I Had...The Time Of My Life!

If I were to create my own law school I would do just a few things differently than we do here at Washburn. First, I would change the name of the course Washburn calls Civ Pro II to Civ Pro I, and vice-versa. Second, I would raise the grade curve by a full point. And finally, I would require every student to complete at least one semester of Law Clinic. I would also make tuition free and have free doughnuts every morning. But that is a different topic.

Since I am writing about the Law Clinic, I will get right to it. I have had the rare pleasure of working in the Clinic since May of 2007. Thus, when I graduate, I will have been in the Clinic for a full year. I started working on civil cases last summer. In the fall, I added criminal cases. While not everyone will have the sort of experience I have had in the Clinic, I have observed that everyone learns a great deal about the practice of law. In fact, I would contend the Clinic is by far the single greatest educational experience of my law school career.

Professor Waugh assigned my first case last May and it is still ongoing today. It involves a lawsuit over medical bills and "insurance." It is one of those cases that would make a great movie - like The Rainmaker. There are big, powerful law firms and lawyers involved in this one and then Tai Vokins, the legal intern from the Washburn Law Clinic. My first court appearance for this case was on a motion to dismiss. The aforementioned big, powerful law firm tried to get our claims thrown out. The senior partner of the firm argued that our claims are meritless and then the little legal intern got up, argued he was wrong, and won. My thought was, "how is this guy going to tell his client that he, a senior partner at a huge law firm (who undoubtedly charges his clients a zillion dollars an hour), lost to a legal intern?" I suppose the answer is - he did not. The litigation in this case has heated up since then. I have filed motions, taken and defended depositions, and had a chance to interact with attorneys from Topeka and Kansas City.

I have also worked on criminal cases, including a Habeas Corpus Review in Federal Court. Our client is doing time for a murder and I believe he is innocent. This case has taken twists and turns just like my civil litigation. Before I graduate I will have had legal experience that not many law school graduates can claim. I will have completed a jury trial, a bench trial, successfully negotiated diversions, worked out numerous plea deals, taken and defended depositions, filed complex motions, successfully argued for those motions, and handled matters in Shawnee County District Court, Topeka Municipal Court, United States District Court and Tribal Court.

I am not going to lie - the Clinic is hard work. But, like all hard work, there is a reward. You will learn more about practicing law than you ever thought imaginable. You will develop relationships with professors that will last your entire career. Also, you will have real clients with real problems that you will learn a lot about.

We do almost everything in the clinic. If your forte is business law, we have a Transactional Clinic. The transactional interns set up non-profit corporations, standard corporations, write and negotiate contracts, insure their IRS compliance, as well as advise their clients on how to operate their business. If you are interested domestic relations, and child and family law issues, the Clinic has something for you, too. Interns working on these cases deal with issues ranging from protection from stalking, child in need of care, and truancy all the way up to and including divorce. Clinic interns represent people in a variety of family law and criminal law matters in the Kickapoo Nation Tribal Court and the Prairie Band Potawatomi Nation Tribal Court. If you are interested in general civil issues like landlord tenant, elder law (wills and estates), the Clinic is for you. And if you want to work on some of the most interesting criminal defense cases, the Clinic is for you.

I promise if you enroll in Clinic you will not regret it. You will have a marketable edge that most law students cannot compete with. The Washburn Law Clinic is the only real live client clinic in our region. While other law schools have clinics, they do not have the type of clinic we do at Washburn nor the depth of in-house supervision that we have at Washburn. They should call their clinic "externship."

I almost think we should call our clinic "Student Law Firm" because that is what we are. We are a firm with Interns as associates and Professors as partners. You will learn how other attorneys work, how you work, and how a case should be handled. If you do it right, you will finish the Clinic ready to practice law.

I hope you will all consider enrolling in the Washburn Law Clinic next semester. You will not regret it.