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LawsRUs wrote:

calawgrl wrote:

LawsRUs wrote:Good news:
It seems like about 175 students are enrolled in LRWA. Which means--
Although they might add more students until the first day of classes, it seems like our class size is going to be less than 200. It's a very good news.

oohh yayy how do we know this??

If you go to myUSC >> Web Registration >> Fall 2015 >> Law Department, you can see how many people are registered in your classes and even who your professors might be. (tentatively)

Interesting.

Wish our class schedule was set in stone. I'm anxious to take care of getting books.

LawsRUs wrote:Did you guys get Torts, CivPro, and Con Law (not Contracts) for doctrinals?

(Also, thanks YAR and FN.)

I am disappointed that the administration decided to burden first semester 1Ls with both Con Law and Civ Pro. These courses are two of the most challenging courses in law school and Con Law especially is best taken after a student has a semester of law school under their belt. However, so long as faculty such as Brown are teaching the section it may be somewhat tolerable since she is rather clear and uses a very untraditional case book that presents the content with far less intimidation.

The cool thing about Con Law is that with the right exam writing structure and analytical approach you can really set yourself apart on the final exam if you take advantage of the past exam portal. While some profs remove their courses from the portal in advance since Con Law courses were taught in Spring semester the past exams might still by up. As soon as you get access to the portal search for and download the Con Law past exams for your prof and maybe even Con Law profs that you don't have just so you can get more practice. The practice exams will be critical to your success. Depending on your professor I have some practice exam ANSWERS lying around on my desktop as well. Some written by professors and others by past students that Aced the course. For those of you in Con Law, let me know if you'd like to take a look at them.

Shema wrote:

LawsRUs wrote:Did you guys get Torts, CivPro, and Con Law (not Contracts) for doctrinals?

(Also, thanks YAR and FN.)

I am disappointed that the administration decided to burden first semester 1Ls with both Con Law and Civ Pro. These courses are two of the most challenging courses in law school and Con Law especially is best taken after a student has a semester of law school under their belt. However, so long as faculty such as Brown are teaching the section it may be somewhat tolerable since she is rather clear and uses a very untraditional case book that presents the content with far less intimidation.

Damn..thanks for the heads up. I'm terrified now of getting median pwned.
I feel bad for the section not in Brown.
They probably brought ConLaw first semester to get kids to enroll in the new 1L elective Constitutional Rights second semester idk. But then they could have pushed CivPro back a semester if that was the case. But I could understand the argument for taking CivPro in the fall since people wouldn't understand some of the basic concepts when reading a case.

Excited to join you guys in the fall! I got Torts, CivPro, and Contracts.

Is it normal for us to have different core classes in different semesters? Was under the impression that 1Ls take the same classes at the same time..

junglegeorge wrote:Excited to join you guys in the fall! I got Torts, CivPro, and Contracts.

Is it normal for us to have different core classes in different semesters? Was under the impression that 1Ls take the same classes at the same time..

Hi george, I'm glad you will be joining us!
Yeah that was my impression too. . I was surprised and confused I didn't get K.

(You and FN might be in the same small section since you guys have the same doctrinals.)

junglegeorge wrote:Excited to join you guys in the fall! I got Torts, CivPro, and Contracts.

Is it normal for us to have different core classes in different semesters? Was under the impression that 1Ls take the same classes at the same time..

In the previous 4 years that I am aware of 1Ls at Gould have all taken the same three courses but with different profs depending on the section assignment. Typically the identical courses were K, Tort and Civ Pro.

Two insider reasons for the change come to mind. Last semester two profs taught two large sections. Armour taught two sections of Tort and I believe Klerman taught two sections of Civ Pro. This may indicate a shortage in faculty since it is very uncommon for a law prof at any law school to carry more than one 1L section. Another observation is that Dean Ras (former dean) usually teaches contracts and I think he is not teaching this year or semester.

The good news is that TLS wisdom tends to prevail so following much of the insights you'll read on these threads will help give you an advantage over your peers.

Shema wrote:
In the previous 4 years that I am aware of 1Ls at Gould have all taken the same three courses but with different profs depending on the section assignment. Typically the identical courses were K, Tort and Civ Pro.

Two insider reasons for the change come to mind. Last semester two profs taught two large sections. Armour taught two sections of Tort and I believe Klerman taught two sections of Civ Pro. This may indicate a shortage in faculty since it is very uncommon for a law prof at any law school to carry more than one 1L section. Another observation is that Dean Ras (former dean) usually teaches contracts and I think he is not teaching this year or semester.

The good news is that TLS wisdom tends to prevail so following much of the insights you'll read on these threads will help give you an advantage over your peers.

