But Is It Good: The Need to Measure, Assess, and Report on Court-Connected ADR
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We know that very few civil matters reach disposition through trialbut what do we really know about how civil cases do reach disposition? What number of civil cases reach disposition through settlement? What number of civil cases reach settlement through court-connected alternative dispute resolution (ADR)? Do we know enough about the results of courtconnected ADR to be able to detect potential patterns of systemic discrimination? This Article examines what we know from federal and state court systems public reporting and finds: 1) only a minority of federal district courts and state court systems report regarding dispositions through settlement; 2) there is no consistent logic in how these settlements are categorized and reported; and 3) while a goodly number of court systems reference their use of ADR, only two states report essential bare bones data including the numbers of dispositions produced by ADR. The Article urges the need for such data collection and reportingas well as collection and reporting regarding other data elementsto ensure that court-connected and court-reliant ADR are making a difference, a good difference.