If you are one of the students participating in teaching at Central High School next year, please check you student mail folder for information related to your class schedule for next year and other forms that should be turned in once you have enrolled for fall. 

If you are planning to take a make-up exam, your form must be submitted to Student Records by 5:00 p.m., Wednesday, April 18.

The Preliminary round of the First Year Oral Advocacy Competition was a great success! Over 40 first year students competed throughout the day and received glowing remarks from their peers. Congratulations to Mia Walters, Kaitlyn Jones, Billy Hopkins, Sean Dennis, Lacey Gullett, Chadler Hardin, Jon Hollan and Lindsey Howard as they advance to the Quarter Final Round on Wednesday in the Allen Courtroom.

There are 13 study days remaining before final exams begin.  Now is not the time to procrastinate, to make excuses, or to give less than 100%.  If you use good time management skills and plan what you are going to accomplish each day, you will be more productive and you will hold yourself accountable.  Here are some tips for finding time:

• Realize that you control your time.  With intentional behavior, you can take control of the remainder of the semester rather than feeling as though it is a roller coaster ride. Make time for what really matters.
• Work for progress in every course.  If you focus on one course to the detriment of the other courses, it creates a cycle of catch-up and stress.  Space out work on a major assignment over the days available and continue with daily work in all other courses.
• Use small pockets of time for small tasks.  Even 15 minutes can be used effectively!  Small amounts of time are useful for memory drills with flashcards or through rule recitation out loud.  Twenty minutes can be used to review class notes and begin to condense the material for an outline.  Thirty minutes can be used for a few multiple-choice practice questions or to review a sub-topic for a course. 
• Capture wasted time and consolidate it.  Students often waste up to an hour at a time chatting with friends, playing computer games, answering unimportant e-mails, watching television, and more.  Look for time that can be used more productively.  If several wasted blocks of time during a day can be re-captured and consolidated into a longer block, a great deal can be accomplished.
• Use windfall time well.  It is not unusual in a day to benefit from unexpected blocks of time that could be used.  A professor cancels class.  A study group meets for less time than expected.  An appointment with a professor is shorter than scheduled.  Rather than consider the time as free time, use it for a study task.
• Realize the power of salvaged blocks of time.  If you capture just 30 minutes of study time a day, that is 3.5 extra hours per week.  An hour per day adds up to 7 hours per week.  Time suddenly is there that seemed to be unavailable.
• Break down exam review into sub-topics.  You may not be able to find time to review the entire topic of easements intensely, but you can likely find time to review its first element intensely.  By avoiding the "all or nothing mentality" in exam review, progress is made in smaller increments.  It still gets the job done!
• Evaluate your priorities and use of time three times a day.  Every morning look at your tasks for the day and evaluate the most effective and efficient ways to accomplish everything.  Schedule when you will get things done during the day.  Do the same thing at lunch time and make any necessary changes.  Repeat the exercise at dinner time.
• Cut out the non-essentials in life.  Save shopping for shoes for that August wedding until after exams.  Stock up on non-perishable food staples now rather than shop for them every week.  Run errands now and get them over with to allow concentrating on studies for the rest of the semester.
• Boost your brain power in the time you have.  Sleep at least 7 hours a night.  Eat nutritional meals.  Your brain cells will be able to do the academic heavy lifting in less time if you do these simple things.
  

So, take a deep breath.  Take control of your time.  And good luck with the remainder of the semester.  Adapated from a post by Amy Jarmon, Texas Tech Univ. School of Law.

Adjunct Professor Steve Lyverse will teach a new course offering for Fall 2012 : In-House Counsel Legal Practice. 

Lyverse's early career was with an international accounting firm, then shifted to senior industry finance positions.  A sale of his domestic employer gave Lyverse opportunity to create the first in-house legal function for a European conglomerate. A further acquisition  offered the experience to join a large global law department.

In 2001, Lyverse was hired by Hillerich & Bradsby Co. to create their first In House Law Department.  As a result, Lyverse has 22 years of diverse legal practice in a variety of business environments.

