Overview
The Day Division course of study consists of three academic years of full-time study. Under the regulations of the Law School, Standards of the American Bar Association, and the Rules of the Board of Bar Examiners of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, only those students who can devote substantially all of their working time to the study of law are eligible to enroll in the full-time Day Division and to complete their law study in three years.
Semester Hour Requirements
The academic year consists of two semesters: the first, or fall, semester commencing in September, and the second, or spring, semester commencing in January. The Day Division requires six semesters of class work. A total of 84 semester hours is required to receive the Juris Doctor degree.
Curriculum
Day Division Requirements
First Year, First Semester Courses, 15 Credits
First Year, Second Semester Courses, 14 Credits
Second Year, 24-32 Credits
| LAW-2315 | Professional Responsibility | 3 |
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| Electives | |
Third Year, 24-32 Credits
Notes:
- Courses will have final exams in both the fall and spring semesters. See Rules and Regulations, Section Grades and Examinations.
- Second- and third-year students may not enroll in fewer than 12 credits nor more than 16 credits in a semester, and may not enroll in fewer than 27 credits nor more than 30 credits in the academic year. NOTE: No more than 12 credits from clinical programs/externships may be counted toward the degree.
- Professional Responsibility is a required course. It must be taken by Day Division and Evening Division students any time after the first year.
- All students must complete a minimum of 84 credits in order to receive the Juris Doctor degree.
- Students must complete the Legal Writing Requirement.
- Students must complete 6 Experiential Learning credits.
- Day students who have received conditional admission to the dual degree J.D./Tax LL.M. program must defer taking Constitutional Law until the second semester of their second year in order to take Basic Federal Income Tax in the second semester of the first year.
- Students who are enrolled in the Accelerated JD Program are subject to the specific rules and curricular requirements of that program.
Learning Outcomes
Adopted by the Suffolk University Law School Faculty in April 2017
These learning outcomes identify the desired knowledge, skills, and values Suffolk University Law School believes its students should master upon their successful graduation.
- In accordance with ABA Standard 302(A), the successful Suffolk graduate should know and understand substantive and procedural law. Specifically, graduates should:
- Learn the fundamental principles of Civil Procedure, Constitutional Law, Contracts, Criminal Law, Professional Responsibility, Property, and Torts.
- Comprehend substantive and procedural law through elective coursework appropriate to the professional and intellectual interests of each student.
- In accordance with ABA Standard 302(B), the successful Suffolk graduate should be able to perform legal analysis and legal research, solve problems, and communicate effectively in the legal context. Specifically, graduates should demonstrate the ability to:
- Analyze legal issues orally and in writing by critically reading legal authority, synthesizing rules, evaluating facts, applying law to facts, and solving problems.
- Conduct accurate, thorough, and efficient legal research.
- Communicate in a concise, organized, professional, and timely manner appropriate to the audience and circumstances.
- In accordance with ABA Standard 302(C), the successful Suffolk graduate should understand and exercise proper professional and ethical responsibilities to clients and the legal system. Specifically, graduates should demonstrate the ability to:
- Identify ethical issues and resolve them in a manner consistent with the law and rules governing lawyers.
- Maintain practice competencies through knowledge of relevant law, development of applicable skills, and understanding current practice technologies.
- Understand and apply a lawyer’s ethical duties to clients, including those associated with client centered representation in a world of diverse clients.
- Fulfill the public responsibilities of lawyers.
- In accordance with ABA Standard 302(D), the successful Suffolk graduate should demonstrate other professional skills needed for competent and ethical participation as a member of the legal profession. Specifically, graduates should demonstrate the ability to:
- Develop and analyze facts.
- Counsel clients.
- Negotiate on behalf of clients.
- Engage in self-evaluation toward life-long professional development, competence, and well-being.
Required Courses
Civil Procedure
Litigation of the modern unitary civil action. Jurisdiction of state and federal courts; law applied in federal courts; pleading, pretrial motions, and discovery; trial by jury and evidentiary law; the binding effects of adjudications.
Constitutional Law
Survey of the history and development of constitutional law in the United States, including the federal system, the commerce clause, intergovernmental relations, due process, equal protection, police power, taxation. Analysis of selected decisions of the United States Supreme Court.
Contracts
Contracts defined and classified; capacity of parties; nature and legal effect of offer and acceptance; consideration; fraud, mistake and undue influence; statute of frauds; types of illegality; interpretation of language; operation of law; effect of express and implied conditions; performance of conditions; waiver of conditions; rescission of contracts; performance; excuses for nonperformance, including novation, alteration and impossibility of performance, breach of contract and remedies; damages, nominal and compensatory; quasicontracts, introduction to the Uniform Commercial Code; professional responsibility of the lawyer in contract law.
Criminal Law
The course emphasizes the general principles, sources, and purposes of the criminal law, including the following doctrinal issues which apply to crimes in general: the act requirement, the mens rea requirement, causation, liability for attempted crimes, accomplice liability, defenses, and criminal code interpretation. Additionally, the course studies one or more specific crimes in-depth, including homicide, and repeatedly raises the question: how well does American criminal law fulfill its goals?
