Courses and Curriculum

Course Number: 6120
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Fall
Required: Yes
Prerequisites: None
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: Property I first addresses the rights that come with property ownership, then considers limitations on those rights by private agreement (covenants and easements) and by governmental regulation.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: Lecture and class discussion.
Written Assignments: None
Type of Exam: Open-book final exam at the end of the semester.
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Exam and class participation.

Course Number: 6240
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Fall
Required: Yes
Prerequisites: None
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: A study of modern practice in civil cases under Rules of Civil Procedure and other sources of procedural law. Civil Procedure I and its continuation, Civil Procedure II, cover all aspects of jurisdiction and other issues bearing on what court(s) may hear a case; choice of state or federal law; pleading; joinder of claims and parties; class actions; discovery and other pre-trial procedures; summary judgment; nonjury and jury trials; appeals; and claim and issue preclusion.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: Socratic dialogue and lecture
Written Assignments: No
Type of Exam: Three hour, all essay final exam, open book, students can bring the textbook, statutory supplement and extra cases, articles and print outs of course materials into the exam room. No Internet access.
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Final exam (85%) and class participation (15%).

Course Number: 6160
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Fall
Required: Yes
Prerequisites: None
Recommended Courses: None
Course Overview: In this course students are introduced to the fundamentals of legal reasoning and analysis and the basics of predictive legal writing.
Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: This course includes four general components: classroom instruction, assigned readings, out-of-class research and writing assignments based on mock legal problems, and individual teacher/student conferences.
Written Assignments: Students are required to complete 2-3 writing assignments during the semester.
Type of Exam: There is no exam.
Basis for Grading Student Performance: The grade for the course is based on the student's performance on the writing assignments.

Course Number: 6165
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 1
Semester Offered: Fall
Required: Yes
Prerequisites: None
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: Introduction to paper and electronic resources that cover primary and secondary legal materials, including case law, statutes, agency regulations for federal and state jurisdictions, and treatises, journals, Restatements, and other secondary sources. The class discusses research plans and develops brief research strategies for hypothetical situations.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: One hour per week in-class instruction, introduction to new legal resources and questions and answer period regarding hypotheticals.
Written Assignments: Weekly short answer assignments, research journals, and final in-library quizzes.
Type of Exam: Two in-library research quizzes.
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Combination of graded weekly assignments, in-library quizzes, and class participation.

Course Number: 6130
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 4
Semester Offered: Fall
Required: Yes
Prerequisites: None
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: A study of the methods and policies for allocating risks of harm; intentionally inflicted harms; negligence in its general aspects and its application to products liability, landowners, and automobile traffic; emotional harms; defamation; and fraud.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: 4 credit mandatory examination course
Written Assignments: None
Type of Exam: Closed book mid-term and open book final exam.
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Closed book mid-term and open book final exam intended to measure each student's knowledge, understanding of substantive law, analytical ability, and competence to write intelligently, competently, and persuasively. Class participation may be considered as well and completion of all assigned Computer Aided Legal Instruction (CALI) exercises

Course Number: 6220
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 2
Semester Offered: Spring
Required: Yes
Prerequisites: Property I
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: Property II first covers acquisition and transfer of ownership rights in property. The rest of the semester deals with sharing ownership rights over time, including estates, future interests, concurrent estates, and landlord-tenant relationships.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: Lecture
Written Assignments: None
Type of Exam: Long-answer essay exam at the end of the semester. You may use notes, outlines, books, and any other written resources you bring with you to the exam.
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Exam and class participation

Course Number: 6340
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 2
Semester Offered: Spring
Required: Yes
Prerequisites: Civil Procedure I
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: This practical bar course continues the introduction to civil litigation that began in Civil Procedure I. Civil Procedure II covers case management, discovery, motions relating to judgment space, jury and nonjury trials, appeals, and claim and issue preclusion.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: Class lecture and discussion, problem-solving, exam
Written Assignments: Short, discovery assignment
Type of Exam: Essay, short answer, and multiple choice
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Exam, participation, discovery assignment, mid-term

Course Number: 6260
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 2
Semester Offered: Spring
Required: Yes
Prerequisites: None
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: This course builds on the first semester Legal Writing I course by introducing students to: (1) more sophisticated aspects of legal reasoning and analysis; (2) more sophisticated aspects of legal research; (3) the basics of persuasive legal writing; (4) the basics of appellate procedure and/or trial-level motions procedure; (5) the basic parts of an appellate brief and/or a trial brief; (6) the basics of oral advocacy; and (7) ethics and professionalism in brief writing and oral advocacy.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.

Course Number: 6140
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Spring
Required: Yes
Prerequisites: None
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: After a brief overview of the sources of criminal law and the purposes of criminal punishment, this course will consider the constituent parts of criminal conduct, including act (or omission), culpable mental state, result, and causation. These general principles then will be brought to bear on a specific area of the criminal law: homicide. The course also will consider common defenses to criminal charges, including self-defense, necessity, duress, insanity, and intoxication. Finally, the course will consider liability for attempted crimes and for crimes committed by others. Throughout the course, students will be required to consider the constitutional limits of the criminal law and the relationship of substantive principles to practice.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: Roughly two-thirds of the class sessions will be devoted to traditional Socratic dialogue, in which students will be called upon to analyze real and hypothetical cases and statutes. The remaining class sessions will be devoted to problems, in which the class as a whole will develop an appropriate response to a detailed problem of the sort that lawyers confront in the practice of criminal law.
Written Assignments: None, apart from final exam.
Type of Exam: Combination of essay and short-answer questions.
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Final exam; classroom participation.

Course Number: 6250
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Spring
Required: Yes
Prerequisites: None
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: Constitutional Law I is divided into two parts. Part I focuses on governmental structures. Part II begins our coverage of individual rights and liberties. Part I's coverage includes the power of judicial review, separation of powers, federalism, and congressional powers. Part II focuses on freedom of expression.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Type of Exam: Open book; half essay, half multiple choice.
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Final Exam

Course Number: 6920
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Fall & Spring
Required: No
Prerequisites: Legal Research & Writing
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: This course is designed to reinforce the legal research skills learned in the first year course and to expand those skills in both breadth and depth. The course includes targeted research into legislative histories, administrative histories, online resources search optimization, and law office technology.  The course also explores practice materials, business, ethics, and international law resources, and technology efficiency tools.

Course Materials: Materials are provided.
Course Format: Lecture, hands-on research, discussion.  The class meets twice a week in 80-minute sessions for thirteen weeks plus one outside of class face-to-face session.
Written Assignments: 4 graded assignments and various ungraded assignments that count toward participation points.
Type of Exam: None
Basis for Grading Student Performance: graded assignments: 20% each; class participation 20%.
Other Comments: Enrollment in Advanced Legal Research is limited to 15 students. Students will be enrolled in order of pre-registration, or at the professor's discretion. Once the class is full, interested students have the option to join a wait list.  

The combination of assignments for this course meet the Principles and Standards for Legal Research Competency outlined by the American Association of Law Libraries and the ABA Standards and Rules for Procedure for Law Schools, Standard 302.

Course Number: 6925
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Spring
Required: No
Prerequisites: LAW 6160 and LAW 6260, and completion of first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: Advanced Persuasive Writing is a graded three-hour course. This course covers advanced strategies in persuasive writing and builds on the introductory persuasive writing instruction provided in the Appellate Advocacy. The course approaches persuasive writing from a theoretical as well as a practical standpoint. In terms of a theoretical perspective, the course covers persuasive writing strategies that are expressly based on theoretical principles of other disciplines, such as literary theory, classical rhetoric theory, and psychology theory. A tremendous amount of research and scholarship has been undertaken in these and other disciplines regarding aspects of human nature that are important in understanding the process of persuasion. Accordingly, lawyers as persuasive writers have much to learn from these disciplines. The strategies covered in this course are based on some of the theoretical principles reflected in the work of these disciplines.

From a practical standpoint, the strategies covered are concrete and relevant to the practice of law. That is, although the course covers the theoretical principles underlying the strategies, the course is not exclusively theoretical. The strategies generated from these principles are specific and concrete, and directly applicable to the day-to-day writing of practicing lawyers. Thus, the course combines theory with practicality.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Written Assignments: Your final grade in this course will be based on several graded short writing assignments. Some of these graded writing assignments will be Group Assignments that will be completed by groups of 2 to 4 students. Other assignments will be Individual Assignments that will be completed by students working on their own.
Other Comments: This course may be used for experiential learning credit.

Course Number: 6993
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Spring
Required: No
Prerequisites: Trusts & Estates
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: This course is a continuation of Trusts & Estates.  It primarily focuses on topics related to the law of trusts, including fiduciary administration, modification, termination, and alienation of trusts; charitable trusts; and issues of trust interpretation and construction.  Other topics may be covered as time permits.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: Lectures cover topics included in assigned readings.  Students are expected to be prepared to discuss the assigned readings.
Written Assignments: None
Type of Exam: Final Exam
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Final Exam

Course Number: 6991
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Varies
Required: No
Prerequisites: Law students must have completed their first year of law school. Non-law graduate students are welcomed without prerequisites.
Recommended Courses: Water Law & Policy

Course Overview:

The Colorado River has long been hailed as “America’s Nile”—and for good reason. Encompassing territory within two nation-states (Mexico and the United States), seven U.S. states (Arizona, California, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, Utah, and Wyoming), and twenty-nine reservations on which thirty Native nations reside, management of the river’s life-giving flows is a proverbial jigsaw puzzle. It is no surprise that the Colorado River Basin is commonly regarded as the most “institutionally encompassed” basin in the world. Governing the river’s management is a labyrinthine body of laws and policies that has amassed for more than a century and is colloquially referred to as the “Law of the River.” Analogous to a river trip, this seminar is essentially a journey through the Law of the River—its legal history, current doctrinal composition, and cutting-edge issues implicated in its evolution. All readings and lectures have been carefully curated to this end. While gaining basic familiarity with the Colorado River Basin and the Law of the River, students will invest the lion’s share of their energy in the seminar into papers addressing self-selected topics for which extensive feedback will be provided by peers and the instructor. In this way, the seminar is an excellent option for satisfying the College of Law’s Advanced Writing Requirement. Beyond the classroom, an option field trip will be organized to a nearby portion of the Colorado River Basin.

Course Materials: No textbook. All reading materials will be posted on the course website.
Course Format: Seminar-style class discussions and writing workshops.
Written Assignments: Research paper
Type of Exam: None
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Research paper, short quiz, and class participation.

Course Number: 6990
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Varies
Required: No
Prerequisites: Law students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: Water Law & Policy, Federal Indian Law

Course Overview: Advanced Water Law & Policy is a paper-based seminar that enables law and non-law graduate students to complete research projects on self-selected topics in the fields of domestic, international, and comparative water law and policy. The Native Waters version of this seminar focuses on Native nations and their legal and political relations over water with their co-sovereigns, the United States and the states, within the U.S. portion of North America. Beginning with the foundational concepts of tribal sovereignty and the federal-tribal trust relationship, the seminar turns from this core material to the Winters doctrine, surveying not only the Winters decision itself, but also a host of subsequent jurisprudence and positive law addressing tribal water rights (reserved rights), such as adjudicatory jurisdiction, quantification methods, treatment of groundwater, allotment and derivative individual water rights, and federal conflicts of interest and breach of trust actions. Not to be overlooked, the primary instruments for resolving tribal water rights claims in modern times, negotiated settlements, will also be discussed. Finally, as a complement to the preceding material, the seminar will draw to a close with an examination of contemporary tribal water management, which will include a field trip to the Wind River Reservation. Because of its research- and writing-intensive format, this seminar is an excellent option for satisfying the College of Law’s Advanced Writing Requirement.

