Choose Your Path
Choose Your Path
We prepare students to thrive in many practice areas, from business and corporate law to public policy and criminal and civil litigation. Given the range of possibilities, our holistic approach helps you discern the academic path that best fits your interests, skills, and ambitions. What follows is some advice to keep in mind as you craft your own course of study.
A Holistic Approach to Your Course of Study
One way of thinking about your choices is through the metaphor of a tree: Your first-year foundational courses represent a flourishing root system, your core group of upper-level courses in several areas forms a solid trunk, and more specialized courses branch out from the sturdy trunk.
This is only one example of a course of study鈥攜ou can construct many other paths.聽
Course Selection Tips
Create a foundation聽of knowledge by taking introductory courses in a number of core areas, including:
- Administrative law
- Business law
- Criminal law and criminal procedure
- Environmental law and land use
- Evidence
- Family law
- International law
- Intellectual property
- Labor and employment law
- Tax
Develop specialized knowledge聽by taking a reasonable concentration of courses in one or two areas that interest you.
Diversify your perspective聽with a range of courses鈥攖o broaden your capabilities and satisfy the Perspectives on Justice and the Law requirement.
Continue strengthening your research and writing skills聽through clinics, the ABA Upper-Level Writing course, and other opportunities.
Sharpen your practical skills聽by taking clinical courses, externships, and other experiential courses.
Fulfill course requirements for graduation and admission to the bar, including a course on Professional Responsibility.
Focus on the Bar Exam
Be sure to discuss your course selections with your advisors, current professors, and professors with expertise in areas that interest you. You should also check what subjects are tested on the Multistate Bar Examination and individual state bar exams. Most jurisdictions also mandate completion of the Multistate Professional Responsibility Examination as a prerequisite for taking a bar exam and being admitted to practice law. Some jurisdictions also limit the number of clinical or co-curricular credits that may be applied toward a law degree.聽
Find information about bar admission requirements:
Planning Your Course of Study
- We offer most courses in one section each year.
- We usually offer required courses in three or more sections each year.聽 While many courses satisfy the Upper-Level Writing or Lawyering Skills requirement, some courses focus specifically on Advanced Legal Writing or Advanced Legal Research. We offer multiple sections of these courses each semester.
- We offer other select courses in three sections each year because they attract such large numbers of students. Typically, these courses are Corporations and Evidence.
- We offer select courses in two sections each year because they attract such large numbers of students. These typically include Administrative Law, IP Survey, Criminal Procedure, Secured Transactions, Tax I, Trusts and Estates, Mediation, and Dispute Negotiation.
- We offer some specialized or advanced courses once every two years because they appeal to smaller numbers of students.
- Courses usually offered in academic years ending with an even number:
- American Indian Law
- Art of Lawyering and the Commercial Lease
- Death Penalty Seminar
- Environmental Law: Clean Water Act
- Mental Health and the Law
- Courses usually offered in academic years ending with an odd number:
- Admiralty Law
- Compliance and Performance Counseling
- Conducting Internal Investigations
- Food and Drug Law
- International Arbitration
- Patent Litigation
- Prosecutorial Ethics
- Seminar on Law and Higher Education
- White Collar Crime
- Courses usually offered in academic years ending with an even number:
Also note that we develop new courses and cease offering others as legal, social, and economic developments warrant.