Categories: Law Practice Skills
Administrative Law Module
Course Page for Spring 2025 ZPO - Ohnesorge, John
Recent Offerings of this course by this instructor
Advanced Legal Research
Course Page for Spring 2025 ZPO - Shucha, Bonnie, Turner, Kristopher
In this simulation course, students will gain substantial, hands-on experience conducting legal research, combining traditional methods with AI-enhanced techniques. Students will learn how to approach, conduct, track, and present their research using facts and circumstances drawn from legal practice.
This course will explore how to analyze a legal issue and develop an effective research plan. Students will examine primary law (federal, state, and tribal) and secondary legal sources, critically assessing their credibility, relevance, and inherent biases. Students will also use advanced tools for litigation, transactional, and business & public records law research.
Throughout the course, we will discuss the practical and economic realities of legal research in practice. Students will gain experience with Clio law practice management software and other legal technologies lawyers use to improve efficiency and protect client confidentiality. Guest speakers will provide an in-depth look at legal processes and sources and offer a real-world view of the research experience.
Weekly instruction combines classroom lecture and discussion, hands-on research, and self-evaluation and engagement with sources followed by timely instructor feedback. Two major assignments include an oral presentation of research results and a database certification project.
Learning Outcomes:
By the end of the course, students should be able to:
• Analyze facts and develop a research plan that maximizes search accuracy and efficiency
• Locate and critically assess sources of legal information, discerning their credibility, relevance, limitations, and inherent biases
• Conduct cost-efficient research using a blend of traditional methods and AI-enhanced techniques
• Convey research findings clearly and effectively both orally and in writing
• Recognize the practical realities and economic impacts of conducting research in legal practice
• Navigate advanced features of MS Word, Adobe Acrobat, and Clio with an understanding of metadata and confidentiality implications
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Arbitration
Course Page for Fall 2021 - Carne, Danielle
Arbitration is a process that involves a third-party neutral, who is granted jurisdiction to issue “final and binding” (usually) decisions through a privately- (or sometimes legislatively-) established adjudicatory process. Although still referred to under the umbrella of “alternative” approaches to dispute resolution, arbitration has become a mainstream method for resolving conflicts. Used in the mid-twentieth century primarily for application in the collective bargaining environment, the use of arbitration has expanded into nearly every conceivable category of dispute: employment, commercial, construction, securities, domestic, and sports, among others.
This course will explore the process and practice of arbitration. Through an examination of episodes of the first season of the popular 1980s television show “Love Boat”, the course will engage students in a semester-long mock arbitration case from evidence-gathering through the hearing phase. In the process of preparing for and presenting the case, students will be introduced to readings, guest speakers (time permitting), and analytical discussions focused on fundamental arbitration concepts that will be applicable in many future settings.
Learning Objectives:
1. Become familiar with the nuts and bolts of the arbitration process.
2. Understand the legal and philosophical foundations of the arbitration process.
3. Through a simulated case, practice applying the theories and techniques of arbitration as an opportunity for reflection and evaluation.
Break-out rooms see 950-101
Course Page for Spring 2024 ZPO - Poe-Gavlinski, Ryan
Recent Offerings of this course by this instructor
Business Law
Business Organizations I Module
Business Organizations Module
Course Page for Fall 2021 - Ohnesorge, John
Recent Offerings of this course by this instructor
Business Orgs Module
Business, Tax & Compliance Colloquium
Course Page for Spring 2023 ZPO - Tahk, Susannah
Description: This is a course that will meet several times throughout the semester to hear guest speakers present new research on topics relating to business law, tax law, and compliance. Students will meet with business and tax faculty before each session to talk about the research and about new developments in these areas.
No prerequisite; pass/fail only grading; grade based on short response papers (does not meet upper-level writing req.).
