Legal research and writing are essential components of any healthy law practice. Finding useful sources of law and translating that research into effective writing are critical skills of lawyers. If these statements are true, why are legal research and writing courses often limited to the first-year curriculum? If legal research and writing permeate every facet of law practice, shouldn’t these skills be intertwined throughout the curriculum, including in casebook and upper level courses? Is the lack of curricular integration of legal research and writing a symptom of the hierarchical structure of the legal academy, often placing LRW faculty and law librarians at the bottom of the totem pole? In what ways have you worked with your faculty colleagues to challenge the “separate but equal” status of legal research and writing in the classroom and in the larger context of the legal academy? What are the tools that are most effective when breaking down barriers of separation to provide students with a quality legal education? How have you struggled and overcome hierarchical structures that negatively impact you as a legal writing professor or law librarian?
We invite you to join us on Friday, December 6, 2019, when we address these questions and more during our one-day LWI Workshop, “Dismantling the Separate but Equal Paradigm: Integrating Legal Research and Writing into the Law School Curriculum.”
The complete program of speakers and topics may be accessed here. Registration for this event is required by December 2, 2019.