Are there academic institution-specific equivalents to attorneys (a professional who assists in navigating conduct and justice systems)?

Question

There's an interesting question over at Law.SE on the possibility of suing a university over what the OP saw as unfair disciplinary practices. I have often wondered...

Is there a type of professional or professional practice related to advising or representing students and/or faculty within the context of internal disciplinary procedures?

As a concrete example, let us assume that Mary was expelled for allegedly falsifying data for her thesis. Mary contests this.

• If she sues in civil court, she should consult an appropriately-qualified, local attorney.
• But if she instead takes her argument directly to the university's disciplinary committee, she will need someone with an in-depth knowledge of the policies, procedures, rules of evidence, witness disqualification criteria, time limits, etc. that are internal to the university. This person could scrutinize the investigation in-depth and "beat them at their own game" by pointing out how the evidence, according to university policy, should be seen in her favor or does not meet the internal requirements for expulsion.

Another example might be a purely advisory context: perhaps one is considering a romantic liaison with a student, and is wondering whether this could affect their employment.

Does such a professional or service exist? Is this a domain of highly specialized "regular" lawyers? Is there a separate professional practice for academic advisors?

Clarifications:

• This is a general question; I'm not currently facing a situation on which I need advice.
• If necessary, we can limit the scope of the question to academic misconduct (plagiarism, falsifying data, cheating on exams, etc.) rather than personal misconduct.
• I will tag this as US to further limit the scope, but I'm certainly interested in any answers, regardless of the location.

Answer 1

I’m not aware of what you are asking about existing as a type of professional that one can retain (as per your question) — I suspect that would be a rather poor way to make a living — but at my university there are people who are available to consult on matters such as Mary’s expulsion case.

Since Mary sounds like a graduate student, the relevant place to go would be the university ombuds office. In some cases the student union or an employee union of some sort may offer some help.

If Mary were a faculty member, she would go to a committee of our academic senate where advisers would be able to advise her if the thing she wants to complain about is a violation of her rights as a faculty member, and about the procedure for challenging the administration’s decisions.

These advisers are themselves regular faculty members like me and only do this as a “side gig” for a few hours a month, but they will have received specialized training that gives them the knowledge to offer this sort of advice (in fact I am currently on a sister subcommittee of this committee so I received a lot of the same training myself), and will also have auxiliary staff they can turn to who specialize in the relevant policy matters and can offer further information if the need arises.

These advisers won’t be available for an unlimited time. Likely they will be able to meet with Mary 2-3 times and discuss her questions, but it’s not quite the same as having your own lawyer or other professional that you retain on an hourly basis.

Since through my involvement in the sister subcommittee I am privy to faculty grievances a bit like Mary’s, I can tell you that faculty members who really need professional help with their grievance process will often hire a lawyer (I have also seen cases of students hiring lawyers for help with a disciplinary matter), and this can make a big difference - it’s far from easy for someone without experience in these administrative processes to navigate the system. A lawyer may not be intimately familiar with the specific institution’s policies, but broadly speaking they have the right training and skill set to help in such challenging situations. They don’t come cheap, however...

Answer 2

In the United States, there is a lot of variation from institution to institution. If such an office exists, your best bet is to ask the ombuds. An ombuds is generally an impartial third party who mediates disputes within an institution. Ombuds typically cannot make binding decisions, and merely serves as an advisor between parties. Many institutions in the US have an "Office of the Ombuds", or something similar. For a couple of descriptions of what an ombuds' office may do, see:

• University of Arizona's Ombuds
• UC Riverside's Office of the Ombuds
• MIT's Ombuds Office

Many institutions also often maintain separate offices for addressing specific kinds of complaints. For example, most American institutions of higher learning have a Title IX office, which is meant to focus on issues of sex and gender discrimination. The Title IX office will often be tasked with investigating accusations of misconduct, and may employ one or more attorneys who specialize in Title IX cases. Such an office may also employ or authorize various semi-professional investigators or coordinators to help deal with their caseload—the ATIXA website may give some insight. The Title IX office might work in parallel with a civil authorities (police and the courts), and may issue academic penalties (suspension or expulsion, for example) independent of a criminal case. There are attorneys who specialize in these issues, both in terms of prosecution and defense.

Most institutions also have some kind of "Academic Integrity Office" or "Offce of Student Conduct" (often housed under the umbrella of a Dean of Students). These offices are generally tasked with adjudicating accusations of cheating, plagiarism, and (if applicable) honor code violations; and may hear cases of discrimination, harassment, or sexual misconduct. Typically, this office is empowered to make decisions regarding student conduct, and can issue penalties (such as failing grades in classes, suspension, etc.). Most institutions have some kind of formal process, and the decisions are often made by a committee consisting of faculty, administrators, and/or students. Appeals generally go to a provost, president, or chancellor of an institution, and can eventually involve attorneys who specialize in academic misconduct (there are property rights associated to education, hence these kinds of issues cannot always be resolved internally). Examples include

• University of Arizona, where academic integrity falls under the purview of the Dean of Students,
• University of Nevada, Reno, which has an independent Office of Student Conduct, and
• UC Riverside, where accusations of misconduct may be brought before the academic senate.

Depending on the nature of your question, any one of these offices (or its equivalent) might be of service. Within an institution, you might also consult with HR, the chair of your department, your dean (assuming that you are faculty), your union (assuming that you are represented by a union, either as a graduate student or as faculty or staff), an appropriate vice president's office (e.g. VP of Student Services), or an outside attorney who specializes in the appropriate field.

Answer 3

An additional perspective (from a European university, if that matters), adding to already good answers. Mostly in case that someone with a concrete issue finds this question later.

I would most likely advise our grad student to wait retaining a lawyer until absolutely necessary. Apart from the non-negligible monetary cost of doing so, bringing your lawyer to a meeting can often be interpreted as escalating the conflict, which in systems where private disputes are rarely settled in court, will mean that the university will do likewise. As such, retaining a lawyer might close the door on amicable solutions.

I have personally seen some cases where students (possibly by online advise) will "lawyer up" in cases about minor academic misconduct (plagiarizing an assignment in a course), which promptly made our dean forward the case to the legal department -- we are not equipped to handle such things ourselves. This meant that cases which would have been handled with a slap on the wrist and a failed course, was now dragged out in a lengthy legal procedure. In such cases, consulting with the student union or university ombudsperson is almost always better.

Answer 4

All that stuff would still generally be best done by a lawyer. Aside from being knowledgable in actual law (or at least able to look it up properly), lawyers are well-versed in finding and analysing rules/policies/procedures, and marshalling evidence and argument to achieve a desired outcome within a set of rules. The skills that lawyers use would transfer easily to internal university procedures conducted under university policies. (Note that some university procedures do not give much latitude for use of counsel, but they would almost alwayes be entitled to attend hearings, etc., and give advice.)

If you are looking for a specific type of lawyer then you probably want someone who is good in contract law, administrative law, discrimination law, and litigation. These are the main areas of law that are likely to bear on university processes relating to university disciplinary procedures. In particular, if you are dealing with a public university then they are subject to rules of administrative law that may go beyond their written contractual obligations, so a lawyer will be aware of legal requirements imposed on the university that its own staff may not be familiar with.

The main reason that lawyers are not usually used for this type of thing is simply that they are too expensive for internal matters like this. Nevertheless, for certain wealthy people, it would be perfectly natural for them to hire a lawyer for a matter like this, particularly if it involves a matter of high importance to them.