Legal Analysis, Writing & Research
Legal Analysis Writing & Research
LAWR Department Rules - August, 2008
Legal Analysis, Writing & Research is nationally recognized. U.S. News & World Report ranks Rutgers - Camden Legal Writing # 11, as voted on by other legal writing professors from around the country. As part of the Lawyering Programs, Legal Analysis, Writing & Research is integrated with the school's clinics, competitive moot court, and pro bono programs. This interdependence and client-centered focus is reflected in the collaboration among faculty. Many legal writing faculty teach extensively in or work with the clinical and pro bono programs.
The first-year legal writing courses focus on predictive interoffice memos in the fall and briefs and oral advocacy in the spring. In both semesters, students write multiple drafts of assignments. Students also have the opportunity to receive individualized feedback from their professors during scheduled conferences. Classes have a student-teacher ratio of approximately 18 to 1. Teaching assistants are an integral part of the first-year program, earning academic credit and grades for their work. The upper-level curriculum is designed to enhance the depth of student knowledge and also to introduce students to more sophisticated techniques of persuasion, drawing on classical rhetoric, psychology theory, creative writing, and visual design theory. The law school also offers multiple sections of writing courses each summer.
Legal writing faculty are dedicated to both teaching and scholarship. They present
regularly at national and regional conferences and serve on the boards and committees
of national legal writing organizations. Many of the legal writing faculty have
also received competitive grants for their teaching and scholarship. And several
faculty members have been selected to attend scholarly writing workshops and
to be facilitators at those workshops. They regularly conduct continuing legal
education seminars and publish scholarship on the practice and teaching of law.
In 2006, the Legal Writing Institute selected Rutgers - Camden as the host of the
LWI Idea Bank. With nearly 2,100 members, LWI is the world's largest organization dedicated to advancing the field of legal writing.
Click here for the LWI website.
Professor Ruth Anne Robbins is the current president of the Legal Writing Institute.
For more information about the Legal Analysis, Writing & Research, please contact the current Chair of the Legal Analysis, Writing & Research, Professor Sarah E. Ricks, at:
sricks@camden.rutgers.edu.
Persuasion Conference
In September 2008, the LAWR department organized a conference about the theories and scholarship of persuasion in legal writing and lawyering. The conference was sponsored by both Rutgers School of Law - Camden and Wyoming College of Law. The speakers were invited from law schools around the country.
Persuasion Conference Description of Presentations
Persuasion Conference Schedule at a Glance