LAW 7867

First Amendment Law Clinic

Course Description

Course information provided by the Courses of Study 2024-2025.

This will be the first semester of the newly-created First Amendment Clinic. Students will engage in litigation and policy analysis supporting the interests of news outlets, journalists, researchers, and other newsgatherers in aid of their critical function of reporting and communicating important news and information, as well as human rights advocates, political activists, and other individuals targeted based on their expression. The Clinic's cases involve the intersection of Freedom of Information laws or the First Amendment with several substantive areas of law related to the promotion of social justice: immigration, criminal justice, scientific integrity, democratic institutions and norms, human rights, journalism, and internet speech. Students will have the opportunity to vet potential cases, conduct offensive and defensive legal research, write party and amicus briefs, and, if they continue in the clinic next year, may have the possibility of conducting oral argument. The First Amendment Clinic is committed to teamwork and developing student's collaborative skills, and students will have the opportunity to work on these skills in tandem with members of other clinics with which we are co-counseling. In addition, in the clinic seminar, practitioners in the field will speak to the class to provide additional practical insight to students. Finally, students will have the option to visit a newsroom as part of the clinic's "field trip" toward the end of the semester. Students who sign up for the clinic will be required to participate in a "bootcamp" to take place the weekend after the first week of classes. To apply, please submit a resume, statement of interest, short writing sample, and a transcript.

When Offered Spring.

Course Attribute (CU-CEL)
Satisfies Requirement Fulfills the experiential learning reqiurement.

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