Course Materials: No textbook. All reading materials will be posted on the course website.
Course Format: Seminar-style class discussions and writing workshops, and field trip.
Written Assignments: Research paper
Type of Exam: None
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Research paper, short quiz, and class participation.

Course Number: 6915

Credit Hour & Credit Type: 3

Semester Offered: Fall

Required: No

Prerequisites: Student must have completed their first year of law school.

Recommended Courses: N/A

Course Overview: This course covers the fundamental legal principles governing agency relationships and unincorporated business associations. Among the topics covered include the creation of an agency relationship and the legal effects of agency and fiduciary relationships; the formation, operation, and dissolution of partnerships (including general partnerships, limited partnerships, and other types of partnerships) and limited liability companies; and the distribution of powers among the owners and managers of such organizations; and the relative advantages and disadvantages of various organizational forms.

Course Materials: Casebook

Course Format: Lecture

Written Assignments: Franchise agreement drafting

Type of Exam: written, during exam period

Basis for grading student performance: Final exam and class participation

Other comments: Students who have taken Business Organizations may not take this course

Course Number: 6500
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Fall
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: The course includes study of how various types of laws apply to agriculture, especially focusing on legal rules unique to agriculture.  Subjects include contracts, secured transactions, bankruptcy, mortgages and installment contracts, cooperatives, tort liability, employment, farmland protection, estate tax, water law, environmental law, and other regulations applicable to agriculture.

Course Materials: Roger A. McEowen, Agricultural Law in a Nutshell, along with cases to be posted online.
Course Format: Lecture
Written Assignments: Students may choose to write a research paper satisfying the advanced writing requirement.
Type of Exam: Alternatively, students may choose to take a comprehensive, open-book essay exam at the end of the semester.
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Either the final exam or research paper, combined with performance on in-class questions throughout the semester.

Course Number: 6920
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 2
Semester Offered: Spring (Lottery)
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: This course introduces students to various methods of alternative dispute resolution such as negotiation, mediation and arbitration. The course is designed to give students an opportunity to experience different ways to communicate, negotiate and represent clients in alternative dispute resolution processes. The course exposes students to both the theory underlying various dispute processes and the skills necessary to master negotiation, mediation, and arbitration.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Other Comments: This course may be used for experiential learning credit.

Course Number: 6540
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Fall
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: The antitrust course consists of the study of the federal laws regulating monopolies and restraints of trade. The substantive provisions of the antitrust laws are relatively brief - there are only three main statutes - the Sherman Act (1890), the Clayton Act (1914) and the FTC Act (1914). These statutes entail broad prohibitions, and there are no detailed regulations like the tax code. Antitrust tends to be more like Constitutional Law than like other statutory law courses - basically, there is a foundational text (the Sherman Act) containing some broad generalizations and a lot of Supreme Court cases interpreting the law.

Overview of Topics - The topics we will be covering in the course include the following: 1. Policies behind and the history of the antitrust laws and economics as it applies to antitrust. 2. Monopolization. There are a number of classic cases in this area. We will discuss the Microsoft case. 3. Horizontal restraints, including price fixing, division of territories, and group boycotts. A horizontal restraint occurs when competitors in the same market get together and try to avoid having to compete in the marketplace. 4. Horizontal mergers is the next topic. These types of mergers are usually questionable. We will discuss the major cases as well as the Justice Dept. merger guidelines. 5. Vertical restraints of trade (these include things like territorial restrictions by the manufacturer on the distributor, tying arrangements and exclusive dealing). This is a very controversial and active area. Unfortunately, we will not have time to cover the antitrust exemptions, such as state action, nor will we cover antitrust issues in patents or international antitrust or the Robinson Patman Act (price discrimination).

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: Modified seminar
Written Assignments: 20 - 30 page research paper
Type of Exam: None
Basis for Grading Student Performance: 20 - 30 page research paper, plus class participation and presentation of research paper in class. The research paper can be used to fulfill the upper class writing requirement.

Course Number: 6915
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Fall
Required: No
Prerequisites: Completion of first year courses

Course Overview: This course will introduce students to basic principles of appellate practice including reviewing a record, the importance of preserving issues at the trial level, standards of review on appeal, appellate brief writing, oral advocacy, and subsequent motions practice (e.g. motions for en banc review and drafting Supreme Court petitions for certiorari). The course will require observation of at least one appellate argument and will require significant written work and class participation in simulations and class discussion. 

Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling, supplemental materials
Course Format: Lecture, class discussion, simulation
Written Assignments: Appellate brief and other written assignments, oral advocacy assignments
Type of Exam: none
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Written work and class participation

Course Number: 6915
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Fall
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: None.

Course Overview: Banks are some of the most regulated businesses in the United States. This course addresses banking law related to chartering, safety and soundness, and consumer protection. Because banking law is constantly evolving, emphasis will be placed on core concepts and current issues. By the end of the semester, you will be able to describe the basic regulatory structures that apply to banks. You will be able to read and interpret banking statutes, regulations, and agency guidance. And you will be able to evaluate proposed changes to banking law. Please note that this course focuses on commercial banks and credit unions. It does not cover securities regulation and insurance.

Course Number: 6620
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Spring
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: None.

Course Overview: This class focuses on the consumer and business bankruptcy process, principally in the context of cases commenced by individuals and business entities under Chapters 7, 11 and 13 of the Bankruptcy Code.  The course is designed as an introductory course in consumer and business bankruptcy for the student who has not taken another bankruptcy course.  I recommend that students either have taken a course on secured transactions or at least have some familiarity with that part of the law. The course will also focus on the Small Business Reorganization Act as well as the Cares Act, and in particular Sub-Chapter V of Chapter 11.

At the end of this course, it is my hope that each student will have an ability to recognize when bankruptcy law applies and how it might assist clients.  The ability to spot issues and to avoid pitfalls created by the Bankruptcy Code will be paramount.  There is not sufficient time to teach the true mechanics and filing a bankruptcy case; however, it is my hope that the general process can be summarized in a fashion that will allow students to successfully navigate these waters in practice.

Course Materials: The Law of Debtors and Creditors: Text, Cases, and Problems (Wolters Kluwer, 8th edition 2021) (text).

There were substantial changes to bankruptcy law in October 2005.  Therefore, materials published prior to that date may well be outdated and possibly dangerously misleading.  Do not use ancillary/supplemental materials published prior to that date. Further, the Small Business Reorganization Act and the Cares Act made substantial changes to the bankruptcy law in 2019 and 2020, respectively.

Course Format: We will split class time on traditional case analysis and practical problems.  You will need to analyze the cases in the Text (and supplemental cases that I will assign from time to time) on your own and be prepared to discuss and apply them, as well as the applicable sections of the Bankruptcy Code, in order to (1) contribute to the class discussion and (2) address the problems that will be assigned prior to each class. .

Written Assignments: Quizzes will be assigned a few times during the semester through Westlaw/TWEN.

Type of Exam: One final examination

Basis for Grading Student Performance: Attendance, participation, student presentation, and one final examination. Students will be required to teach all or part of a lesson during the semester as a means to develop a deeper understanding of at least one part of the course. 

Course Number: 6915
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 1
Semester Offered: Spring

Course Overview: This course is designed to help you develop skills such as analytical reasoning and application analysis writing, that are critical components of passing a bar exam. Additionally, through the use of multiple simulations, this class is designed to allow you the opportunity to practice exam taking techniques to help you develop effective strategies and to help put you in the best position to pass the bar. Please note, this class is intended to compliment, not be a substitute for, a substantive bar review class. We therefore recommend that you take a substantive bar review class in the summer in addition to taking this course.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Grading is S/U

Course Number: 6555
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Fall
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: Interesting issues surrounding euthanasia, assisted reproduction, and withdrawing life-sustaining treatment are in the news constantly. This course analyzes the role law plays in resolving ethical issues in healthcare. In addition to learning substantive law, this course emphasizes critical thinking and is designed to give students practice researching, writing, presenting and making persuasive oral arguments. Class will often include practical exercises, hypotheticals, debate and other active learning. Diverse views are welcomed.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: Active participation, class lecture and discussion, presentations, practical exercises
Written Assignments: Research paper
Type of Exam: None
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Paper, participation, and presentation
Other Comments: An interesting course with practical teaching on advanced directives, capacity, and other issues that recur frequently in real law practice.

Course Number: 6310
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Fall
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: This is an introductory course into the law of business organizations. It explores the legal considerations in forming, carrying on, and terminating business enterprises. Specifically, this course deals with the management and control of business enterprises, the liabilities of owners, and the transferability of ownership interests.  The course will discuss the fiduciary duties of business managers and owners, as well as the issues that arise in suits based on the breach of these duties. In addition to the standard emphasis on state corporate law, especially that of Delaware, some attention will also be devoted to federal securities laws.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: The required textbook contains cases and problems that are included in the assigned reading. Lectures will cover the topics included in the assigned readings and students will be expected to be prepared to discuss cases and problems assigned in the readings. Students will also be expected to prepare answers to assigned problems and be prepared to present their answers to the problems when called upon.
Written Assignments: None
Type of Exam: One final exam. The exams will include multiple choice questions and may also include essay questions.
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Ten percent (10%) of each student's grade in the course will depend on class participation when called upon. The final examinations will determine the remaining 90% of the grade.
Other Comments: Business Organizations is a prerequisite for Taxation of Business Entities, Business Planning, and Advanced Business Organizations. Students who have taken Agency and Partnership or Corporations may not take this class.

Course Number: 6560
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Spring
Required: No
Prerequisites: Federal Income Taxation and Business Organizations
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: Using a problem involving several persons who are organizing a business entity, Business Planning will consider the role of the attorney organizing the entity, the characteristics of several kinds of business organizations and making judgments about which organization should be used to house a particular business. The class will also consider a number of issues to be addressed by attorneys at the formation stage of the business and in planning both for its operation and potential exits by its owners. Although some tax issues will be raised, primary focus will be on non-tax aspects.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Written Assignments: Project(s)
Type of Exam: This is a skills course; there will be no examination.
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Students will be graded on a project or projects involving preparation of memoranda and other documents.
Other Comments: Business Planning is limited in enrollment to 20 students determined by lottery.  This course may be used for experiential learning credit.

Course Number: 6915
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Summer
Required: No
Prerequisites: None
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: An intensive, two week course about European Trade and Human Rights Law, offered at the University of Cambridge. In 2017, the course will focus on the Brexit Crisis. This course has two basic objectives: (1) to broaden the student’s knowledge of the relationship between the European economy and human rights law and policy and (2) to examine basic institutions and processes affecting developments in international trade, immigration and refugee flows into the EU.

Course Materials: The majority of the literature in the course assumes an introductory level knowledge of macroeconomics and public international law.  Students with a limited background in these subjects may need to supplement the required readings with outside material.
Other Comments: Does not satisfy the Advanced Writing or Skills requirement.

