One L’s Face-Off in Civ Pro

April 20, 2007

In a creative way to understand how the civil procedure rules work in real life, the entire first-year day class has participated in a semester-long simulation litigation project in their Civil Procedure: Rules classes. Developed by Professor Angela Upchurch, and refined by Professor Susan Gilles, the project culminated in an oral argument on a joinder issue presented by a “firm” from each class before a panel of judges and all of their classmates.

In a mock lawsuit, Chris Robbins v. Fred Reckless, Section A represented the defendant, Fred Reckless and Section B represented the plaintiff, Chris Robbins. The students have “litigated” several stages of the lawsuit: interviewing their clients; filing complaints and answers; preparing discovery logs; critiquing a deposition of Mr. Reckless (a New Jersey truck driver ably played by Professor Jim Beattie); and finally briefing and arguing a joinder motion. Using TWEN (The West Education Network), an online classroom resource, the students have been “serving” opposing counsel and “filing” their motions and briefs. The project has allowed students to realize that in litigation, the procedural rules constantly interact with substantive law, strategic considerations, and lawyers’ ethical obligations.

“It’s been exciting to see the students’ enthusiasm,” said Gilles. “The students consistently did a great job and developed a real sense of responsibility for their client. The project also built community among the first-year class, and a sense of competitiveness between the two sections.”

Each class broke into groups (“firms”) of four to five students and in their final class project, the entire first-year class came together to hear the firm of Capital & Associates (a firm from Section B) and Buntage & Colangikoczy (firm from Section A) present oral argument based on a defense motion to implead a third party.

Renee Colangeli, who argued on behalf of her client, Fred Reckless, said about the class: “Being able to apply facts of a case to the rules we have studied in civil procedure helped me to better understand their meaning and know when to apply them. Speaking in front of the other first-year day students was extremely hard, but gave me great experience. This class project forced me to use the skills I learned from both the Moot Court competition and the laws which we have studied in class. It was a nice break from the normal classroom routine.”

Upchurch also expressed her excitement about the active learning that took place among the students. “The class was very engaged and they drove the learning process,” she said. "As the professor, you had to be prepared to instruct each day on a variety of issues because students were presented with a number of options in their lawsuit and they decided which direction to take."