Thanks for the great insight, Shema.

Laws, I wouldnt start worrying about your courses yet. None of our schedules are finalized and we have no idea what administration might be trying to do by pairing these apparently difficult courses.

New Poll Up

I assume those are the only class combinations and that everyone is taking Civ Pro.

Post the number associated with your course combo in the thread as well.

ETA: #1

The booklist is up on OASIS. When are you guys planning on buying--during orientation?

# 3

#2


Also, I did some research on book prices yesterday, so I'm planning on buying some of my books from Chegg around the first week of August (b/c they have a 21 day return policy just in case my schedule changes) and for everything else, I'm probably buy it at Orientation!

It's true that usually all 1Ls are on the same schedule, and that the schedule consists of civ pro, torts, and contracts in the fall.

I know that at least in fall 2013 the school had to tweak the fall 1L schedule because some of the professors who teach 1Ls in the fall were away, i.e., visiting at other law schools for a semester. If the school is adjusting the fall schedule again this year, I suspect it is for the same reason.

Before the school made the change in fall 2013, the administration took into account how other law schools have adjusted their 1L schedules and determined that students learned just as well on a different sequence. From what I heard afterwards, that turned out to be the case with the 2013 entering class and there weren't any problems.

I understand that it may be confusing at this point, but you needn't worry. I do not think that swapping one four-unit class for another will make the fall semester any more or less difficult. I agree that con law is a difficult class. I had a hard time with it during spring semester. But so is contracts. I found contracts difficult to learn in the fall. I would not be concerned about swapping them. I think you will find 1L to be academically challenging regardless of whether you take contracts then con law, or con law then contracts. I would be hesitant to place trust in anyone who uses this scheduling change as a reason to heighten anxiety or exploit uncertainty among incoming 1Ls.

As many people have remarked, schedules are not finalized until orientation. This makes it a hassle to buy books in advance. There's no ideal solution to this. The best I can say is that this is the only semester that you'll have to buy books last minute. For the remaining five semesters of law school, you'll have your schedule and booklist finalized in advance. Also, professors will be understanding during the first week of class. When I started 1L, some of my professors put PDFs of the reading assignments (for the first week) online. This made it easy to stay on top of the reading while I waited to get books.

JPell wrote:It's true that usually all 1Ls are on the same schedule, and that the schedule consists of civ pro, torts, and contracts in the fall.

I know that at least in fall 2013 the school had to tweak the fall 1L schedule because some of the professors who teach 1Ls in the fall were away, i.e., visiting at other law schools for a semester. If the school is adjusting the fall schedule again this year, I suspect it is for the same reason.

Before the school made the change in fall 2013, the administration took into account how other law schools have adjusted their 1L schedules and determined that students learned just as well on a different sequence. From what I heard afterwards, that turned out to be the case with the 2013 entering class and there weren't any problems.

I understand that it may be confusing at this point, but you needn't worry. I do not think that swapping one four-unit class for another will make the fall semester any more or less difficult. I agree that con law is a difficult class. I had a hard time with it during spring semester. But so is contracts. I found contracts difficult to learn in the fall. I would not be concerned about swapping them. I think you will find 1L to be academically challenging regardless of whether you take contracts then con law, or con law then contracts. I would be hesitant to place trust in anyone who uses this scheduling change as a reason to heighten anxiety or exploit uncertainty among incoming 1Ls.

As many people have remarked, schedules are not finalized until orientation. This makes it a hassle to buy books in advance. There's no ideal solution to this. The best I can say is that this is the only semester that you'll have to buy books last minute. For the remaining five semesters of law school, you'll have your schedule and booklist finalized in advance. Also, professors will be understanding during the first week of class. When I started 1L, some of my professors put PDFs of the reading assignments (for the first week) online. This made it easy to stay on top of the reading while I waited to get books.

Thank you for this..and congrats on your graduation!

LawsRUs wrote:Thank you for this..and congrats on your graduation!

Thank you!

Great points JPell! You should tryout for a job at the law school (J/K). In any event, I hope you are right about the points you made. Again for those of you in Con Law first semester taking heed to TLS wisdom about how to approach doctrinal courses will give you a competitive edge in a course that as most 1L's will admit was one of the more difficult courses.

