Curriculum Guide · Courses

Professor Jayasuriya

J.D. Course 301 | 2 credit hours

In this course, students will learn the concepts and skills needed to create a research plan for both legal scholarship and legal practice. Scholarly research often goes beyond traditional legal research. This course focuses on methods for research across a range of disciplines and sources. The focus throughout is on learning methods that can be applied in any research situation, although specific sources are used as illustrations.

This course will provide in-depth coverage of the full range of legal research material including: case law; court rules; state and federal legislation and legislative history; state and federal regulations and regulatory history; agency decisions; legal periodicals; and other topics related to legal scholarship.

In order to examine the unique issues of research for legal scholarship, students will learn how to pick a topic for a scholarly legal paper. The course focuses not only on finding answers to research questions, but also on using cost-effective and efficient research techniques.

Throughout the semester students will complete research assignments and keep a research journal. Students will also create an annotated bibliography for a topic approved by the professor. The bibliography may be used to write a concurrent seminar paper or a journal note.

Grading will be based on course assignments and a special requirement or the annotated bibliography.

Students may not receive credit for both this course and Law Firm Research Seminar or Legal Research Skills for Practice or Advanced Legal Research.