Course Number: 6645
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Spring
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: This course will cover a broad range of issues touching upon children, including but not limited to: dependency; termination of parental rights; adoption and child custody and support, parental rights and state authority and the juvenile justice system. We will also study the interrelationship of rights and responsibilities among the child, parents and government; the perceptions of children's competence as a basis for government regulation; and the role of the child's lawyer, paying particular attention to practical and ethical considerations in representing children. Children and the Law is a course for students who are considering a career in child advocacy as well as for those who have any interest in the subject of juvenile law. Also for anyone who is considering general practice, the bulk of cases filed in Wyoming are divorce or family law cases that usually involve children. Using an interactive, seminar format, we will explore federal, as well as state laws, cases and regulations pertaining to the children in the legal system.

Children's issues frequently arise in general law practice, including in child abuse and neglect cases, domestic relations, adoption and delinquency proceedings. Both nationally and in Wyoming, lawyers, judges and advocacy organizations are struggling with many concepts surrounding children in our legal system. A course on children and the law is very timely. In child abuse and neglect cases, the legal representation of parents, children, and child protection agencies is often seriously deficient.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.

Course Number: 6565
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Spring
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: Civil Procedure, Professional Responsibility, Evidence

Course Overview: Civil pretrial is an intensive learn-by-doing course designed to prepare students for civil litigation practice.  Students litigate a civil case from inception to the point of trial preparation.  In addition to lecture and demonstration, class consists of practical exercises simulating typical law firm work.  Students will interview a client and/or witness, conduct factual investigation, research applicable law, draft pleadings, serve and respond to written discovery, take a deposition, argue a motion, and negotiate a settlement.  A sample case frames the course by providing documents, facts, and witnesses for discovery and pleadings.  While graded work is handled individually, students will work together on certain litigation activities throughout the semester.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: Practical exercises, class lecture and discussion.
Written Assignments: Draft litigation documents.
Type of Exam: None
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Documents drafted, participation, and oral exercises.
Other Comments: Great introduction to civil litigation of any kind. This course counts toward experiential learning credits.

Course Number: 6970
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 1-2
Semester Offered: Fall, Spring, Summer
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: Credit is given to student competitors in approved inter-school competitions. Students receive one S/U credit hour for participation in a regional competition as part of the University of Wyoming Law School team. This credit is to be applied in the semester after the student participates in a qualified competition. Please see Dean Hoyt before you register for this credit.

Approved inter-school competitions include:

PACE Environmental Moot Court Competition. This is the preeminent environmental law moot court competition in the nation. Students have a chance to improve their oral advocacy and writing skills while mastering such difficult environmental law issues and policies as the Clean Air Act, the Endangered Species Act and the National Environmental Policy Act. The University of Wyoming and the law firm of Holland and Hart sponsor the intramural competition where 1st, 2nd, and 3rd year students compete against each other for a chance to be selected for the national moot court competition held at the Pace Law School in White Plains, New York.

Trial Competition. This competition encourages development of litigation skills. Each litigation team, consisting of two attorneys and two witnesses conduct either a civil or a criminal trial in an intramural competition. Each team prepares all phases of the trial from opening statements to direct and cross-examination and closing statements. The winners of the intramural competition go on to compete in the regional competition sponsored by the Association of Trial Lawyers.

Moot Court Competition. This competition is sponsored by the Young Lawyers Section of the Bar Association of the City of New York. Students write appellate briefs and present oral arguments in a simulated appeal to the United States Supreme Court. The student compete in an intramural competition. The winners of the intramural competition participate in a regional competition. Regional winners then progress to a competition sponsored by the American Bar Association.

Client Counseling Competition. This competition emphasizes communication and other interpersonal skills essential to the sound representation of clients. In this intramural competition, students interview and counsel a client, suggesting possible advantages and disadvantages of courses of action in resolving legal problems. Winners of the intramural competition progress to the national client counseling competition which is sponsored by the Law Student Division of the American Bar Association.

Basis for Grading Student Performance: Grading is S/U.
Other Comments: One credit per competition. Credit is given to student competitors in approved inter-school competitions. Please see the Dean Hoyt if you have any questions regarding which are approved competitions. Credit is applied in the semester after the student participates in the regional or national competition.

Course Number: 6915
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Fall
Required: No
Prerequisites: Must complete first year of law courses.
Course Overview: This seminar provides an introduction to comparative contract law and the comparative methodology. It will guide students through the comparative analysis of key topics in contract formation, validity, interpretation, performance, breach, and remedies. We will examine questions like: Why does one legal system use the mailbox rule for acceptance while another relies on receipt? How does the concept of consideration manifest in legal systems across the world? How do legal systems decide on remedies like monetary damages versus specific performance? Adopting a "learning by doing" approach, students will engage with practical case scenarios under multiple legal frameworks, including international rules such as the Vienna Convention on International Sales of Goods (CISG) and the European Draft Common Frame of Reference (DCFR). The sources of study will include (but not be limited to) the common law tradition as represented by the U.K. and the U.S. and the civil law tradition as represented notably by China, Germany, France and Eastern European countries. In addition to readings, students will gain hands-on experience conducting comparative research, including through two special sessions led by law library staff. Students will learn how to effectively find, evaluate, and use foreign primary sources and academic commentary. Over the course of the semester, students will apply their growing expertise in comparative methodology and research through short written assignments. The seminar culminates in an individual (or group) research paper (approx. 6,000 words, not counting footnotes), requiring students to conduct comparative analysis of a contract law topic selected by the student after consultation with the instructor and the law librarian.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling. All other materials will be made available on the WyoCourses page. 
Course Format: Seminar, class lecture and group discussion.
Written Assignments: An individual memo, a research memo, and reaction papers.
Type of Exam: Final research paper
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Active participation, written assignments, and final research paper.

Course Number: 6590
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: TBA
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Course Overview: The study of the law applicable to transactions or occurrences involving contacts with more than just one state, including questions of choice of law, jurisdiction, and recognition of foreign
judgments. The casebook is David P. Currie, Herma Hill Kay & Larry Kramer, Conflict of Laws: Cases -- Comments -- Questions, Sixth Edition (West 2001).

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.

Course Number: 6250
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Spring
Required: Yes
Prerequisites: None
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: Constitutional Law I is divided into two parts. Part I focuses on governmental structures. Part II begins our coverage of individual rights and liberties. Part I's coverage includes the power of judicial review, separation of powers, federalism, and congressional powers. Part II focuses on freedom of expression.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Type of Exam: Open book; half essay, half multiple choice.
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Final Exam

Course Number: 6350
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 2
Semester Offered: Fall
Required: No
Prerequisites: Constitutional Law I
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: The course focuses on constitutionally protected individual rights and liberties. Specifically, the following topics will be covered: equal protection; substantive due process, including the right of privacy; procedural due process; and religious freedom.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Written Assignments: None
Type of Exam: Open-book, half essay and half multiple choice
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Exam
Other Comments: Taken for a letter grade ONLY

Course Number: 6600
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Varies
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: The consumer protection course covers three main topics: (1) the law of advertising and marketing; (2) consumer credit regulation; and (3) consumer warranty law.

This is an exciting area to study because of the continuing onslaught of new issues, with corresponding policy responses. Some of the new developments that will be covered are: federal credit card legislation, and creation of the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau; Internet commerce online contracts, and consumer protection; debt collection; subprime mortgage and foreclosure crisis; consumer privacy and credit reports; auto leasing; pay-day loans; loan "flipping" and predatory lending; identity theft; Spam and Do-Not-Call list for telemarketing, and consumer arbitration.

We will cover the basic consumer protection mission of the Federal Trade Commission and the State Attorneys General. We will discuss federal Truth in Lending regulations, Equal Credit Opportunity, Fair Credit Reporting and identity theft, UCC warranties, the Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act, and new car "lemon" laws.

Course Materials: We will use the brand-new 4th edition of my casebook and the 2013 edition of Selected Consumer Statutes. You will be exposed to the very latest development. See the current Book List lunder Scheduling.
Course Format: Lecture/discussion
Written Assignments: One 5-page take home mid-term assignment required. 15-20 page research paper optional in lieu of final exam.
Type of Exam: Two hour final, 1/2 essay,1/2 multiple choice.
Basis for Grading Student Performance: This course features a traditional end of semester exam but also allows students to choose to "opt out" of the final exam by writing a15-20-page research paper on a topic of their choice. The grade is based 25% on class participation. 25% of the grade will be based on a 5-page take-home assignment. This will be graded and returned prior to the end of the semester. 50% of the grade will be based on either the final exam or a 15-20 page research paper. The research paper can be used to fulfill the upper class writing requirement.
Other Comments: This is a critically important course because we are all consumers in a time of economic trouble. Some of you may use this knowledge either for yourselves or for consumer or business clients. It is also a good basic course for those planning a general, business oriented practice because consumer protection laws affect any business that deals with consumers. The course combines administrative law topics, federal and state statutes and regulations, first amendment and common law. Students will also be asked to attend some part of the annual Consumer Issues Conference at the Wyoming Union in lieu of one class session. This year’s topic will be “Navigating the New Healthcare Market, held October 2 - 4."

Course Number: 6915
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 2
Semester Offered: Spring  
Required: none
Prerequisites: none
Course Description: This is a two-hour paper course, meeting once a week on Wednesdays from 3:00 to 4:50 on Zoom.  The paper can be used to fulfill the advanced writing requirement.  The course will cover the work of the Federal Trade Commission, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, state and private cases under state unfair and deceptive practices acts, as well as the law of advertising and marketing, consumer credit, and consumer privacy.  Some current topics include proposed regulations on deceptive earnings claims by employers, commercial surveillance and personal data security, “junk fees,” “impersonation fraud,” use of fake consumer reviews and social media influencers, “negative options” (such as subscription services with auto renewal), as well as deceptive labelling of food products.  

Course Materials: Text will be Pridgen, Sovern & Peterson, Consumer Law: Cases and Materials (West Academic 5th ed. 2020).   
Written Assignments: Paper (I don’t know what these usually state)
Type of Exam: Paper

Course Number: 6935
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Spring
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview:

This topics course will introduce the student to the world of transactional drafting. It will cover such basic topics as fact investigation and the role of the lawyer in a transaction proposed by the client, including possible negotiations with other parties. It will also cover such topics as drafting the essential parts of a contract;drafting clear and unambiguous contract provisions; and the proper use of boilerplate or form contracts. Throughout the course, we will discuss the ethical obligations of lawyers involved in transactional drafting, including situations where the parties to a transaction claim to be friendly and wish to avoid the expense of hiring separate counsel. This will be a learn by doing course. The principal teaching method will be working through a series of simulations. Among other things, students will be asked to negotiate one or more deals with other students in the class, or with students in another section of the course, then document their agreement through appropriate contracts and auxiliary documents. Students will be evaluated through a mixture of performances and written documents.

This course will satisfy the College of Law skills course requirement.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: Skills
Written Assignments: Many
Type of Exam: Skills and participation
Other Comments: This course may be used for experiential learning credit.

Course Number: 6915

Credit Hour & Credit Type: 3

Semester Offered: Spring

Required: No

Prerequisites: Student must have completed their first year of law school.

Recommended Courses: Agency & Partnership

Course Overview: This course first provides a primer on the law of agency and fiduciary relationships.  It then covers the legal issues involved with the corporate business form, including formation and management, disregard of the corporate entity, control and management in closely held and public corporations; duties of officers and directors, control of the corporation, and takeovers.

Course Materials: Casebook

Course Format: Lecture

Written Assignments: Varies

Type of Exam: Written, during exam period

Basis for grading student performance: Final exam and class participation

Other comments: Students who have taken Business Organizations may not take this course.