Professors:  Celeste Hammond and Virginia Harding

Professor Celeste Hammond is best known for teaching a transactional approach to commercial real estate law.  She has published two casebooks looking at commercial real estate law from that perspective.  Commercial Leasing: A Transactional Primer, 2nd ed (Hammond with Bogart) will be the text for the course.  Professor Hammond practiced law for eight years before joining the faculty at John Marshall Law School.  She has been a visitor at Loyola University Law School where she taught this course several years ago.  Professor Hammond is committed to teaching law in the context of practice, especially with an emphasis on transactional skills training.  Thus, she brings Virginia Harding with her as a team teacher.   Professor Hammond is active in real estate bar associations and has been elected as a fellow to American College of Real Estate Lawyers and to Counselors of Real Estate (CRE).   Both Professor Hammond and Ms. Harding have taught on-line aspects of their courses.  They are enthusiastic about teaching at Louisville using this new technology.  Her bio can be found at www.jmls.edu.   She encourages prospective students to contact her at 7hammond@jmls.edu to discuss the course.

Virginia M. Harding
Practicing Attorney – Gould & Ratner LLP, Chicago

Virginia Harding is a real estate attorney whose clients have developed office parks and master planned communities.  She has been involved with all aspects of client projects starting with land acquisition and concluding when the properties are sold or leased.  She has worked on real estate transactions throughout the country.  As an adjunct professor she has taught an Advanced JD Property course and a Drafting and Negotiations Workshop.  She has also team taught with Professor Hammond using the casebook and materials that will be used for the Real Estate Transactions Course.  She brings the insights and experiences of a practicing attorney into the classroom.  Her complete bio can be found at www.gouldratner.com. 
 
Course description:  In the fall,  Real Estate Transactions will focus on the commercial lease transaction.  Leasing is one of the skills that all attorneys need to develop because clients either own properties that they wish to lease or clients are seeking to lease space or a building for their own use.  While everyone learns about landlord tenant law as part of their Property course, the only form of lease that law students and young attorneys are most likely to have seen is an apartment lease.  Every practicing attorney remembers the first time they were asked to review a lease for a client.  First the instrument was long and almost every clause seemed to be complicated and confusing.  What was important and what not?  This course will make use of a form office lease developed by attorneys from the American Bar Association, Leasing committee.   The course will give students an opportunity to examine an office lease in detail.  It will provide insights as to what is important to the landlord and what is important to the tenant, what business motivations support the goals of the parties to the lease.  Students will develop a number of critical skills:  the art of interviewing and asking clients questions; drafting lease provisions and modifying lease clauses to reflect the terms of the deal.  This course will be taught using a variety of distance learning techniques - video teleconferencing, materials and lectures posted on Blackboard, e-mails and conference calls.  Students will complete some assignments individually and will complete others as group projects.  In addition to written assignments, students will also do a lease negotiation.  There will be a final take-home project rather than a final exam. 

Student Nominations for the Louis D. Brandeis American Inn of Court are now being accepted.

The Inn's purose is to promote professional skills and values, with a special emphasis upon ethical and responsible advocacy in state and federal courts.  Each Inn consists of distinguished members of the bench and bar, as well as a limited number of carefully selected students.

If you would like Dean Chen to nominate you for student membership in the Louis D. Brandeis American Inn of Court during the 2012-2013 academic year, please send an email to Ms. Wimberg (b.wimberg@louisville.edu) by Friday, April 13.  Selection is based upon your demonstrated interest in advocacy and your student leadership or academic record.  

The Brandeis Inn hosts an orientation reception for new members.  Thereafter, the Inn will meet six times during the academic year on Tuesday evenings.  At each meeting, members of the Inn will participate in an educational program and enjoy a meal together.   Information regarding meeting dates for the 2012/2013 academic year will be circulated to nominees.

