Instructor Terry Ellis has been teaching at De Anza College since 1975, and believes that students who are deeply interested in his discipline will always exist.
Ellis was the first to teach a class about paralegal and judicial matters at De Anza in the early 90s. The program has evolved since then, and now an average of 300-400 students come through his classes each year.
“Some of the reasons he stands out are because of his open door policy during office hours, where he always has a line of students waiting to speak to him, giving each student what they need,” former paralegal student Wendy Yee said.
“Professor Ellis has a willingness to listen and help students in the program with their problems, whether they are personal or professional. He has a special enthusiasm for teaching, breadth of knowledge, compassion, offering encouragement and support,” Yee said.
Besides teaching, he is a judge pro tempore in the Santa Clara County Superior Court system, and is active in the South Bay community and legal arena.
Ellis began teaching at De Anza in January 1975, just two weeks before graduating from law school. Soon, Ellis founded and became Director of the Administration of Justice and Paralegal program, the first in a community college in California. Similar programs were created at West Valley College and San Francisco State University.
Ellis teaches principal legal courses; legal procedures, evidence, landlord and tenant law, wills and trusts, paralegal programs and an overview of American and California law.
One of his favorite areas is criminal law because “this was the class which I started teaching at De Anza.”
Aside from his role as instructor and judge, Ellis has maintained the American Bar Association’s rigorous standards of the ABA Guidelines for the approval of paralegal education programs. Nationwide, approximately 260 paralegal programs are approved by the ABA. There are only four ABA approved programs in Northern California, and De Anza’s program is considered one of the best in Northern California.
Ellis lends support to other programs in California that want to acquire and maintain ABA approval.
Yee said that last year, when De Anza was about to cancel the traditional end-of-year celebration of the students of the paralegal program, Ellis paid for the festivities out of his own pocket. The celebration is used to build a social network between alumni and the legal community.
Most of his students have a professional interest in becoming paralegals or law enforcement officers.
“Some are truly interested in being law enforcement officers, and there are students who are interested in transferring and majoring either in administration of justice or in some other legal subjects,” Ellis said. “This is an excellent way to start being a lawyer, as we teach students the same king of things that they would be taught in a university law school.”
Ellis pays special attention to teaching legal research because our legal system is based on precedents, so students who are interested in becoming lawyers have to learn how to do research on an appropriate court decision, how to find them, and how to read and interpret them.
“Law is always changing, both statutes and court decisions; societal attitudes are changing as well. There are periods when the law and society become more conservative, and periods when changes bend to more liberal,” Ellis said.
