WESTERN STATE UNIVERSITY COLLEGE OF LAW

Western State University College of Law is a practice-oriented law school, with courses that emphasize the development of lawyering skills. Professional Skills I and II form the core for the professional skills curriculum and are required for all students. Class sizes are limited to 15 students. Like all first-year courses at WSU, Professional Skills courses are graded and are worth three credits.

Over the past two years, the faculty has made substantial improvements to the Professional Skills Program. The Professional Skills Program is now organized and administered under a Director/Assistant Director Model, with adjunct instructors teaching individual classes. In 2005, the faculty appointed Professor Marc McAllister as the tenure-track Director of Professional Skills. Before coming to Western State, Professor McAllister served as a law clerk for a United States Circuit Court of Appeals judge and practiced as a litigator at a large law firm. WSU also recently hired a full-time, non-tenure track Assistant Director.

The Director has compiled a core group of adjunct instructors, all of whom have taught legal writing and research in the past. The Director and Assistant Director have implemented an extensive training program for adjuncts. Training workshops consist of techniques for implementing learning theories in the classroom, grading calibration exercises, instruction on implementing technology into the legal writing curriculum, and techniques for teaching a diverse student body (WSU’s student body is consistently ranked among the most diverse in the nation).

The Professional Skills Program teaches the foundational skills of legal research, case synthesis, legal and factual analysis, citation, and objective and persuasive legal writing. The courses comport with the “process-oriented” approach to writing instruction, teaching legal writing in stages reflecting the writing processes employed by experts. These courses also fully integrate research and writing instruction. The process-oriented approach enhances student learning by providing opportunity for instruction at each stage of the writing process, and by providing for immediate application of all research instruction.

All assignments in Professional Skills are original and are based on current legal issues. Professional Skills I includes four major writing assignments, which each increase in difficulty from the previous assignment. The first assignment uses only one precedent case. The second assignment increases in complexity by requiring application of several additional precedent cases. The final two assignments add the component of open research.

In Professional Skills II, students learn the art of advocacy, both oral and written. In this course, students write two major appellate briefs and engage in oral arguments. The brief assignments involve multiple drafts and increase in complexity from prior assignments. The semester culminates in a moot court competition in which all Professional Skills students argue before a panel of local judges, professors, and practicing attorneys.

Upper-level students are required to take six units of Advanced Professional Skills courses and must satisfy WSU’s Upper-Level Writing Requirement. The Advanced courses include those offering live-client experiences. Members of the local bench or highly-skilled trial lawyers teach these courses. Many students fulfill the Upper-Level Writing Requirement through WSU’s extensive judicial, criminal, and civil externship programs.