I do not say this to stir anxiety among incoming 1Ls. The whole point of this forum is to help people better deal with the rigor of law school. That being said, the chief difference between Con Law and K (Contracts) is the role of cases in Con Law versus K. Because Supreme Court issues evolve over time the case law on one issue may change 3 or more times over the course of the history of the Court. Thus Con Law, unlike contracts, requires a student to participate in a higher degree of case law analysis. For this reason too, the challenge of the Con Law exam is arguable more rigorous than K because it involves a higher level and more intricate level of analytical reasoning. The only aspect of the K course that elevates it to a point remotely close to Con Law is the interchange between the Common Law and the UCC/Restatement which complicate the study of K. Putting aside the $5 law school words and jargon, K can get complicated but most 1Ls would agree that Con Law has even more layers. Thus, giving students an opportunity to build these skills in the first semester with more introductory courses such as Torts and Contracts is a better progression into a more complicated course such as Con Law. I think it is fair to point that out to students without risk of flaring up feelings of anxiety.

I make these points to make it clear that my comments were not merely intended to insight "anxiety." Commensurate with the spirit and intent of TLS I intend only to share my own experience with similarly situated persons in hopes that we can learn from one another. I think that we can learn better from one another when we support our conclusions with facts instead of challenging one another's motives.

For those of you in Con Law, you will want to pay close attention in Law Language and Values because many of the concepts covered in the earlier part of that course are directly transferable to Con law and will definitely help you develop important writing and analytical skills needed specifically on the Con Law exam. If you would like me to point out the areas of the Law Language and Values course that relate directly to Con Law so that you can go into LAWS knowing what to pay attention for shoot me a PM and I will be happy to share that with you.

And JPell; no hard feelings. I just wanted to explain myself but I do respect the points you made and find them rather meaningful.

Does the schedule mean that people in section N only have one 8:00am class (Legal Research) on Thursday? It also looks like there is just about 3 hours of class each day, which really doesn't seem that bad if you have worked full time before... I just hope I can use my time efficiently.

You guys, I'm terrified for Con Law now....

@Joe, it doesn't seem like it. I don't think "N" means anything actually. I'm sorry about getting an 8 am class....

@hannnah, it's going to be okay I think because everybody will be on the same boat and won't know exactly what's going on. Well not everybody ( #1), but most people.

Joebear wrote:Does the schedule mean that people in section N only have one 8:00am class (Legal Research) on Thursday? It also looks like there is just about 3 hours of class each day, which really doesn't seem that bad if you have worked full time before... I just hope I can use my time efficiently.

So initially I thought that Legal Research was only one day a week (on Thursday) becuase of the designation TH. But I found that the T refers to Tuesday and the H refers to Thursday, thus Legal Research is two times a week and not one.

Polymorphic wrote:

Joebear wrote:Does the schedule mean that people in section N only have one 8:00am class (Legal Research) on Thursday? It also looks like there is just about 3 hours of class each day, which really doesn't seem that bad if you have worked full time before... I just hope I can use my time efficiently.

So initially I thought that Legal Research was only one day a week (on Thursday) becuase of the designation TH. But I found that the T refers to Tuesday and the H refers to Thursday, thus Legal Research is two times a week and not one.

Confirmed.



ETA: Had to double-check that. I wasn't sure either, but I don't remember the university designating the days of the week like that when I was registering for class in undergrad

A few pages back in the thread someone mentioned an assignment, I just wanted to check that I have the right one.

Is it the "Getting Ready for your First Legal Research Class"?
Or is there another one that I'm completely missing...

Thanks in advance!

There's an assignment? Where am I supposed to go to find the assignment?

I don't see the assignment on the portal anymore. It was about how to brief a case.

Joebear, sorry for the scare!
Oh, ok thanks Laws!

Under Library Orientation though, I still see a list of things (including reading) that need to be done before the first LRW Class, just a heads up (:

cwin25 wrote:Joebear, sorry for the scare!
Oh, ok thanks Laws!

Under Library Orientation though, I still see a list of things (including reading) that need to be done before the first LRW Class, just a heads up (:

Yeah, cwin is referring to the following assignment:

USC Law Library wrote:Please complete the following tasks before your first Legal Research (LAW 515) class so that you will be prepared to fully participate in class.

Pick up the Legal Research Course Reader at Copy Vision (Room 18). Make sure you bring the Course Reader with you to each Legal Research class session. You can also access the Course Reader here and on Blackboard under Course Documents.
Review the Legal Research Syllabus on Blackboard (in the Course Documents folder).
Read Chapters 1 and 2 in your Legal Research Course Reader.
Take the Introduction to Legal Research Quiz on Blackboard (in the Introduction to Legal Research folder)
Register your Westlaw password. Refer to the Westlaw registration info you received by email for instructions.
Register your LexisNexis password. Refer to the LexisNexis registration info you received by email for instructions.

It's under myLaw Portal > Student Services > Orientation Information (top right) > Library Orientation Information

Other than that, I haven't seen anything else.

Anyone else having issues uploading their picture? I have the appropriate size, it is saved as a jpg and I keep getting an error back.