Course Number: 6880
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Spring
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: Evidence

Course Overview: A study of the post-investigative phase of the criminal process: from charging decisions through sentencing and appeals. Topics covered include: the decision to prosecute; bail and pretrial release; grand jury and preliminary hearing practice; criminal discovery; the role and responsibilities of defense counsel and of the prosecutor; jury-related issues, such as pretrial publicity, Batson, and deliberative secrecy; defendants rights to presence, confrontation, and to present a defense case; verdicts; sentencing; appeals and post-conviction proceedings. The coursework may include a few practical assignments, such as motion drafting, during the semester in addition to a final exam.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: Lecture and practical exercises
Written Assignments: May include motion drafting and other practical written exercises.
Type of Exam: 1-1/2 hour final essay exam
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Final exam (50%); practical exercises (50%); in addition, students may be rewarded for outstanding class participation or penalized for repeated lack of preparation.

Course Number: 6630
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Fall
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: Often titled, Criminal Procedure: Investigation, this course examines the legal requirements for investigating crime and the constitutional rights of criminal suspects under the Fourth, Fifth and Sixth Amendments of the United States Constitution (mostly the Fourth). A majority of the focus will be on law enforcement practices and the constitutional principles by which criminal investigations can be conducted by law enforcement.

Major topics include search and seizure issues under the Fourth Amendment, the exclusionary rule, the privilege against self-incrimination, confessions, Miranda, identification of suspects, the right to counsel in interrogations and entrapment. Because this is a class with substantial discussion, the professor reserves the right to institute a laptop ban if class discussion becomes lagging. If that becomes the case, the professor will make an accommodation for students who have received an accommodation mandating use of laptops.

This course will teach bar materials for all major state jurisdictions and is recommended for those interested in criminal law, either on the prosecution or defense side.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: Socratic dialogue and lecture.
Written Assignments: Several written assignments during semester.
Type of Exam: 3-hour final exam; part essay, part short answer.
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Final exam and written assignments.

Course Number: 6635
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Fall
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: As a result of the prevalence of domestic violence in our society, attorneys, regardless of their area of expertise or practice will find themselves confronting cases in which domestic violence is an issue. Domestic relations lawyers, criminal defense lawyers, labor lawyers, corporate lawyers, bankruptcy lawyers, tort lawyers, and real property lawyers, regularly represent victims or perpetrators of domestic violence. Due to the prevalence of domestic violence and the frequency with which it finds its way into the legal system, all actors within the legal system should be properly educated.

The Domestic Violence and the Law Class has been offered since 1999 by Professor Dona Playton. Professor Playton has trained and consulted extensively, including consulting with the ABAs Commission on Domestic Violence, the Wyoming Supreme Court and the Wyoming Coalition Against Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault. The course covers subjects from the history of relationship violence, cultural issues, including immigration and tribal concerns, economic impacts, women as defendants, law enforcement and prosecutorial roles, civil protection orders, stalking, sexual assault and batterer intervention programs, working with people with disabilities, the impact on children, as well as state and federal legislation that impacts domestic violence in criminal and civil cases. Guest speakers, valuable hand-outs and practice tools created by the instructor and other experts in the field, as well as videos are integrated throughout the course. The Domestic Violence class helps prepare students to take part in the Legal Services Program, and the Domestic Violence Legal Assistance Project. Students having taken the class will go on to represent victims effectively, make well-informed legal decisions, create effective legislation, and further educate judges, attorneys and other professionals on the dynamics of domestic violence, sexual assault and stalking and on the critical importance of applying the law in a safe and effective fashion when handling such cases.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Written Assignments: Research Paper
Type of Exam: None
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Paper, satisfies advanced writing requirement
Other Comments: Recommended as a prerequisite for Domestic Violence Clinic

Course Number: 6665
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 2
Semester Offered: Spring
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: The course will explore selected topics relating to education law, at all levels of education (primary, secondary, and higher education). Some of those topics will be selected by the professor, and others will be selected by the students. Professor-selected topics in recent years have included school desegregation, affirmative action, gender equity in athletics, search and seizure, corporal punishment, student free speech rights, and religion in schools.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: The class will meet one day per week for two hours. During the first half of the course, students will read cases and other materials on topics selected by the professor and engage in discussion of those topics. Each student will prepare a paper on a topic to be arranged with the professor. During the second half of the semester, students will make presentations on their paper topics and lead class discussion on those topics.
Written Assignments: One paper of at least 20 double-spaced pages (exclusive of title page, table of contents, footnotes, and appendices) on a topic related to education law. The paper should be thoroughly researched, well written, and fully documented.
Type of Exam: No Exam
Basis for Grading Student Performance: 75% for written paper (including good-faith first draft); 25% for class participation, including attendance, student presentation, and contributions to class discussion.
Other Comments: Enrollment in seminars is limited to 10 students, first come, first serve. If you are interested in this course, you should pre-register as soon as possible, but please see the professor if you wish to take the course and you are on a wait list.

Course Number: 6745
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Fall
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: Constitutional Law II

Course Overview: In this class we will examine a variety of laws, regulations and legal theories governing the workplace and the employment relationship in its varied forms. Globalization, immigration, technological advances, and a variety of cultural changes have significantly shifted the type of work available in the United States, the way that work is performed, and who participates in the American workforce. In the midst of new and ever changing technologies, globalization and a volatile economy, sits the varied and dynamic laws governing the work relationship. From contract law to torts, property law to constitutional law, civil procedure, civil rights, a variety of regulatory regimes, as well as many laws that are specific to the employment context, the panoply of laws that govern and influence the employment relationship are many and varied. Whereas, the relationship of worker and employer is as old as human history, the law governing this area is relatively new and ever changing. This class seeks to explore this vast array of rules and laws in such a way that it provides students with solid grounding in the major doctrines and theories governing the employment relationship, but also provides them with the ability to think and reason about this dynamic area of law with respect to areas that are ever changing and unsettled. Thus, while significant time is spent on black letter law, a substantial amount of time is also spent understanding the theoretical underpinnings of the laws in the employment area and discussing how such laws should govern the employment relationship given the many current issues that arise in the context of that relationship and the ever changing nature of the employment relationship .Issues explored include globalization, immigration, healthcare, discrimination, pay structures, shifting workplace demographics and changes is the types of work available; to name a few. Specific laws examined include those governing hiring, firing, wage and hour, discrimination, breach of contract, health benefits, unemployment, workers compensation, and if time permits trade secrets, post-employment restrictions, occupational safety and health and alternative dispute resolution.

While this course will not devote extensive time to the labor-management relations laws that are covered in the separate Labor Law class, we will touch on the effects of collective bargaining agreements when pertinent. More often than not, both federal and state laws will govern a particular aspect of the employment relationship and state laws addressing a particular issue will differ. Therefore, when exploring the above topics, we will give attention to the interplay of these laws and the many procedural issues that arise in the employment context.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: Socratic questioning, general class discussion, and problems and exercises performed inside and outside of class. The class is divided into law firms or groups and it is in the context of these groups that most Socratic questioning takes place and most in class discussion and problem solving is performed. For example, groups are called on in the course of routine questioning rather than individuals.
Written Assignments: There are approximately three short writing assignments that will be given throughout the semester. Students have the option of completing these assignments in a group or as an individual. Students also have the option of writing a major paper rather than taking the final exam. The major paper can be written to fulfill the law school writing requirement.
Type of Exam: Two hour open book; or students can write a major paper in lieu of taking the exam.
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Class participation and attendance, short writing assignments and either performance on the exam or the major paper.

Course Number: 6660
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: TBA
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: This course provides an overview of the broad field of environmental law, with an emphasis on the major federal environmental statutes, including the National Environmental Policy Act, the Endangered Species Act, the Clean Air and Clean Water Acts, as well as the federal programs for the regulation or management of hazardous wastes and hazardous substances. We will consider both the substantive requirements of these statutes and their conceptual approaches to environmental protection. The course also will explore issues such as the role of states in implementing these national laws, various approaches to enforcing these laws, common-law doctrines relevant to environmental protection, and economic aspects of environmental law.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: Lecture (supported by PowerPoint) with class discussion.
Written Assignments: None
Type of Exam: TENTATIVE: combination of essay and multiple choice.
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Grade based primarily on exam, with a class participation component.

Course Number: 6670
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 2
Semester Offered: Spring
Required: No
Prerequisites: Gift & Estate Taxation, Income Taxation, and Trusts & Estates
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: This course surveys basic estate planning principles and techniques.  It covers professional responsibility issues related to estate planning; the drafting of basic estate planning documents, such as wills, trusts, and powers of attorney; tools to plan for incapacity; and techniques to minimize federal wealth transfer taxes.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: Lectures cover topics included in assigned readings.  Students are expected to be prepared to discuss the assigned readings.
Written Assignments: This course requires completion of three written assignments: (1) the drafting of a simple will, (2) the drafting of a will with contingent trust, and (3) the preparation of a memorandum that analyzes an assigned estate planning problem.
Type of Exam: No Exam
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Grades are based upon the three written assignments described above.

Other Comments:  This course may be used for experiential learning credit.

Course Number: 6960
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 1-3
Semester Offered: Fall, Spring, Summer (Online)
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: The externship program provides second and third year students with an opportunity to learn through practice by working directly with attorneys or judges for academic credit. Externship placements are limited to judges, government agencies and nonprofit organizations, and must be pre-approved by the Externship Program Director.

Course Materials:
Course Format: Online, written assignment are due weekly. Students will be informed of the specific date applications are due which is generally after the advising period.
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Grading is S/U.
Other Comments: A complete listing of summer and fall externship positions is available online.  Students may not participate in the externship program and a legal clinic in the same semester except with permission of both directors.

Course Number: 6640
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Spring
Required: No
Prerequisites: None
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: Once, family law occupied a quiet backwater in legal practice and academia. No longer. Today, family law finds itself on the front lines of what Justice Scalia has called the culture war of modern America. The perceived social consensus that long undergirded the legal regulation of family life has largely collapsed. Family law is currently embroiled in a series of hot-button debates: same-sex marriage, divorce, out-of-wedlock childbearing, abortion, and the deregulation of sexuality. The very definition of family and the boundaries of family law have become blurred. Family law now draws from constitutional law, and extends to criminal law, conflicts of laws, welfare law, and the law of contracts, torts, property, and inheritance, to name a few. From marriage to divorce, property distribution, child custody and the termination of parental rights, this class will explore the many areas and facets of family law with an eye toward providing students with a firm doctrinal grounding, while preparing them for what they will face as they enter into practice. In the context of this exploration we will look closely at many of the cultural issues noted above, and the effects those issues are having not just on the family and the law related to the family, but on society as a whole.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Written Assignments: Short, discrete assignments required in conjunction with the problems and exercises.
Type of Exam: 2-hour exam
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Class participation, short problems and exercises given in various ways throughout the duration of the class, and a 2 hour final exam.