Business,Tax & Compliance Colloquium
Course Page for Spring 2025 ZPO - Tahk, Susannah
Description: This is a course that will meet several times throughout the semester to hear guest speakers present new research on topics relating to business law, tax law, and compliance. Students will meet with business and tax faculty before each session to talk about the research and about new developments in these areas.
No prerequisite; pass/fail only grading; grade based on short response papers (does not meet upper-level writing req.).
Recent Offerings of this course by this instructor
Civil & Criminal Litigation
Complex Litigation
Course Page for Fall 2024 Regular - Everts, Gregory, Leffel, Michael
Complex Litigation is a course in advanced civil procedure that focuses on class actions and other litigation involving multiple parties and claims, and jurisdictional overlap. The course will have an emphasis on class action litigation, but will also explore MDL and arbitration proceedings and a variety of related topics: Article III standing, consolidation and joinder, litigation management, discovery, settlement, the role of experts, ethical issues, and more. Class discussion will consider both practical and theoretical problems relating to complex cases.
Recent Offerings of this course by this instructor
Deposition Skills
Course Page for Spring 2025 ZPO - Leffel, Michael , Mittal, Anne-Louise
This Deposition Skills course focuses on the fundamentals of deposition practice under federal and state court rules. The course emphasizes experiential learning, while still conveying a deep understanding of deposition practice. In-person attendance is expected and important for the course exercises. The course will provide background on different types of depositions, the goals of taking and defending depositions, deposition logistics, legal rules governing depositions, how to prepare to take and defend depositions, and various special issues related to the depositions of expert and corporate representatives.
Recent Offerings of this course by this instructor
Empirical Analysis and the Law
Course Page for Spring 2022 - Didwania, Stephanie
In many areas of law and law-making, attorneys are increasingly called upon to evaluate and present empirical evidence to support their claims. Fortunately, most empirical research today uses only a handful of research methods. In this seminar, you will learn about these methods and the types of legal questions that they can address. The goal of this seminar is not to equip students to become producers of empirical research, but rather, to help students become better consumers of empirical research and in so doing, build an important set of skills for legal practice. No special preparation or background in empirical methods is necessary for this course and this course will not require you to produce your own empirical research. For example, we will not cover methods of collecting data or coding. Rather, class time and assignments will be primarily devoted to: (1) understanding the intuitions behind the most widely-used empirical methods in law, and (2) giving you the tools you need to be able to read empirical work with a critical eye, including basic literacy in statistics.
Estate Planning & Real Estate
European Union Law
Course Page for Fall 2023 BFF - Giessen Faculty,
Course Description:
The subject of this six-week, one-credit course taught by Professors from Justus-Liebig University in Giessen, Germany, will be an "Introduction to the Law of the European Union." This will be a general introduction to the legal system of the European Union covering both its constitutional and institutional architecture and focusing on a selection of issues including (1) the EU institutional setting, (2) sources of EU law (treaties, secondary legislation, law-making procedures, direct effect, supremacy), (3) remedies in EU law (enforcement proceedings, preliminary references, direct actions, liability), (4) general principles of EU law (human rights, citizenship, rule of law, discrimination, proportionality), (5) the internal market (free movement of goods, persons, services and capital), and (6) a brief overview of other policies of the EU. The focus will be on understanding the underlying principles of European legal integration and becoming familiar with European Union legal sources.
Note: The course will meet starting on September 15th and meet each Friday thereafter until October 20th; the final exam will be a take-home exam on Saturday, October 21st.
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Executive Board
Family Law
Federal Appellate Litigation & Practice
Course Page for Fall 2021 - Wright, Steven
Recent Offerings of this course by this instructor
Federal Appellate Litigation & Practice
Course Page for Summer 2023 AMM - Wright, Steven
Recent Offerings of this course by this instructor
Federal Appellate Litigation & Practice (BJJ session)
Forensic Pathology for Lawyers
Course Page for Spring 2025 GIE - Corliss, Robert, Kallan, Jamie
This course is designed as an introduction to the basic principles of forensic pathology with an emphasis on its intersections with the legal system. Law students will be provided an overview of how Forensic Pathologists perform an autopsy and utilize investigative information to determine cause and manner of death via lectures, readings, and discussions that will cover topics such as medicolegal death investigation in the state of Wisconsin, injury interpretation, postmortem changes, forensic toxicology, and expert witness testimony.
