Advanced Legal Research

Advanced Legal Research offers students an opportunity to gain in-depth working knowledge of legal research methods and resources. The course will emphasize use and comparison of a broad range of legal research tools, with a focus on electronic materials. The course will review the complete range of federal and state primary sources, diving deeper to cover topics critical to practical legal research, such as how to work with court dockets and how to track down superseded statutes; in addition, we ll introduce two other critical areas of legal research, legislative history and administrative materials; finally, we will survey all major secondary resources and practice aids for efficient and effective research. In tackling each of these areas, students will become expert in the use of Lexis and Westlaw, but will also be introduced to a number of other subscription-based and free resources for conducting quality legal research. Upon completion of this course, students should be able to evaluate research options and make choices that best suit the widest possible variety of modern legal research situations.

This course section will meet in person every week for two hours. Students will have several opportunities to assess their progress in the course, through a combination of shorter and more in-depth research assignments. The process of researching these hypotheticals will provide students with an opportunity to review all the studied resources within the context of discreet substantive questions, and develop their skills at conveying the fruits of their research to others. In keeping with ABA regulations requiring substantive and meaningful interaction between instructor and student and among students, students will actively participate in weekly discussion board prompts in Canvas, as a substantial portion of their participation grade for the course.