Stuart Adams teaches Law Practice Management. He served as legal counsel for public sector economic development agencies and has been in private practice for over 35 years, assisting entrepreneurs on business start-ups and business management issues. He is a founding equity member and served on the executive committee of a multi-disciplinary technology and business management consulting company, as president of the Entrepreneur Society, co-founder of the Bluegrass Inventors Guild, board of directors of The Venture Club of Louisville, and boards of several technology groups. He volunteers as a certified Mentor for SCORE, a United States Small Business Administration resource partner.

Congratulations!  You are about to finish another semester in law school.  Here are some tips to make the most of the last two full weeks of classes in preparation for finals:

• Do not skip classes.  Professors often give information about the exam during the last few classes.  In addition, there is a good chance that there will be questions on the exam specifically on the last week’s material.
• Attend all review sessions that your professors offer.  Professors provide review sessions to help you do well on the exam.  Whether the session is a professor-led review of the material or based on questions and answers, you can use the session to your advantage.  If you are confused about certain areas, then this is the time to get the material straight.  If you think you understand the material, then this is the time to “test” your depth of understanding.
• If there are not scheduled review sessions, ask your professors any questions that you have this week.   Once classes are over, many professors work from home or work in their offices during limited hours.  Yes, you could e-mail or telephone the professor regarding your questions; however, there is no substitute for being there face-to-face.
• Try to have all of your reading and outlining completed by April 20.   You want to allow yourself plenty of time for learning your outlines, memorizing black letter law, and applying the concepts through practice questions. 
• Evaluate your status in each course.   Determine which topics and sub-topics still need to be learned for each course.  Determine which topics and sub-topics just need to be reviewed.  Determine how many practice questions need to be completed for each topic and sub-topic.  Prioritize your studying tasks.  Be realistic. 
• Map out your plans for each day for the next two weeks.   A monthly calendar format may help you to see when your exams are, when papers are due, when other projects may be due.  Mark down review sessions being held by professors.  For each day, indicate the course(s) you plan to study, the topics or sub-topics for that course, and the hours of study. 
• Maximize your study time within your plan.   Decide whether you learn better by studying one course all day or by mixing up two or even three courses in the same day.  Decide when you are most alert and place the most difficult tasks (intense learning and memorization for many students) in those time slots.  Use time slots when you are less alert for tasks that you find easier (review of material already learned, practice questions, and flashcards for many students). 
• Re-check the exam schedule to make sure that you have written the correct days and times down for all of your exams.   Nothing can be more distressing than to find out that you missed an exam because you were not careful enough in noting the dates and times on your calendar.  If in doubt, find out now.
• Have a talk with your significant others about the fact that you will be studying for exams and need their understanding.   Have a heart-to-heart with your friends, parents, spouse, children, and any others who need to be cooperative with your efforts.  Schedule needed babysitters now.   

It is the student's responsiblity to read all of the registration instructions.

1. Please check your Summary of Account on ULink to make sure that you do not have any financial holds or parking tickets on your account.  If you have these types of holds on your account, you will not be able to register for classes.
2. Employment Certification.  This form is only available in hard copy in the Office of Student Records, 217.  Every student must complete a new Employment Certification Form before each semester's registration.  Pursuant to ABA Standard 304, "[A] student may not engage in employment for more than 20 hours per week in any semester in which the student is enrolled in more than 12 class hours."
3. Pre-Registration Permission Forms.  The deadline to submit your Summer 2012 and/or Fall 2012 form(s) is 5:00 p.m., Monday, April 9.  Pre-Registration Permission Forms are available outside 217.  A Pre-Registration Permission Form must be completed by: 

• students wanting to take non-law school classes;
• dual degree students;
• full-time students wanting to register for more than 16 hours, and part-time students wanting to register for more than 12 hours;
• students wanting to register for an Independent Study; and
• students requesting to change divisions.

All registration forms are available outside office 217 and can also be accessed online at http://www.law.louisville.edu/academics/registration-forms.    
 

Please contact Dean Ballard if you would like to schedule an appointment for academic advising or registration advising.  Office 212, kimberly.ballard@louisville.edu, or 852-8956. 

If you have questions concerning registration or forms, please contact Barbara Thompson.  Office 217, barbara.thompson@louisville.edu, or 852-6367.