[Note: as compared to the fall term course on Law & Forensic Science, this course, Forensic Pathology for Lawyers, focuses on a specialized, law-practice-related area (e.g., death investigations and case management).]
Full Time Government & Legislative Clinic
Governance, Leadership, and Diversity in the Boardroom
Course Page for Fall 2023 Regular - Nili, Yaron, Papandreou, Radhika
Using a mix of articles, case studies and guest speakers, the course will explore the intersection of corporate governance, board governance and leadership and diversity in the boardroom. Combining both legal and organizational management perspectives, the course will explore the importance of board diversity, the importance of the board as a key corporate entity, intra-board dynamics, and the role of the board in the day to day management of the company and through organizational crisis. The course will be co-taught by Prof. Nili and by Ms. Radhika Papandreou, the Managing Partner of the Chicago office of Korn Ferry.
Internal Competition
Internal Competition (GFE Session)
Law Practice Technologies
Course Page for Fall 2023 Regular - Turner, Kristopher
This course is designed to introduce students to a wide range of technologies they will use as they begin their legal careers and deepen their understanding of commonly used office technologies. The class also examines how a lawyer’s technological competency interacts with marketing, online presence, ethics, client privacy and more.
Weekly instruction will involve short lectures on how legal technology is developing and used in offices, hands-on learning about existing technologies, and guest lectures from legal tech experts.
Students will be expected to complete a series of learning modules outside of class via the NSLT Legal Technology Certification program on common legal technologies topics such as e-discovery, case management and trial practice tools, among others. Students will prepare two presentations for the class on emerging technologies and creating a law firm technology budget.
This class is 3 credits and is a mandatory pass/fail course. The course is open for up to 30 2L or 3L students.
Recent Offerings of this course by this instructor
Law, Leadership, and Professional Identity
Course Page for Fall 2024 Regular - Vande Zande, Dan
Lawyers provide critical leadership in every aspect of society, not only through the practice of law, but also in leading business, governmental, and other organizations. In this course we will examine and evaluate the principle elements of leadership in the broad context of history, theory, and practice. We will also briefly consider several specific leadership styles, including adaptive, authentic and servant leadership. We will place significant emphasis on developing our professional identity as a means of understanding our ethical responsibilities to clients, courts, opposing counsel, and the legal system as a whole, as well as gaining client/follower trust. We will also apply leadership principles to common situations facing lawyers and other leaders such as decision making in the face of uncertainty or dilemma, resolving toxic or crisis situations, managing risk, enhancing emotional intelligence through active listening, and negotiating based on common interests and with an implementation mindset.
Recent Offerings of this course by this instructor
Lawyering Skills Course
Course Page for Spring 2024 ZPO - Poe-Gavlinski, Ryan
Topic reflects current issues related to law practice and to lawyers’ skills.
Recent Offerings of this course by this instructor
Lawyering Skills for LLMs
Litigation Practicum -Products Liability
Course Page for Fall 2024 Regular - Bruce, Teresa
Many students leave law school feeling like they don't understand how an actual case unfolds from beginning to end. This course is designed to remedy that problem. It features a simulated products-liability lawsuit based on a real case the professor litigated. Each student in the course will represent a party, be paired with opposing counsel, and engage in the same activities that a practicing attorney would engage in from the day the client walks in the door to the eve of trial. Students will gain insight into the substantive law of torts and legal ethics and get experience with some of the following skills (in addition to the skill of legal writing): conducting client interviews, drafting pleadings, engaging in discovery, and arguing motions. They will generate a portfolio, which will include a variety of documents, demonstrating that their writing skills have a wider breadth than just memoranda and briefs.
