LAW 5929: Legal Services Practicum - 2164

Legal Services Practicum
Class Term:
Spring Term 2015-2016
Catalog Number:
5929
Class Number:
13886
Class Schedule:
Thursday
4:30 pm
6:20 pm
Room:
LAW 121
Professor(s):
Type:
Practicum
Credits:
4 (2 Contact, 0 Field)
Graduation Requirements:
Professional Skills
Priority:
Limited Enrollment - 3rd Year Priority
Full Year Course:
No
Category:
Standard Courses

Additional Information

This course offers students a great opportunity to help indigent clients and to learn important legal skills under the close supervision of experienced attorneys at Neighborhood Legal Services Association. Students will work on cases involving poverty law issues such as eviction, expungement of criminal records and a few student opportunities will be available for handling protection from abuse cases.
The classroom component will focus on various substantive and procedural poverty law issues, on ethical considerations, and on legal skills — such as interviewing, counseling, fact-gathering, legal analysis, negotiation, research, drafting, and litigation — critical to legal practice. Classroom assignments will include simulation exercises and preparing a monthly journal.
The field component will focus on advising and representing indigent clients at District Judge hearings in landlord tenant cases and preparing and presenting expungement petitions in Common Pleas Court. Students may also present motions in Motions Court. A few students will assist staff attorneys with Protection from Abuse cases. Field assignments will be available in Pittsburgh.
All students will be required to participate in a morning site visit to NLSA’s Pittsburgh office on Saturday, January 4 [this will be one of the scheduled classes] for additional substantive training. Office procedures and case assignment processes will be reviewed. This is an excellent opportunity for students to gain experience in advising and representing clients and in working with other students and attorneys to resolve legal issues through negotiation.
Most students will be able to complete the field component before final exams.
Any interested student should send a copy of his/her resume, along with his/her first and second choices for a field assignment, to Ed Stevenson at Neighborhood Legal Services Association, 928 Penn Avenue, Pittsburgh, PA 15222, fax to 412-355-0168 or email to stevensone@nlsa.us.
For more information, please call Ed Stevenson at 412-255-6700, ext. 6156.
An optional two-credit externship at the legal services program may follow successful completion of the course.

Grading Details

Honors/Pass/Fail Grade: based upon performance in the classroom component and upon performance in providing legal services to indigent clients. No final exam.

Description

This course offers students a great opportunity to help indigent clients and to learn important lawyering skills under the close supervision of an experienced attorney at Neighborhood Legal Services Association or Laurel Legal Services. Students will work on cases involving poverty law issues such as eviction, expungement of criminal records and a few student opportunities will be available for handling protection from abuse cases and for assisting individual debtors in simple Chapter 7 bankruptcy cases in a pro se clinic. The classroom component will focus on various substantive and procedural poverty law issues, on ethical considerations, and on lawyering skills — such as interviewing, counseling, fact-gathering, legal analysis, negotiation, research, drafting, and litigation — critical to many types of legal practice. Classroom assignments will include simulation exercises and preparing a monthly journal. The field component will focus on advising and representing indigent clients. Field assignments will be available in Pittsburgh, Bridgeville, New Castle, and Butler. This is an excellent opportunity for students to gain experience in the county where they live or hope to practice. Most field assignments will include courtroom experience, and most students will be able to complete the field component before final exams. Every attempt will be made to schedule the field assignment at times convenient to the student.

PA Practice Practicum