center for Judicial Education, named for the 1978 graduate of the law school and a founding partner of the firm Klineand Specter. The center will collaborate with the other eight law schools across the state and the Pennsylvania Unified Court System to offer courses now required annually for about 600Pennsylvania judges.

“This is a new vision of pro bono on a giant scale in a state where we’re harnessing all of the expertise and talent in all of the law schools,” said Duquesne University president Ken Gormley. “We’re all coming together to work on something that benefits the profession.”

Mr. Gormley, who led the Duquesne University School of Law until he became the university president in 2016, said the idea for a judicial education center has been something he and others have considered for years.

Under a December 2016 order from the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, all state judges are required to take 12 credits of continuing judicial education each year.

The new partnership will help make the required credits more accessible for jurists across the state, as well as offer courses and seminars in fields such as ethics, psychology, science and health. Currently the only options for local judges pursuing more education are the National Judicial College in Reno or courses through the Pennsylvania State Conference of TrialJudges.