Course Number: 6680
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Varies
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: Civil Procedure I & II and Constitutional Law I & II

Course Overview: Where exactly does the federal judiciary fit within our constitutional order in the United States? This fundamental structural question frames Federal Courts as a whole. Every exercise of judicial power by federal courts places them in potential conflict with other governmental actors. On the one hand, federal courts’ exercise of judicial power might intrude upon the constitutional domains of Congress and/or the Executive. On the other hand, federal courts’ exercise of judicial power might usurp a function that lawfully should be performed by state courts. Reflected in these structural tensions, the foundational principles of separation of powers and federalism are woven in a skeletal way throughout the course. In this sense, it lies at the intersection of constitutional law and civil procedure. At every turn, this intersection can be seen in the course’s topical coverage, which encompasses overlapping doctrinal, historical, and theoretical material on the justiciability doctrines (advisory opinions, standing, ripeness, mootness, political questions); congressional control of federal courts; constitutional and statutory federal question jurisdiction; federal common law; the Eleventh Amendment and state sovereignty; and U.S. Supreme Court review of state court decisions.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: Lecture and class discussion
Written Assignments: None
Type of Exam: Open-book, multiple-choice midterm quiz and open-book, free-slot final exam.
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Final exam, midterm quiz, and class participation.

Course Number: 6915
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: 
Required: No
Prerequisites: Constitutional Law

Course Overview: The course will examine the constitutional, political, and sociological debate over gun rights, incorporating perspectives of race, gender, class, and regional culture.  It is planned that the topics of 8 to 10 class sessions will be determined based on student interest, as determined by a combination of instructor judgment and a student survey. 

Course Materials: Firearms Law and the Second Amendment: Regulation, Rights, and Policy
Course Format: TBD (seminar or doctrinal lecture style are being considered)
Written Assignments: TBD (depending on the course format)
Type of Exam: TBD (depending on the course format)
Basis for Grading Student Performance: TBD (depending on the course format), but certainly including class participation

Course Number: Law 6915
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Fall
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must complete their first year of law school.

Course Overview: Properly preparing for and litigating cases involving forensic science testimony and evidence is an extraordinary challenge; one that lawyers will continue to encounter as science ever evolves.  This course will provide students with practical knowledge and application skills in handling cases involving scientific evidence, such as breath or blood alcohol and DNA testing. Any prior knowledge required to excel in this area will be covered throughout the course. We will discuss the underpinnings of the use of scientific evidence in court, including an overview of foundational requirements and rules that govern the admissibility of scientific evidence at trial. Students will then learn how to practically respond to the demands of both confronting and presenting scientific evidence, utilizing hypothetical scenarios and exercises in the classroom that reflect real-life courtroom experiences. Basis for Grading Student Performance: The grades will be based on in-class projects and exercises.  The final exam will be comprised of both an interview of an expert and a cross-examination of that expert.  No written exam.

Course Number: 6675
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 2
Semester Offered: Varies
Required: No
Prerequisites: Income Taxation and Trusts & Estates
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: This course surveys the federal tax consequences of wealth transfers during life and upon death.  It covers the federal gift tax, estate tax, and generation-skipping transfer tax.  The course also serves as an introduction to estate planning.  State taxes on the transfer of wealth are not covered.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: Lectures cover topics included in assigned readings.  Students are expected to be prepared to discuss the assigned readings.
Written Assignments: None
Type of Exam: Final exam
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Final exam
Other Comments: This course is a prerequisite for Estate Planning.

Course Number: 6685
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Spring
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: Health spending accounts for 18% of the United States' gross domestic product. This course introduces students to the web of laws that regulate the health care industry and health professionals. It covers professional licensing and liability, institutional regulation and liability, EMTALA, HIPAA, the Affordable Care Act, Medicare, Medicaid, and fraud and abuse laws.  Given the breath of material covered, this course provides a critical first step for students interested in specializing in health law and an overview for any general practitioner.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: Class lecture and discussion. debate or flipped class
Written Assignments: Short essay
Type of Exam: Essay, short answer and multiple-choice
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Exam, participation, short essay, and debate or flipped class.
Other Comments: This course does not address informed consent, health care decision making, reproduction, medical aid in dying, or related issues covered by Bioethics Law, nor does it include public health issues presented in Public Health Law. It focuses primarily on business law and economic issues. 

Course Number: 6715
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Spring
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: This course will explore the legal, historical, and policy perspectives that shape U.S. law governing immigration and citizenship. We will examine the constitutional bases for regulating immigration, the history of immigration law in the U.S., the source and scope of congressional and executive branch power in the realm of immigration, and the role of the judiciary in interpreting immigration law. In the course of that exploration, we will address citizenship and naturalization, the admission and removal of immigrants and nonimmigrants, and the issues of undocumented immigration and national security. We will also analyze the impact of immigration in other areas, including employment, criminal law, family unification, human rights, and discrimination.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling. 

Course Number: 6915
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Fall
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: Courses in criminal law tend to focus on the front end of the criminal legal process: the constitution protections afforded to criminal defendants during the investigation and prosecution of a crime. But for most individuals caught up in the criminal legal system, especially those charged with serious offenses, the trial process is only the preamble to an extended period of time in America's prisons. This course focuses in depth on a key component of the "back end" of the criminal legal system: the law and policy of incarceration. This course will briefly cover some criminological theories related to sentencing and the causes of mass incarceration before turning to the following topics: the scope of prisoners' constitutional rights, access to the courts for the incarcerated, litigation over conditions of confinement, including solitary confinement, access to medical care, and other civil rights-based claims, and the Prison Litigation Reform Act. This course is essential for anyone interested in criminal defense, criminal prosecution, or civil rights litigation.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: Lecture, class discussion
Written Assignments: Final paper and additional assignments
Type of Exam: None
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Written work and class participation

Course Number: 6320
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Spring
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: Income Taxation focuses on the federal taxation of individuals. It includes taxation of compensation, installment sales as well as taxation of gains on property transfers. We will begin by studying what constitutes income and generally move through the deduction, timing and characterization sections of the Internal Revenue Code (the Code). The objective will be to enable you to understand the overall structure and application of the Code and to advise clients on issues pertaining to what constitutes taxable income in a given taxable year.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: The course will use the problem method. You will be expected to closely read, analyze and apply the cases, Code and Treasury regulations that supplement the Code. Income tax is a prerequisite for Business Planning, Estate Planning and Taxation of Business Entities.
Written Assignments: None
Type of Exam: Final exam
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Final exam (95%) and class participation (5%).

Course Number: 6940
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 1-2
Semester Offered: Fall, Spring, Summer
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: Research and writing in specialized or advanced areas of the law. Independent Study papers may not duplicate material taught in a regular law school offering. They are intended to allow students to explore a new area, not covered in the COURSE DESCRIPTIONS, or to conduct more in-depth research into a topic presented in a regular law school offering.

Students are to contact a professor who has a background or interest in the students topic area to determine if the professor will supervise the Independent Study.

Within one week after the start of the semester, students must submit to the Assistant Dean or Associate Dean of Academic Affairs a written proposal, signed by the student and supervising professor, that describes the topic and paper requirements. Forms for this purpose are available from the Assistant Dean or Associate Dean of Academic Affairs. Completed forms must be submitted to receive credit.

Basis for Grading Student Performance: Grades are generally based on a research paper. The paper may be structured so as to fulfill the advanced writing requirement.
Other Comments: Students receive one credit hour for 50 hours of work or 2 credit hours for 100 hours of work.

Course Number: 6941
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 1-2
Semester Offered: Fall, Spring, Summer
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: Research and writing in specialized or advanced areas of the law. Independent Study: Clinic is intended to allow students who have served at least one semester in a clinic to continue casework independently that cannot be reasonably completed during a semester’s time. Must have faculty clinic director approval, as well as the Assistant Dean or Associate Dean of Academic Affairs.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under under Scheduling. 

Course Number: 6940
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 1-2
Semester Offered: Fall, Spring
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: Intensive research, writing, and editing of case note or comment and cite-checking of articles for the Wyoming Law Review. Credit earned for a grade of S/U only. Law Review membership is required. Credit may be received in the third year only. Maximum six hours in academic career.

Basis for Grading Student Performance: Offered for a grade of S/U only.
Other Comments: Students receiving independent study credit for an unpublished Law Review comment or case note are to register for this section. Students receive Law Review/Independent Study credit in the third year only. If you write for law review during your second year of law school, you will not receive academic credit for that work until your third year.

Course Number: 6700
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Varies
Required: No
Prerequisites: None
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: This course provides an overview of federal Indian law—the judicial decisions, federal statutes, treaties, and executive policies that govern Indian rights, tribal powers, and the relationships among the three sovereigns in our polity. Principal topics include the historical development of Indian policy; sources of and limits on tribal powers; the respective jurisdiction of tribes, the federal government, and states; the federal trust doctrine; Congressional plenary power and its perceived origins; and Indian property rights. 

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: Lecture and discussion.
Written Assignments: One 10-page final essay
Type of Exam: Final essay
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Student performance will be assessed on the final essay (70%) and class participation (30%).
Other Comments: Indian Law is one of the most difficult fields of law to learn on one’s own. A semester-long exploration of the history of the development of Indian law and policy, with plenty of opportunities for discussion, is useful for understanding the material and for practicing in this field. 

Course Number: 6725
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Spring
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: Intellectual property is the most valuable asset many corporations have in today's global business world. This course introduces students to basic principles of federal copyright, patent, and trademark law. Given the breadth of material covered, the course is best understood as a first step for students interested in specializing in this area and an essential overview for any general practitioner.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: Class lecture and discussion, problem-solving, exam
Written Assignments: Short essay
Type of Exam: Essay, short answer and multiple choice
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Exam, essay, participation and current event report
Other Comments: All businesses have intellectual property issues, and this course is a good introduction to help prepare students to meet their clients' needs.

Course Number: 6720
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Spring
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: This course covers international law in its classic sense--public international law, or "the law of nations, as well the growing impact of international law on domestic legal orders. It looks at topics such as the sources and evidence of international law, sovereignty, transnational legal process, the bases of national jurisdiction, conflicts of jurisdiction, the international use of force, etc. However, modern public international law also includes areas of more immediate interest to practicing lawyers, such as conflicts between nations over which one has the right to assert jurisdiction over certain activities, international extradition, and immunities from jurisdiction.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: Lecture and discussion.
Written Assignments: Four short reaction papers.
Type of Exam: There is a take-home final exam, consisting of two essay questions, that accounts for 40% of the grade.
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Reaction papers: 40%; Final Exam 40% class participation 20%.
Other Comments: This course should be of interest to anyone following international affairs and will complement International Business Transactions and International Human Rights Law.

Course Number: 6765
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Spring
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: This course is intended to prepare students to represent clients in business transactions that occur across international borders.  It will consider the sources of international business law, the interaction between applicable international and domestic laws, and the choice of law issues that arise in international business disputes.  The course follows a sequence of increasingly complex transactions, from the sale of goods across borders, to sales through distributors and licensing, to foreign direct investment.  Topics will include the formation of basic commercial transactions, financing the sale of goods, transport of goods, agency and distributorships, licensing of intellectual property, establishment and operation of foreign investment, corruption, and dispute resolution.  The relationship between law and culture will also be considered.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: The required textbook contains cases and problems that are included in the assigned reading. Lectures will cover the topics included in the assigned readings and students will be expected to be prepared to discuss cases and problems assigned in the readings. Students will also be expected to prepare answers to assigned problems and be prepared to present their answers to the problems when called upon.
Written Assignments: Short written responses to problems provided in the textbook will be required on a few occasions throughout the semester.
Type of Exam: One final exam.
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Ten percent (10%) of each student's grade in the course will depend on class participation, forty percent (40%) will depend on written assignments, and fifty percent (50%) will depend on the final exam. 