Local & Municipal Law
Managing Early Years of Practice
Marriage & Divorce module
Course Page for Fall 2022 - Brito, Tonya
This 1-credit module is available for students enrolled in Prof. Brito's Family Law: Marriage & Divorce in same semester. The module entails completing two short (5-page) writing exercises.
Mock Trial (general coaches & scrimmage coaches)
Mock Trial (mock trial scrimmage)
Mock Trial (scrimmage competitors)
Mock Trial Executive Board
Mock Trial Scrimmage (GFE Session)
National Transactional LawMeet
Course Page for Spring 2022 - Nili, Yaron
The National Transactional LawMeet is the premier “moot court” experience for students interested in a transactional practice. The Transactional LawMeet is designed to give law students a hands-on experience in developing and honing transactional lawyering skills, providing each participant a meaningful and engaging simulation of transactional practice. The Transactional LawMeet involves three distinct phases:
1. Students work in teams and prepare a proposed draft agreement based on a fact scenario provided by the Transactional LawMeet.
2. Each team writes mark-ups to draft agreements prepared by the opposing teams they will encounter during the Regional Rounds.
3. Opposing teams negotiate the contours of the deal. Each team will represent one of the two parties to the transaction.
Recent Offerings of this course by this instructor
National Transactional LawMeets
Post-conviction Motion and Brief Writing
Race, Class & Democratic Legitimacy module
Rental Housing Law (AFF Session)
Course Page for Fall 2022 - Mitch,
Rental housing law was primarily viewed as a type of property law involving the transfer of an interest in land. However, as recognized in the seminal Wisconsin cases Pines v. Perssion and Pagelsdorf v. Safeco Ins. Co. of America, rental housing law is now more of a regulated, contractual relationship involving numerous and often conflicting private, and public interests. As rental housing law evolved over the past 60 years, courts built upon common property, contract, and negligence principles, to create complex standards such as the implied warranty of habitability, and many strict administrative regulations were developed. In addition to covering this historical evolution, this course will discuss the issues that contribute to a lack of affordable and safe rental housing and the existence of discrimination in rental housing. The class will cover how Wisconsin regulated, and more recently deregulated rental housing practices. Finally, the course will discuss policies and practical efforts to address the eviction crisis including eviction moratoria during the pandemic and various efforts to establish a right to counsel for renters in eviction cases. This is a 1-credit, mandatory pass/fail, limited enrollment course. Evaluation of students will be based on class participation, regular class attendance, and a final paper that may meet the upper-level writing requirement.
Scrimmage
Scrimmage (GFE Session)
Spanish for Lawyers
Course Page for Spring 2025 ZPO - Cruz, Nancy
Spanish for Lawyers is intended to aid fluent or highly proficient Spanish speakers develop vocabularies to facilitate more effective attorney communications with Spanish-speaking clients who possess limited English proficiency. This course is not intended for law students with beginning or intermediate Spanish language skills. The course is appropriate for law students whose Spanish proficiency is high (can speak and understand at an advanced level, even if not fluent). The course will introduce Spanish legal terminology in such areas as immigration law, criminal law, family law, and administrative law, among others. The emphasis will be on speaking and listening comprehension. Students will also be given coursework assignments, including but not limited to grammar exercises, to assist students with Spanish mastery. Class instruction will be primarily in the Spanish language and will be conducted in person. Finally, the 2-credit course will be graded on a mandatory pass-fail basis.
If you are interested in taking this course, please complete the form located at this URL:
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfUqPcYihG92zE1Mi7WNf_JE3Ej4mWq1NC2msvW8BbZy5ITsg/viewform?usp=sf_link
Substance and Practical Skills
Course Page for Fall 2024 Regular - Edwards, Timothy
This course will explore the substance and practice of electronic discovery. The course will involve substantive instruction, with a strong emphasis on practical skill application through meet and confer strategies, discovery plans, and objective-oriented exercises within the context of a single case.
