Curriculum Guide · Courses

Professor Colleen Shanahan

J.D. Clinic 627 | 10 credit hours

The Community Justice Project will open the Fall of 2010. This clinic is designed to offer students an opportunity not only to represent at least one client in a case from beginning to end but also to participate in a larger case in which they will use a broad range of problem solving skills. The cases will come from community sources and their subject matter will change based on community need. The subject matter for the cases include handling HIV cases for incarcerated persons, working on legal problems for “homecomers” who are re-entering society after a period of incarceration, and representing allegedly mentally ill people in civil commitment proceedings. The clinic will also take, as a part of its case load, non-traditional cases, matters which challenge our traditional notions of lawyering because there is no obvious litigation strategy that will “solve” the problem. Such cases provide a platform for students to think strategically about the project of justice. The Clinic will provide students with training and practice in many lawyering skills, will assist them in reflecting on what it means to have a client who is looking for a lawyer to provide and communicate about desired legal services, and will stimulate thinking broadly about the myriad ways to effect change within the legal system.

The Community Justice Project will cut across many subject matters areas. Students in this clinic will use multiple tactics to achieve client objectives, including advocacy, public relations, the use of media, lobbying, legislative and policy drafting and community organizing. The clinic embraces a focused and explicit use of clinical education to enhance the students’ commitment to social justice. In short, in addition to specific traditional legal skills, the Community Justice Project will teach students about the commitment that will sustain and energize people over the long haul, the tactics that can produce success in particular cases, and the sense of strategy that looks to long-term (perhaps very long-term) success and participation in a protracted struggle for justice.

See clinic course description in the Online Curriculum Guide or the "Clinic Enrollment Policies" in the Bulletin.

A student may only en¬roll in Advanced Evidence: Trial Skills; Civil Litigation Practice; Patent Trial Practice; Trial Practice and Applied Evidence; Trial Practice: Working with Expert Witnesses; or any section of Trial Practice during a semester prior to enrolling for credit in the Center for Applied Legal Studies, Community Justice Project, Criminal Defense and Prisoner Advocacy, Criminal Justice, Domestic Violence, Juvenile Justice, or Law Stu¬dents in Court Clinics. Students may not take Advanced Evidence: Trial Skills; Civil Litigation Practice; Patent Trial Practice; Trial Practice and Applied Evidence; Trial Practice: Working with Expert Witnesses; or any section of Trial Practice during the same semester or a subsequent semester in which they enroll in the Center for Applied Legal Studies, Community Justice Project, Criminal Defense and Prisoner Advocacy, Criminal Justice, Domestic Violence, Juvenile Justice, or Law Stu¬dents in Court Clinics. Students may not concurrently enroll in this clinic and an externship or a practicum course.