Upper Level Writing Presentation Certification

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Oral Certification


I certify that ____________________________________________________
                            (name of student)

has met the upper-level writing presentation requirement in

___________________________________________________________________
                         (name of course or activity)

OBJECTIVE

Each student is required to complete a rigorous writing experience after the student has earned at least 26 hours of law school credit.

A rigorous writing experience reflects the core values of supervised rewriting and individualized feedback. Students undertake supervised rewriting to better organize contents, further develop a point or thesis, recast ideas in more sophisticated language, achieve analytical flow and clarity, and furnish accurate and proper citations. Professors must provide individual feedback to each student. A single draft is generally insufficient to satisfy the upper-level writing requirement. Professors should encourage students to start the writing process early to allow time for rewriting.

CERTIFICATION

_____ The student's final written product must be of satisfactory quality as determined by the supervising professor. Moreover, any rigorous writing experience demands that the student produce a substantial amount of written work. For example, a unitary writing project such as a scholarly article, a directed research paper, or an appellate brief normally should consist of at least 20 pages or 5,000 words (excluding footnotes).

CURRICULUM

A student may meet the upper-level writing requirement by participating in a variety of writing experiences, including seminar courses, directed research, clinic, law journal, and moot court. The Associate Dean for Academic Affairs, in consultation with the supervising professors, will approve specific courses offering writing experiences that may satisfy the requirement, including an aggregate writing project consisting of a series of documents. A list of approved courses will be made available to students with pre-enrollment materials.
A student may use part of a jointly written work (such as a moot court brief) as the basis for meeting the requirement only if the student develops that part into an individual writing project under a professor's supervision.
The upper level writing requirement may be met only in a course or activity supervised by a full-time member of the faculty, other than in exceptional circumstances with advance approval of the Associate Dean for Academic Affairs.

TIMING

Students are encouraged to initiate the upper-level writing experience no later than in the next-to-last semester of law school. Failure to do so could result in a delay of graduation.

__________________________________________________________________________________
    signature of professor                     date

(approved by faculty November 6, 2006)

URLs For Links On This Page

PDF Version of this form
» http://washburnlaw.edu/current/forms/certificationwriting.pdf
Upper Level Oral Presentation Certification
» http://washburnlaw.edu/current/forms/certificationoral.php