Environmental Law Advocacy I

Environmental Law Advocacy I - Professor Craig Johnston

• Course Number: LAW-594
• Course Type: Experiential
• Credits: 3
• Enrollment Limit: Determined by the Registrar
• Description: This class centers on a moot court experience, but includes more than that. During the first four or five weeks, each student will write a brief on an environmental problem. There will also be classroom sessions focusing on both brief-writing and oral advocacy. Over approximately the next three weeks, the students will engage in six rounds of argument. The first three of these arguments are practice rounds and the next three are competition rounds.

After the six rounds of argument are over, the top three advocates (based on both the brief and the arguments) will be offered the chance to participate on our national team for the Pace Environmental Moot Court Competition. Alternatively, any of these three students may choose to participate in the national animial law moot court competition. We will also identify four other advocates, who will have the chance to accept any unclaimed spots on either team (unclaimed spots on the Pace team, if any, will be offered based upon each student’s rank in the in-school competition). We also will name alternates, in case any of the top seven advocates decline a spot in either competition.. From that point forward, the students who are each national team (we will have two two-person teams in the animal law competition) will write team briefs for their respective competitions, and then, during the spring semester, compete in the oral portion of the competitions. Everyone else will rewrite the brief they wrote for the in-school competition, based on the comments they have received both on the brief they first submitted and during the course of the practice and competition rounds.

This course is graded. Students who re-write their briefs can use those re-written briefs to satisfy either one of our upper-level writing requirements.

• Prerequisite: none
• Evaluation Method: Oral argument and re-written brief
• Capstone: yes
• WIE: yes