There will be 3 seats available for U of MN students in Spring 2015. The instructor is Prof. Diane Marie Dube, J.D., M.P.A. Class will meet on Fridays from 10 to 11:50 am at William Mitchell College of Law.
Legal Scholarship for Equal Justice (called Equal Justice Applied Research at St. Thomas) is a seminar offered jointly by the four Minnesota Law schools. The class meets at a different law school each year (William Mitchell in 2015) and is open to students from all four schools. This class is not an internship, but rather a three-credit research course.
Note: The first class session is Friday, January 16; the last class session & the Continuing Legal Education Program will be Friday, April 24. The drop deadline for this class is January 2.
Students choose a research topic from the LSEJ research topic list or a topic of their own choosing that advances equal justice. Students must have an attorney supervisor and are encouraged to finalize their topic choice before the class convenes. Classroom sessions focus on the development of project topics, research skills needed for equal justice issues, policy analysis and problem solving, working collaboratively, the role of the public interest lawyer, and additional topics of interest to the seminar participants. Class members are linked with the attorneys whose legal issues generated their projects. These attorneys serve as "field contacts" to help supervise the project.
In addition, students should expect to spend significant time on field work with their field contacts or other local public interest practitioners, and in gathering information for their paper. Through this field work, students will gain an understanding of public interest practice in general, the legal issues involved in their individual projects, and the real world implications of their topics.
Students’ completed works will be presented before a CLE audience of lawyers on Friday, April 24, and will be made available to practitioners, students, faculty and others on the LSEJ website.
Required text: Bardach, Eugene, A Practical Guide for Policy Analysis (4th edition recommended; 3rd edition acceptable)