Course Number: 6915
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Varies
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: International Law

Course Overview: International Environmental Law is a paper-based, graduate-level seminar offering a survey of global environmental challenges and international legal instruments and organizations that have emerged to address them. The seminar begins by examining the general framework and evolution of international environmental law as a field. Against this backdrop, the seminar then turns to a host of legal measures and entities developed in response to several challenges in the field: climate change, access to freshwater resources, and biodiversity and wildlife protection. Finally, the seminar concludes with a series of writing workshops devoted to refining students’ papers and presentation skills. Because of its research- and writing-intensive format, this seminar is an excellent option for satisfying the College of Law’s Advanced Writing Requirement.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: Seminar-style class discussions and writing workshops.
Written Assignments: Research paper.
Type of Exam: None.
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Research paper, short quiz, and class participation. 

Course Number: 6775
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Fall
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: International Law

Course Overview: An examination of norms, institutions and select problems relating to international human rights law. The course will address civil and political rights questions (including the expanded use of international criminal law as a means of enforcing universal values), social and economic rights (including access to medicines) and select group rights issues (including indigenous rights).

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: Seminar discussion with occasional lectures.
Type of Exam: None
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Final paper or a series of reaction papers (75%); Participation (25%). 

Course Number: 6915-06
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Spring
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: Designed to introduce students to the law and institutions governing international trade and investment relations and to provide them with a better understanding of the rules, norms,   principles, and methods of dispute resolution surrounding global commerce.  The course will focus on disputes that take place between two or more countries and the various forums – national, regional and multilateral – in which these disputes are resolved.  We begin with an overview of issues that cut across various types of international transactions, including the role       of international lawyers, international dispute resolution, the place of international law in the U.S. legal system, the extraterritorial application of domestic law, the World Trade Organization and regional trading arrangements (NAFTA, the EU, etc.), and the rules governing national trade, investment and currency flows.  The course also will explore the interaction and compatibility of international trade rules with the rules governing intellectual property protection, environmental protection, labor and human rights, among other issues.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling. 

Course Number: 6166
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Fall
Required: No
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: This course introduces students to the basic lawyering skills of interviewing, fact investigation, counseling, and negotiation. It employs simulation exercises, self-critiques, and feedback from the faculty member as well as other students. The course is intended to teach and improve basic skills needed for the practice of law. In addition to the exercises, students are exposed to the theoretical underpinnings of the skills and examine some of the ethical issues involved in creating and maintaining professional relationships with clients and opposing parties and counsel. Enrollment limited to 12.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.

Course Number: 6150
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3 credits
Semester Offered: Spring
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Course Overview:  This course will introduce students both to the various remedies available to litigants and the policies behind why those remedies exist.  Coverage will include equitable remedies such as injunctions, specific performance, and constructive trusts, as well as restitution as a substantive and remedial remedy.  To address both plaintiff and defendant work, the class will cover limiting theories and doctrines so student will have an overview of tools needed to limit or avoid recovery.  This class will be taught with a problem-solving methodology

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.

Course Number: 6730
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: TBA
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: This course will examine American legal thought from the nation’s inception through today. We will discuss issues related to the nature of law, the nature of judicial decision making, the relationship between law and society, and the like. The first part of the course will explore historically important jurists, jurisprudents, and schools of thought, including the constitutional framers, natural law thinkers, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., and Benjamin Cardozo. The second part of the course will explore current schools of thought, including law and economics, feminist jurisprudence, pragmatism, and postmodernism.

The purpose of the course is to encourage critical thinking: to question some of the apparent foundations of legal study and practice that attorneys, students, and professors often take for granted. I do not expect students to agree with all of the viewpoints expressed by the various writers that will be read during the semester. In fact, you might not agree with any of the writers. Such disagreement is fine (and is even to be encouraged).

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: Lecture/discussion
Written Assignments: 5 short (one paragraph to one page in length) reaction papers (giving the student's reaction, analysis, or ideas with regard to any part of the class reading): these papers are not graded, but must be turned in at some point during the semester; the papers are occasionally read in class (without identifying the author) to generate discussion
Type of Exam: Take-home essay (open-book).
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Primarily exam (though grades can be lowered if, for example, the student fails to turn in 5 reaction papers during the semester)

Course Number: 6890
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Fall
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: Land Use deals generally with public regulation of how land is used. Specifically, the course first covers the constitutional law related to land use regulation, including substantive due process, takings, equal protection, freedom of religion, and freedom of speech. The course then examines zoning, subdivision regulation, building codes, and aesthetic controls; local financing issues related to land use such as special assessments and development exactions; and the government's eminent domain power.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: Lecture and class discussion.
Written Assignments: Mid-term take-home essay and final research paper
Type of Exam: None
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Written assignments and class participation

Course Number: 6950
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 1-3
Semester Offered: Fall / Spring
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: Intensive research, writing, and editing of case note or comment and cite-checking of articles for the Wyoming Law Review. Credit earned for a grade of S/U only. Law Review membership is required. Maximum nine hours in academic career.

Course Number: 6755
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Varies
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: This course will examine how statutes are made, amended, and applied.  Priorities are:  1) legislative process in Congress and the state legislatures (especially Wyoming); and 2) statutory interpretation tools and techniques.  Rather than an exam or paper, coursework will consist of four equally weighted practical exercises in addition to participation in classroom discussions.  The course will be taught in collaboration with attorneys at the Wyoming Legislative Service Office and will include exposure to the operations of the Wyoming Legislature and the constitutional, legal, and ethical considerations legislative attorneys encounter when working on legislation and with legislators. 

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: Lecture & Class Discussion
Written Assignments: TBA with the students
Type of Exam: TBA with the students
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Class participation, assignments (if any), and exam (if any).

Course Number: 6760
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Spring
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: None, however Administrative Law could be helpful.

Course Overview: Local Government Law examines the organization, powers, responsibilities, liabilities and financing of units of local government, including counties, cities, school districts and other special districts. Interrelationships among local governments, the states and the federal government are studied. Leading judicial decisions as well as state and federal constitutional and statutory provisions will be assigned. Particular emphasis is placed on the law of Wyoming and other western states.

Students are required to write a paper on a selected subject related to the law governing local government. The paper may be used to satisfy the College of Law upper class writing requirement.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling. Course materials include Professor E. George Rudolph's book on Wyoming Local Government Law, the Wyoming Constitution, selected statutes from Wyoming and other jurisdictions, and judicial decisions from the Wyoming Supreme Court as well as from federal courts and courts of other states.

Course Number: 6790
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Fall
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: Property, Contracts, and Administrative Law

Course Overview: This course focuses on the basic legal rules and principles governing the ownership and development of oil and gas, derived from a combination of property, contract, administrative, and tort law. The majority of the class will focus on the mineral interest; the nature of the interest and leasing, title, and conveyances; and conservation law; permitting, pooling, and unitization. At the completion of this course you should understand substantive legal analysis of problems that may arise during the course of oil and gas development, identify drafting and lease interpretation issues, and appreciate how attorneys use contracts and mitigate and allocate risk.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: Lecture
Written Assignments: Yes
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Written assignments and oral examination

Course Number: 6570
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Fall
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: The Payment Systems course (formerly Commercial Paper) focuses on the use of negotiable instruments (such as checks, drafts, promissory notes, and certificates of deposit) to document debts and to make payments. The course provides an overview of the banking system, the check collection process, and the use of various commercial instruments. Topics include liability for stolen checks, forged signatures, alterations, payment to impostors, insufficient funds, stop payment orders, post-dated checks, and restrictive endorsements. In addition, the rights of good faith purchasers are examined and the use of third parties (such as guarantors, sureties, and accommodation parties) to secure obligations are discussed.

The rules governing these transactions are set forth in Articles 3 and 4 of the Uniform Commercial Code and the Federal Reserve System regulations. The course emphasizes the use and understanding of the Uniform Commercial Code and the Federal Reserve System regulations. Problems are employed to examine legal issues in a realistic commercial context.

Payment Systems (also referred to as Commercial Paper or Negotiable Instruments Law) is a bar examination subject in the vast majority of states, including Wyoming and Colorado.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: A problem approach is used in this course to reinforce an understanding of the legal doctrines and to emphasize the practical effect of commercial transactions and payment systems law on a lawyer's day-to-day practice.

The course is designed to address issues relevant to those students who wish to practice transactional law, as well as those who anticipate a career in commercial litigation or as a general practitioner.
Written Assignments: None
Type of Exam: Two-hour exam; one essay and 15 multiple-choice.
Basis for Grading Student Performance: 90% based on final exam; 10% attendance and class participation.
Other Comments: Payment Systems is taught during the first two-thirds of the semester. Both second and third year students are welcome to enroll. Historically, the class has been composed of both second and third year students.

Course Number: 6915
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Fall
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: COVID-19 sparked national debate regarding public health laws. This course introduces students to legal, scientific, and policy issues surrounding public health. Substantive law focuses on constitutional principles, federalism, statutory protections, and common law. In addition to infectious disease, this course discusses tobacco, obesity, firearms, and motor vehicle safety. Diverse views are welcomed.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: Active participation, class lecture and discussion, presentations, problem solving
Written Assignments: Research paper
Type of Exam: None
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Paper, participation, and presentation

Course Number: 6800
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Varies
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: Administrative Law

Course Overview: This course offers an introduction to diverse laws governing federal public lands and resources, and is valuable to anyone who plans to practice law or a related profession in the West or work for a federal land management agency. The course surveys case law and legislation spanning nearly 200 years. It begins with an historical overview of the evolution of federal land and resource policy. It then takes up the relationship between Congress and the states, exploring Congress's authority under the Property Clause and federal preemption of state laws that conflict with federal policies. A review of Executive Branch authority follows. The course then explores the substantive laws concerning water, minerals, timber, range, wildlife, recreation, and wilderness, on BLM lands, national parks, national forests, and wildlife refuges. These laws include the National Environmental Policy Act, General Mining Law of 1872, Mineral Leasing Act of 1920, National Forest Management Act of 1976, Taylor Grazing Act, Federal Land Policy and Management Act, Endangered Species Act, and Wilderness Act. Throughout the course we consider how politics, interest groups, and the public influence federal resources policy and decision making.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: Lecture and discussion.
Written Assignments: None
Type of Exam: Open book final exam.
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Student performance will be assessed on the basis of the exam, class participation, and a short, oral presentation.
Other Comments: Public Land Law is a complex and fascinating blend of law, history, science, economics, and politics. Any student who plans to remain in the West, where the vast bulk of federal public lands are found, would benefit from an introduction to these issues.

Course Number: 6915
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Fall 2019
Required: No
Course Overview:

The founding documents of the American legal and political system encapsulate, espouse and support the ideas of equality, freedom, and liberty. Yet, many laws passed by the American colonies decades before those colonies became the United State of American dealt with issues of race and gender. These early laws defined who belonged to which races and the consequences of such categorization and set the place for women in society. Accordingly, issues of race and gender in American society are intimately intertwined with law and the American legal system and were part of our history over 100 years before the formation of the United States. Historically, the law has been crucial to our understanding of race and gender and what that means to society. Over time the law has served as both a tool of oppression and of liberation. At the same time, the struggle for equality and freedom by different racial groups, women, and members of the LGBTQ+ community have helped us develop our understanding of, and have refined our commitment to, the founding principles of equality, liberty, and freedom.

Throughout this course we will explore the extremely complex and rich relationship between the law, race, and gender. The first half of the semester will provide a historical overview of these issues and explore the legal structures, theories, and policies that affect issues of race and gender in American Society. In the second half of the semester we will take that knowledge and apply it to contemporary issues of race and gender with an eye towards better understanding and seeking solutions for current problems and challenges.

