Experiential Requirement

This capstone course builds skills and knowledge needed to advise early-stage businesses. The course discusses diverse legal and business topics faced by start-up lawyers such as business formation, intellectual property, legal ethics, employment law, financing the enterprise, operational contracts, reading financial statements, online commerce law, risk management, and exit strategies. The course is not meant to replace the core courses in these areas but addressees their particular application to the start-up arena.

This capstone course builds skills and knowledge needed to advise early-stage businesses. The course discusses diverse legal and business topics faced by start-up lawyers such as business formation, intellectual property, legal ethics, employment law, financing the enterprise, operational contracts, reading financial statements, online commerce law, risk management, and exit strategies. The course is not meant to replace the core courses in these areas but addressees their particular application to the start-up arena.

Building upon first year concepts, including those covered in Evidence, Criminal Procedure, and Criminal Law, students will study criminal case law and statutes, with a focus on federal law in general and white collar crime in particular. Students will also study various procedural aspects of criminal investigation, such as Fifth Amendment and grand jury issues. Finally, students will also cover some basic common law principles, such as inchoate offenses and theft crimes. Students will complete oral simulations of proceedings that occur during criminal investigations and prosecutions.

The course introduces the student - in context of theory, simulated practice, and models of professionalism - to selected topics in the law of the contemporary workplace. Although much emphasis will be placed on traditional labor-management relations, the course offers a working knowledge of the essential language, issues, rules, and strategies found across a wide range of employment law practice including wrongful termination, status discrimination, privacy, wages and hours, alternative dispute resolution, international labor standards, and federal preemption.

This course will provide both narrative and experiential/inter-active instruction on contract drafting and analysis/review skills for those students interested in a transactional practice. There will be a particular emphasis on drafting entertainment industry contracts (i.e., commonly used clauses and concepts in the TV and Motion Picture industries); however, the skills and techniques taught will also apply generally to contract drafting regardless of industry.

The goal of this course is to provide an opportunity for students to learn the basic courtroom skills necessary to have immediate success as a civil litigator. Each class session will focus on the skills used before, during and after any court appearance. Students will learn everything from how to file pleadings through getting the Judge's signature on a proposed order. The heart of this course is an understanding of courtroom procedure - evidenced through both simulations and a visit to a courtroom to view typical examples of law and motion.

This hands-on course provides students a unique opportunity to learn evidence through practical in-court simulations. The course will expose students to complex evidence issues raised by the Federal Rules of Evidence and, where appropriate, the California Evidence Code. During the simulations, students will act as opposing lawyers, witnesses, and judges, and argue for the admission or exclusion of particular pieces of evidence. Prerequisite: Evidence (140).

This skills course is designed for students interested in learning about a career in the criminal law field from a practical perspective. Students will be taught how to read charging documents, evaluate police reports, and argue some of the most common pretrial motions. Students will have an opportunity to participate in simulations using real life cases.

This highly interactive course provides students the opportunity to refine their oral advocacy skills. Through the use of simulated exercises, the course provides instruction on verbal and nonverbal communication techniques to present powerful, compelling oral arguments, and to strategically design effective presentations to motivate and influence audiences of all kinds. Students will also develop techniques to implement communication strategies, including Psychodrama, Neuro-Linguistic Programming, and audience analysis.

This course provides an introduction to patent application drafting techniques for students interested in pursuing patent law as a career. Students are afforded the opportunity to prepare an entire patent application. Although an overview of statutory requirements is included in this course, prior exposure to patent law is considered helpful.