Legal Research and Writing Program

Capital University Law School's required first-year course in Legal Research and Writing provides students with an integrated approach to developing the essential skills of legal research, legal analysis, and legal writing. Students earn four credit hours over the year-long course and are taught in small sections of approximately thirty students.

With its location in an urban area with a large legal community, the Law School has been successful in attracting quality legal writing faculty who have excellent academic credentials and varied practice experiences. Students develop research and analysis skills in the context of writing both predictive and persuasive documents. After completing the Law School's comprehensive course, students have been eminently successful in applying their skills in both private and public sector employment settings.

The Law School has further enhanced its legal research and writing program with the addition of a third year legal writing requirement. In addition to completing the comprehensive first year Legal Research and Writing course, and writing a scholarly article of publishable quality, students are now required to complete a Legal Drafting course in their final year of law school. This course reinforces and expands on the writing skills that students gained in their first year course. It also introduces students to the principles of drafting some common transactional documents. Students are asked to write a new document nearly every week of the semester. They are guided by one-on-one feedback from their Drafting Course Instructor. This course will be the capstone writing experience for Capital's students and will position them well as they embark on their legal careers.

For more information, contact Professor Janet George Blocher, director of the legal research and writing program.