This course takes a community of scholars approach meaning that the basis of learning is class engagement and discussion for which all class members are responsible. There will be weekly readings provided on-line, short writing assignments (of 1-2 pages) required periodically throughout the semester, a short in-class presentation, and a take home final. It is expected that through this work, students will leave the course with a firm grounding and understanding of the many laws and legal structures that affect and inform race and gender issues, and will be able to use that understanding to assess and address contemporary issues related to the same. This class is open to law students, master’s students, and senior level undergraduates upon permission of the instructor.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.

Course Number: 6810
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Spring
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: The course begins with some study of the law and practice relating to real estate transactions, deeds, and titles. The rest of the semester covers the law and practice relating to mortgages, foreclosure, and other financing issues in residential and commercial real estate transactions.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: Lecture
Written Assignments: None
Type of Exam: Long-answer essay exam at the end of the semester. You may use notes, outlines, books, and any other written resources you bring with you to the exam.
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Exam and class participation

Course Number: 6555
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Spring
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: This course explores the law governing contracts for the sale of goods, which is primarily embodied in Article 2 of the Uniform Commercial Code. Topics covered may include formation, warranties, risk of loss, excuses for nonperformance, and remedies for breach.

Course Number: 6830
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Fall
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: Financial institutions and other businesses often take an interest in a debtor's personal property (such as goods, equipment, inventory and accounts) to secure payment of a debt or performance of an obligation. The secured transactions course deals with the law governing security interests in personal property which is embodied primarily in Article 9 of the Uniform Commercial Code.

The course has several goals. The first is to provide students with a working knowledge of Article 9 and related bodies of law. The second goal is to use Article 9 as an example to illustrate how to approach, work with and interpret an unfamiliar statute. The third objective is to discuss and become familiar with many common forms of business transactions and how such transactions work, including loan agreements and other financing arrangements.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: A problem approach is used in the course to reinforce an understanding of the legal doctrines and to emphasize the practical effect of secured transactions law on a lawyer's day to day practice. The course is designed to address issues relevant to those students who wish to practice transactional law, as well as those who anticipate a career in commercial litigation or as a general practitioner.
Written Assignments: You will be required to complete at least one graded take-home project. In addition, I reserve the right to assign additional take-home projects, to ask for written responses to questions posed in class or to request you to hand in answers to homework problems on a periodic basis.
Type of Exam: One final exam and a mid-term exam. Exams may include a combination of multiple-choice questions and short-answer essay questions.
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Grades will be based on a student’s performance on exams, take-home projects and homework assignments. I view class participation and attendance as extremely important. Points will be added to or subtracted from a student’s final grade based on attendance and the quality of class participation.
Other Comments: Secured Transactions is a topic tested on the bar exam in many, if not most, states. Both second year and third year students are welcomed to enroll. Historically, the class has been composed of both second year and third year students.

Course Number: 6840
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Spring
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: Business Organizations is strongly recommended, but not a prerequisite. If you are planning to take Business Organizations, please consider taking Business Organizations before you take Securities Regulation but it is not required.

Course Overview: The Securities Regulation course addresses the potential liabilities associated with the offer, sale, and purchase of securities. The course provides a forum to study federal and state securities laws and the businesses, industries and individuals they govern. The course focuses on regulation of the distribution process and trading in securities. The course examines the responsibilities and liabilities of companies and various persons involved in the private and public offering of securities. The role of lawyers in the process, including both practical and creative lawyering, will also be considered. The objective of the course is to treat the subject in a comprehensive, understandable and yet intellectually challenging manner, seeking to address both theoretical concerns and practical considerations.

The laws governing these transactions are set forth in the Securities Act of 1933, the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, the SEC rules and regulations promulgated pursuant to these acts and the state securities laws. Topics to be covered include definitional issues, exemptions from registration for private offerings, the registration process, disclosure obligations, reporting requirements, insider trading liability, proxy solicitation issues and remedies and liabilities under both federal and state securities laws.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: It is anticipated that a problem approach will be used in this course to reinforce understanding of the legal doctrines and to emphasize the practical effects of securities regulations. The course is intended to address issues relevant to those students who wish to practice transactional law, as well as those students who anticipate a career in commercial litigation or as a general practitioner.
Written Assignments: You may be asked to complete one or more graded take-home projects. The instructor also reserves the right to request students to hand in answers to homework problems or other assignments on a periodic basis.
Type of Exam: A final exam is scheduled. A mid-term exam may be scheduled as well. Exams may include a combination of multiple choice questions and essay questions.
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Grades will be based on a student’s performance on exams, any take-home projects and homework assignments. I also view class participation and attendance as extremely important. Points will be added to or subtracted from a student’s final grade based on attendance and the quality of participation.
Other Comments: Both second year and third year students are welcome to enroll. While Business Organizations is recommended, it is not required. Those students who have not taken Business Organizations will not be at a disadvantage.

Course Number: 6910
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Fall
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: This class is designed to provide students with a broad overview and firm grounding in the many legal topics and issues that arise in the sports and entertainment law context.  Unique to sports law the course will review the legal and regulatory regimes governing high school, college, professional, and Olympic and International Sports.  In the entertainment context the course will explore legal and regulatory issues related to film, music, sound, television, cable, digital, publishing, and visual arts.  At the same time the course will explore topics that transcend both areas of law, including talent contracts, labor issues, agents, managers, copyright, trademark, torts, gender, and race issues. 

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: The course will meet once a week for an hour and 50 minutes. Class sessions will involve class discussion, simulations, problems and exercises to allow students the opportunity to gain experience in the types of negotiation and drafting they are likely to encounter in a sports and entertainment law practice.
Written Assignments: This course will require students to complete 3-4 short drafting assignments in conjunction with in-class simulations and exercises. Students will also be required to complete a final project consisting of 1) a short white paper; 2) an op-ed; 3) an in-class presentation. Further information regarding these assignments will be provided in the class syllabus. There is no final or final paper option. This class will not allow students to satisfy the advanced writing requirement.
Type of Exam: None
Basis for Grading Student Performance:  The basis for student grades will be 1) class participation and preparedness; 2) performance on the short drafting assignments; 3) performance on the final project

Course Number: 6915
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 2
Semester Offered: Fall
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Course Overview:  State Supreme Court jurisprudence is abundant on the rights of students, parents, and teachers in the K-12 system.  In Wyoming and Colorado, in particular, state founders enshrined a strong governmental commitment to public education that is reflected in constitutional language embracing the idea of a “free”, “uniform” system of public education.    This course will introduce students to Wyoming and Colorado state law, policy, and politics related to K-12 education. Specifically, the course will (1) examine the Wyoming and Colorado state constitutions, statutes, case law, rules, administrative law, and local and state governance impacting K-12 education; and (2) analyze both local district and state policies and procedures related to funding, grant management, school accountability and performance, local governance, state governance, federal governance, and current education topics in Wyoming and Colorado. Students will hear from state education leaders throughout the semester and have the opportunity to attend several informative education policy meetings. The interplay between the education system and other governmental entities in the states will also be studied.   

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.

Course Number: 6850
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Summer
Required: No
Prerequisites: Evidence (unless waived by instructor under special circumstances).
Recommended Courses: Professional Responsibility strongly suggested.

Course Overview: Intense two-week “boot camp” version of Trial Practice that requires more than full-time participation (i.e., at least ten hours per day). Typically meets in August.

Course Materials: Thomas A. Mauet, Trials (2d ed. 2009) (ISBN 978-0-7355-7721-3 [Note: It is STRONGLY recommended that students read the entirety of Trials during the summer, before the Institute.] Thomas A. Mauet, Warren D. Wolfson & Stephen D. Easton, Materials in Trial Advocacy (7th ed. 2011) [Note: We may make arrangements for rental of the Materials book.]
Course Format: Lectures and demonstrations by faculty members. Simulated exercises and drills featuring portions of trials (e.g., voir dire, opening statement, direct examination, cross-examination, and closing argument). Jury instruction exercise. In the second week of Institute, each student tries a non-jury trial and (usually as a member of a two-student team) a jury trial.
Written Assignments: Jury instruction exercise. Motions and briefs in some exercises. Outlines submitted in advance of in-court exercises. Trial notebooks.
Type of Exam: No final exam per se. [Jury instruction exercise graded anonymously. Other assignments cannot be graded anonymously.]
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Students are evaluated and graded on their performance in trial-related exercises in class, on their motions and briefs, and on a jury instruction exercise. All instructors use the same grading scale.
Other Comments: Experienced trial attorneys from Wyoming (plus a few from elsewhere) make up the primary faculty for the Summer Trial Institute. The Institute is presented by the American College of Trial Lawyers, the American Board of Trial Advocates, and the College of Law.

Following in-court exercises, students will be critiqued by fellow students and faculty members.

Course Number: 6615
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Fall
Required: No
Prerequisites: Income Taxation and Business Organizations
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: This course surveys the federal income tax consequences of major events in the existence of business entities and their owners including formations, contributions, operations, distributions, redemptions, and liquidations. This course compares taxation of C corporations, Limited Liability Companies, and partnerships. Students will spend significant time on statutory interpretation and along the way consider policy issues that affect how the taxation of businesses is structured and enforced under the Internal Revenue Code.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: The required textbook contains cases and problems that are included in the assigned reading. Lectures will cover the topics included in the assigned readings and students will be expected to be prepared to discuss cases and problems assigned in the readings. Students will also be expected to prepare answers to assigned problems and be prepared to present their answers to the problems when called upon.
Written Assignments: None
Type of Exam: Midterm and Final Examinations.
Basis for Grading Student Performance: There will be a midterm and a final examination. The midterm and final examinations will be of equal value in relation to each student’s grade in the course. The midterm will seek to examine on all materials covered in the course through the last class prior to the midterm. The final will cover the materials beginning after the midterm through the remainder of the course.

Course Number: 6915
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Spring
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: This class will examine how states and societies transition from violent, repressive regimes to a law-abiding and rights –respecting future.  The course explores the set of judicial and non-judicial measures that have been implemented by different countries in order to redress the legacies of massive human rights abuses.  Students are invited to write five short reaction papers or a final term paper.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: Seminar
Written Assignments: Multiple short papers or one final paper

Course Number: 6850
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Spring (Lottery)
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first and second years of law school.
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: Trial Practice is a rigorous learn-by-doing course designed to build courtroom skills. Through a combination of exercises, lectures, demonstrations, drills and complete trials, students are prepared to advocate before judges and juries.
The first half of the course focuses on basic examination and exhibit skills, including direct, cross, redirect, making and responding to objections, and the introduction and use of real and demonstrative evidence. In the sixth week, students conduct bench trials. The second half of the course builds on the basic skills and covers advanced ones, including examination of expert witnesses, opening statement, closing argument and voir dire. Jury trials are conducted in the final two weeks.

Class meets regularly for 4 hours per week except during trial weeks. In-class critiques of student performances focus on issues arising in an individuals presentation from which the entire class can learn. Additionally, many of the exercise s are videotaped and students receive individual instruction in private video-review appointments.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.

Course Number: 6330
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Fall
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: This course considers the transfer of property upon death, including the law of wills, trusts, and intestate succession.  It covers the default estate plan of intestacy; the execution, revocation, and interpretation of wills; testamentary trusts; the use of non-probate transfers as will substitutes; and restrictions on testamentary transfers.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.