Credits from this course will go towards the Experiential Learning requirement.
Recent Offerings of this course by this instructor
Technology and Artificial Intelligence in Law Practice
Course Page for Fall 2024 Regular - Turner, Kristopher
This course is designed to introduce students to a wide range of technologies they will use as they begin their legal careers and deepen their understanding of commonly used office technologies, with an emphasis on the development of generative AI tools that enhance productivity and efficiency. The class also examines how a lawyer’s technological competency interacts with marketing, online presence, ethics, client privacy and more.
Weekly instruction will involve short lectures on how legal technology is developing and used in offices, hands-on learning about existing technologies, discussion of AI development in law practice, and guest lectures from legal tech experts.
Students will be expected to complete a series of learning modules outside of class via the NSLT Legal Technology Certification program on common legal technologies topics such as e-discovery, case management and trial practice tools, among others. Students will prepare two presentations for the class on emerging technologies and creating a law firm technology budget.
This class is 3 credits and is a mandatory pass/fail course. The course is open for up to 30 2L or 3L students.
The Constitution & the Right to Appeal
The Lawyer As Strategic Business Advisor
Course Page for Fall 2024 Regular - Simon, David
The legal profession is on the verge of fundamental disruption, particularly as generative AI develops to replace many more routine tasks now performed by lawyers. Robot-lawyers will never replace strategic, trusted business advisors, however. Law schools and law firms have done little to prepare new lawyers to fill this role and to become trusted strategic advisors to business leaders. This course attempts to fill that void and to provide the tools necessary to succeed in the corporate legal practice of the future. Foley & Lardner partner and University of Oxford MBA graduate David Simon brings together years of practice as a strategic advisor to corporate clients and recent business school learnings in this practical, real-world, interactive seminar.
USPTO Competition
Course Page for Spring 2024 ZPO - von Simson, Charles
Recent Offerings of this course by this instructor
WI Constitution module
Watergate
Course Page for Fall 2023 AGG - Kelly, Kevin
This Watergate class is for one credit. Given the untimely death of Prof. Frank Tuerkheimer, who was going to teach the course, the format and nature of the course is being adjusted.
A fifteen-page paper will be due on November 9th. Paper topics should be cleared through Associate Dean Kelly.
The Watergate scandal remains the greatest scandal in U.S. History, covering the period from late 1971 until a verdict in the Watergate trial in January 1975. That period saw the only time in U.S. history that the threat of viable impeachment and removal caused a President to resign. This is all the more remarkable since the President was re-elected in 1972 carrying all but one state.
The Watergate story can be approached in many ways. This course, going through the Watergate story chronologically, inevitably focuses on how various institutions were tested -- the Senate, the House of Representatives, the Courts, the prosecution including the Grand Jury, and the press. Where appropriate, videos dealing with major events during this unique period in American history will be used.
Readings in the course are a little unusual. Instead of cases, two books constitute the core of the readings, to be supplemented by less than half a dozen cases. It is strongly recommended that those enrolling in the class make these two books their summer reading, virtually eliminating assigned readings during the class. The two books are:
John Dean's Blind Ambition; and
Woodward and Bernstein's The Final Days.
from Pre-filing through Appeal
Course Page for Spring 2025 ZPO - Edwards, Timothy
Litigation Process: from Pre-Filing through Appeal. This class will introduce students to litigation strategy, from pre-filing through to the final appeal, all based on one case. Students will litigate the case through trial in the first semester. Then, in the second semester, interested students available to continue with the course will try the case and manage a subsequent appeal based on a record that they create through discovery and strategic lawyering. The goal of this "two-semester" class is to give students the opportunity to participate in the evolution of a case, from beginning to end, by developing sound judgment, applying the rules to generate results, and managing litigation in a proactive, ethical fashion.