All students must complete at least one rigorous extended piece of legal writing (in addition to those in RWA). The Upper Level Writing Requirement requires each student to demonstrate his or her ability to apply each of these skills in producing one substantial, cohesive piece of legal writing prior to graduating from law school.
Each student is required to take at least one course from selections designated by the Law Faculty or the Curriculum Committee which are grounded in jurisprudential, historical, and public policy concepts.
The ELR consists of three components:
1. the law school’s existing five-credit hour, required Lawyering Skills sequence;
2. one of the law school’s one-credit hour required upper-level specialized legal research courses;
3. at least three credit hours in the law school’s legal clinic, externship, or practica programs
The requirement is satisfied by either Advanced Legal Research or Specialized Legal Research. Students may only take one upper-level research course.
Full-time students with a cumulative GPA of 2.8 or lower after two regular semesters (fall and spring) or part-time students with a cumulative GPA of 2.8 or lower after three regular semesters (fall and spring) must enroll in and pass the Advanced Bar Preparation Skills course and the Writing for the Bar Exam course in addition to the Introduction to Bar Preparation Skills course.
In order to graduate, students matriculating at the law school after July 1, 2020 who are full-time students with a cumulative GPA of 2.8 or lower after two regular semesters (fall and spring) or part-time students with a cumulative GPA of 2.8 or lower after three regular semesters (fall and spring) must enroll in and pass all Uniform Bar Exam tested courses.