Course Format: Lectures cover topics included in assigned readings. Students are expected to be prepared to discuss the assigned readings.
Written Assignments: None
Type of Exam: Final Exam
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Final Exam
Other Comments: This course is a prerequisite for Gift and Estate Taxation, Estate Planning, and the Estate Planning Practicum.

Course Number: 6860
Professor: Jason Robison
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Varies
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school. Non-law graduate students are welcomed without prerequisites.
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: Water is the essence of life. Human relationships over and with water have been a defining feature of human communities and societies since time immemorial. In light of climate change’s current and projected impacts on water resources, there arguably has never been a more important time to study and work in the field of water law and policy. With respect to this field, this course can be analogized to the Platte River: “a mile wide and an inch deep.” The course will provide students with a survey of the laws, policies, and organizations governing water allocation and management at the federal, state, tribal, and local levels in the United States. In other words, the course focuses on U.S. domestic water law and policy—rather than international water law and policy—with particular (though not exclusive) emphasis on the American West. By way of overview, the main topical units address prior appropriation; groundwater law; public rights in water resources, including key federal statutes; water organizations; interstate relations over transboundary waters; and federal and tribal reserved water rights.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Course Format: Lecture and class discussion.
Written Assignments: None
Type of Exam: Open-book, multiple-choice midterm quiz and open-book, free-slot final exam.
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Final exam, midterm quiz, and class participation.

Course Number: 6932
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semesters Offered: Fall, Spring, Summer
Required: No
Prerequisites: Successful completion of two years of law school (must include Professional Responsibility & Evidence).
Recommended Courses: Criminal Adjudication and Criminal Procedure

Course Overview: The Defender Aid Program provides representation to indigent persons in Wyoming state and federal courts.  We represent clients pending trial, on direct appeal from their convictions, and handle post-conviction matters in state and federal court

Course Format: Clinical program. Students are required to put in at least one hundred fifty hours per semester to obtain clinic credit.  This includes one-two hours per week of classroom instruction on procedural and substantive matters related to representation, three hours per week of office hours, and whatever time is necessary to fulfill your obligations in the actual representation of clients.
Written Assignments: May include client letters, motions, briefs, and other petitions and pleadings.
Type of Exam: N/A
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Summer 2015 is S/U grade. Beginning Fall 2015 letter grading. Students are expected to perform 150 hours of coursework and to perform assigned casework in a competent and timely fashion.
Other Comments: This course may be used for experiential learning credit.  Requires third year standing. Enrollment is limited to 8 students, 7 determined on a first-come, first-served basis by registration. If the registration is oversubscribed additional students will be placed on a waitlist. Completion of, or concurrent enrollment in, Criminal Procedure and/or Criminal Adjudication strongly recommended. 

Course Number: 6937
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Fall, Spring
Required: No
Prerequisites: Completed Trusts & Estates and either have taken or currently enrolled in Professional Responsibility.
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: The Estate Planning Practicum provides students the opportunity to work with low-income clients around the State of Wyoming in a transactional law setting.  Students will prepare wills, powers of attorney, advance health care directives, deeds, affidavits of distribution and other probate documents for small estates and will learn how to plan an estate for beneficiaries who are minors or who have special needs.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.
Type of Exam: No Exam
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Letter grading.
Other Comments: This course may be used for experiential learning credit.

Course Number: 6934
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semesters Offered: Fall, Spring, Summer
Required: No
Prerequisites: Successful completion of two-years of law school (must include Professional Responsibility).
Recommended Courses: Family Law, Domestic Violence and the Law, Children and the Law, Civil Procedure, Evidence, Professional Responsibility (required and may be concurrent enrollment), and Trial Practice

Course Overview: The student interns in this clinic, under the direct supervision and mentoring of the Faculty Director, handle a wide array of cases including divorce, child custody, domestic violence protection orders, stalking orders, guardian ad litem appointments in juvenile and domestic relations cases, and other family law matters. In addition, law students represent children or their parents in child abuse and neglect cases, termination of parental rights, children in need of supervision and delinquency actions. Clinic students may travel to the Wyoming Women’s Center to discuss legal issues and to represent qualifying inmates.   Working with real clients with real problems allows law students to begin the lifelong process of becoming thoughtful, responsible, and reflective lawyers. Clinic students gain critical skills in communication, information gathering, persuasion, and legal and factual analysis that prepare them to address the complex needs their clients will present.  Students gain legal experience critical to the practice of law while, at the same time, incorporating how to professionally and ethically represent a client.   Students learn to find the right combination of zealous and compassionate advocacy, are challenged to consider how the practice of law may be reformed and to embrace the professional responsibility of assisting those who may otherwise be barred from accessing the legal system. 

Course Format: Each student must be in the office between 5 and 10 hours per week. Additional office hours may be necessary to complete casework, which includes meeting with clients, negotiating with lawyers, and preparing for and making necessary court appearances. Most court appearances are in state trial courts, either circuit or district courts, but appellate opportunities may also be available. Common appearances involve representing clients in divorce, contested child custody disputes, and other family law.
Written Assignments: Drafting all necessary pleadings, correspondence, and case status review reports.  A written course evaluation, including a self-evaluation component, is also required.
Type of Exam: N/A
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Students receive a letter grade based on learning outcome, legal research and factual investigation, legal analysis, teamwork, ethical responsibilities and written and oral communication skills (a full rubric is available). Students must work at least 150 hours in the clinic, actively participate and prepare for the seminar portion, and complete all tasks to the satisfaction of the Faculty Director.

Other Comments: Preference is given to students with third year standing. Offered for a letter grade. The Family and Child Legal Advocacy clinic is limited to 6 students, with additional students upon the Director’s approval.  If the registration is oversubscribed additional students will be placed on a waitlist.

Suggested coursework includes Domestic Violence Law, Family Law and Children and the Law.

Course Number: 6920
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 2
Semester Offered: Fall, Spring, Summer
Required: No
Recommended Courses: International Law, Immigration Law, International Human Rights and Transitional Justice

Course Overview: This is an opportunity for students to engage in international human rights advocacy and asylum work under the supervision of experienced lawyers.

Course Materials: Distributed in class and posted to TWEN.
Course Format: Weekly clinic seminar and regular case supervision meetings.
Written Assignments: Will vary case by case.
Type of Exam: No Exam
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Grading will be based on a lawyering skills rubric that will be distributed at the beginning of each semester.
Other Comments:  This course may be used for experiential learning credit.  This is a unique opportunity to participate in human rights advocacy and the promotion of social justice both domestically and internationally.

Course Number: 6936
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semesters Offered: Fall, Spring, Summer
Required: No
Prerequisites: Criminal Adjudication and Criminal Procedure
Recommended Courses: N/A

Course Overview: Third-year students can gain practical legal experience in trial and appellate work through the Wyoming Prosecution Assistance Program. The program, founded more than thirty years ago, provides assistance to Wyoming County and Prosecuting Attorneys, to the Wyoming Attorney General's office, and to the United States Attorney for the District of Wyoming in criminal cases and in selected civil cases involving questions of significant public interest.

All students work under the supervision of the faculty director at the law school. The Program is heavily involved with the Wyoming Attorney General's Office, usually in representing the state in criminal appeals before the Wyoming Supreme Court. In handling these appeals, students are responsible for the entire preparation of appellate briefs and the presentation of oral argument to the Supreme Court. Students gain intensive training in appellate advocacy during the brief-editing process and in mock arguments leading up to the students Court appearance. The Program is also heavily involved in working with the twenty-three Wyoming County or Prosecuting Attorneys offices. Recent requests from those offices have included: participation in preliminary hearings on felony charges; participation in criminal trials (principally of misdemeanor charges); the preparation of motions, motion responses, jury instructions, and trial briefs in circuit and district courts; and participation in arraignments and bail hearings.

All of the programs students are expected to devote time to staffing the program office (located at the UW Office Annex). In the office, students field calls from Wyoming County and Prosecuting Attorneys, providing assistance with legal research and the preparation of legal memoranda. The program also includes a classroom component designed to enhance the students understanding of criminal practice and a prosecutors unique ethical obligations. The classroom component focuses on Wyoming criminal law and procedure (including sentencing and restitution) such that each program student will be uniquely familiar with key Wyoming criminal precedent prior to beginning practice. (Note: This will be different than in the past: the classroom component will be much more substantive dealing with Wyoming (and possibly Colorado) substantive criminal law and procedure.) Oftentimes, Wyoming prosecutors, Assistant Attorney Generals, law enforcement agents and others will be invited to address the students.

During the school year, students enroll in the Program for academic credit, earning three hours each semester for working at least 150 hours (and usually much more).

Course Format: Clinical practice and class meetings.
Written Assignments: Assignments will vary from student to student.
Type of Exam: N/A
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Summer 2015 is S/U grade. Beginning Fall 2015 letter grading. Timely performance of assigned clinic projects.
Other Comments:  This course may be used for experiential learning credit.  Requires third year standing. Enrollment is limited to 7 students determined on a first-come, first-served basis by registration. If the registration is oversubscribed additional students will be placed on a waitlist. Completion of Criminal Procedure and Criminal Adjudication prior to enrollment is required.

Beginning in the 2023-2024 school year, Criminal Procedure and Criminal Adjudication will both be required prerequisites for the Prosecution Assistance Clinic. 

Course Number: 6915
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: fall
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Recommended Courses:

Course Overview:  Students will perform the legal tasks involved in starting a business for actual clients, for hypothetical clients, or both.  Most of the course’s actual clients will likely include those referred to the group by the University of Wyoming Technology Transfer and Research Products Center and the University of Wyoming Institute of Innovation and entrepreneurship.  Legal tasks performed for the group’s clients may include advising on entity choice, drafting and filing organizational documents, assisting with intellectual property, employment, and ethical, issues, and assisting with other transactional matters.  Other activities may include attending relevant lectures and business events at the university and in the local community.

Course Materials: See the current Book List located under Scheduling.

Course Number: 6933-01
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Fall and Spring
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed Administrative Law; course limited to 3Ls only.
Recommended Courses: None

Course Overview: The Energy, Environmental and Natural Resources Law Clinic (EENR Clinic) works directly with the Wyoming Attorney General’s Office. Students work with attorneys from the Water and Natural Resources Division of the Wyoming Attorney General’s Office on cases involving the State of Wyoming, state agencies, or state officials. Work in the past has included drafting motions in nationally significant natural resource federal court cases, assisting in agency adjudicative and administrative hearings, and more. For more information, please visit the clinic website.

Course Number: 6915
Credit Hours & Type of Credit: 3
Semester Offered: Spring
Required: No
Prerequisites: Students must have completed their first year of law school.
Course Overview: This experiential class will cover fundamental legal issues of local government law.  Students will learn how local governments – cities and counties – operate within a state and federal framework.  Issues covered include:  (1) formation of local governments;  (2) change in boundaries and cooperation across boundaries;  (3) regulation of conduct;  (4) provision of services/ infrastructure and (5) generation of revenues.  Examples to illustrate key concepts will be drawn from Wyoming, Colorado, Utah and New Mexico.

Course Materials: Rather than a casebook, weekly readings will include cases and articles provided by the professor. 
Course Format: The class will meet twice each week. Students will have the opportunity to work on projects directly with city and county attorneys across the Rocky Mountain west.
Type of Exam: Assessment for the class will be based on class participation and project work product. 
Basis for Grading Student Performance: Students will spend 150 hours on the class. The total will include time in class as well as time logged working on projects outside of class.