Litigation, Dispute Resolution, and Skills (SKILS)

Advocacy I teaches pretrial and trial skills through a combination of lecture, written and oral courtroom exercises, and videotape review.

This course provides an introduction to the domestic law and practice of arbitration. It assess the statutory and decisional law basis for arbitration, especially the provisions of the Federal Arbitration Act. It investigates the central doctrinal issues in the field: the enforceability of unilaterally-imposed arbitration agreements, the arbitrability of statutory rights - in particular, civil rights matters, and the use of contract to establish the law of arbitration between the arbitrating parties. Emphasis is placed upon practical problems that have emerged in the practice of arbitration law: the selection of arbitrators, the use of discovery and evidence-gathering in arbitral proceedings, and the content of arbitration agreements. The course also addresses the new uses of arbitration in the consumer, health, and employment fields.

This course develops students' skills in common legal writing formats other than memos and briefs. Not intended as a remedial course, this course rather provides an opportunity for students to sharpen legal writing skills with an emphasis on clarity and precison of expression. Weekly writing assignments include a few fully drafted documents (e.g., short will, a short contract, a statue), as well as letters, short pleadings, jury instructions, and other short pieces. Students will concentrate on re-writing and editing their work.

This course addresses the relationship of federal courts to administrative agencies and state courts.

The first part is the drafting of arbitral clauses in a variety of circumstantial settings (maritime, labor, commercial, consumer, and employment) in regard to CPR best practices standards and addressing the authority of the arbitrators and the configuration of the arbitral procedure. This process would take several sessions. The second branch would be to view and then construct an arbitration pursuant to one or several of the arbitral clauses. This would require the conduct and architecture of an arbitral trial along with the protocol for its management, both with the arbitrators and the parties. This would take some time as well. Third, the students would be asked to participate in a statutory drafting workshop that reflects their experiences in the two previous branches. They would be asked to evaluate the UNCITRAL Model Law and several national laws of arbitration and arrive at a new and better model law.

This course introduces contemporary issues in several topical areas of particular interest to litigating in federal courts. The course topics are varied, with the unifying theme being that each topic possesses either particular prominence or exclusive jurisdiction within the country's federal court system. These topics include: the history and organization of the federal courts, the courts' relationship with Congress, the practical dynamics of federal procedure, strategic considerations involved in a litigant's choice of federal court, employment discrimination, federal criminal matters, sentencing, civil rights cases, and habeas.

Students will learn about the role of a judicial clerk and how to draft judicial opinions. Students will recognize the impact of written advocacy on judicial opinion writing as they switch roles from advocating as a lawyer to deciding issues raised by the advocates and writing opinions that implement subtle persuasive writing techniques. Students will develop a deeper understanding of the process for creation of legal precedent through opinions, including the impact of standards of review and procedural posture. The course will cover the common forms of judicial writing. With individualized feedback, students will develop precision in self-editing and revision skills and will practice producing concise, clear, and accessible written work.

Students will learn journalistic writing styles to prepare them to contribute accurate and accessible legal information and analysis to general interest and legal trade media as legal analysts or professional journalists. For legal trade publication work, the emphasis will be on readability and appropriate depth for a professional audience. Students will learn journalistic standards of truth and interviewing techniques for print and broadcast media. Live broadcast techniques, including live interview hosting, will also be covered.

This course provides students with the framework for developing a thesis, conducting research, and producing a significant scholarly paper. In an interactive workshop setting, students will discuss progress and receive feedback from faculty and fellow students on: (1) identification and refinement of a thesis; (2) developing and implementing a research plan; (3) appropriate use of authority, including legal citation form; and (4) developing and refining a critical perspective and scholarly argument. Students must be concurrently enrolled in a seminar (SEM) course or an independent study (PERSP 996) of at least two credit hours.

This course is designed for students who want to improve their ability to understand and communicate with Spanish-speaking clients and colleagues in legal settings.

This class will acquaint the student with civil procedure at the state trial court level. Using Pennsylvania as the model, the course traces a civil case from service of process to trial and includes discussion of venue, pleadings, discovery and dispositive motions. The course also deals with other important aspects of civil practice including statutes of limitation, comparative negligence, compulsory arbitration and settlement.

The goal of the course is to improve the legal reading, writing, and editing skills of students. The course will reinforce rules of grammar, punctuation, sentence structure, usage, voice, tone, style, and organization. The emphasis will be on the application of these rules in the context of legal writing. Students will learn how to craft sentences that are accurate, brief, clear, precise, and sometimes persuasive.

The goal of this course is to improve the legal writing and editing skills of students. By engaging in the process of directed writing and editing, students will learn to write clearly, succinctly, precisely, and sometimes persuasively. Emphasis will be given to organization and ingtegration of procedural and substantive aspects of cases.

This course is an introduction to law relevant to assisting people in poverty including law addressing public benefits, housing, consumer issues, custody, domestic violence, and private rights of action. It will also address realities of existence for people in poverty and consider historical and policy perspectives. Finally, the course will focus on some practical skills, and students will participate in mock hearings and/or mock interviews.

Formal courses given infrequently to explore, in depth, a comparatively narrow subject that may be topical or of special interest.