Legal Practice Skills
The Legal Practice Skills Program is a two-semester, three-credit program for first year students including (a) an orientation to law school, the sources of law, and the study of law; (b) instruction in the use of the law library and legal research tools; (c) practice in issue analysis and the writing of legal memoranda; (d) preparation of trial briefs and oral arguments; and (e) an introduction to computerized legal research systems. The program is designed to prepare the student for the writing and research work expected of the modern practitioner.
Property
A study of the acquisition, ownership, and transfer of property both personal and real, including an analysis of ownership concepts, rights of possession, donative transactions, future interests, concurrent interests, landlord and tenant issues, the conveyancing system and governmental regulations.
Torts
General principles, sources and policies of modern tort law, including intentional torts (such as assault, battery and false imprisonment), negligence, strict liability, and products liability. Special attention is paid to the elements of recovery in negligence, including the standard of care, duty problems, and causation, to defenses, including comparative negligence and assumption of risk, and to principles of joint liability, contribution, and imputed liability. Recent statutory changes in these tort principles are also addressed.
Experiential Learning
ABA Standards 303 and 304 [PDF] require all students entering law school beginning in fall 2015 to complete six credits of experiential courses in order to graduate.
Experiential courses fall into three categories
- A Law Clinic. In a Law Clinic, students are provided with substantial lawyering experiences that involve advising or representing actual clients. Law Clinics include direct supervision of the students’ performance by faculty; opportunities for performance, feedback from faculty, and self-evaluation; and include a weekly seminar. Most full-year Clinics are offered for ten credits, six of which count towards this experiential requirement. Part-time Clinics and “Law Labs” are offered for fewer experiential credits (students should consult the course description for each part-time Clinic or Law Lab for the exact number of experiential credits offered).
- An Externship. An externship includes a field placement that provides students with a substantial lawyering experience that is reasonably similar that of a lawyer advising or representing clients or engaging in other lawyering tasks, as well as a classroom component or other means of faculty-guided reflection. An Externship also includes direct supervision of the students’ performance by faculty and/or a site supervisor; opportunities for performance, feedback from faculty and/or site supervisor, and self-evaluation. Students in Externships will sign a written agreement outlining the terms of their Externship and their educational achievement will be evaluated by a faculty member. Externships are offered for between 1 and 5 credits.
- A Simulation Course (listed below). Simulation courses include a classroom instructional component in which students are provided substantial experiences similar to those of lawyers advising or representing clients or engaging in other lawyering tasks in a set of facts and circumstances devised or adopted by faculty. Simulation courses also include direct supervision of the students’ performance by faculty, multiple opportunities for performance, and self-evaluation. Simulation Courses are offered for between 1 and 3 credits. The following courses meet the definition of "simulation course" as required by the ABA. This list is not all inclusive - additional courses will be added as appropriate:
Additional Simulation Courses:
| LAW-2265 | Advanced Legal Writing | 3 |
| LAW-2400 | Advanced Practice Skills | 2 |
| LAW-2518 | Appellate Practice | 3 |
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| Bankruptcy Moot Court Team | |
| LAW-2096 | Bankruptcy Reorganizations | 2 |
| LAW-2555 | Business Planning | 2 |
| LAW-2945 | Business of Practice: Hit the Ground Running | 2 |
| LAW-2998 | Coding the Law | 2 |
| LAW-2046 | Decision Making and Choice Management | 3 |
| LAW-2066 | Design Thinking for Lawyers & Business Professionals | 2 |
| LAW-2138 | Drafting Wills and Trusts | 3 |
| LAW-2951 | E-Discovery Law | 2 |
| LAW-2452 | Employment Law: Lawyering Approach | 4 |
| LAW-2678 | Energy and Natural Resources | 2 |
| LAW-2669 | Entrepreneurship, Venture Capital, and The Law | 3 |
| LAW-2160 | Environmental Law Seminar | 3 |
| LAW-2386 | Federal Indian Law and the Rights of Indigenous Peoples in the U.S. | 3 |
| LAW-2976 | Forensics | 2 |
| LAW-2957 | Housing Discrimination Law, Theory and Practice: Brainstorming and Implementing Solutions to Discrimination | 2 |
| LAW-0082 | Human Rights Project | 2 |
| LAW-2331 | International and Comparative Legal Research | 2 |
| LAW-0066 | International Insolvency Law Moot Court Team | 2 |
| LAW-2225 | Interviewing and Counseling | 2 |
| LAW-2253 | Law Practice Planning: Law As a Career And an Enterprise (seminar) | 2 |
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| Legal Practice in International and Comparative Law | |
| LAW-2156 | Lawyering: Smart Machines / Legal Tech | 3 |
| LAW-2088 | Massachusetts Housing Law Drafting and Advocacy | 2 |
| LAW-2288 | Mediation | 3 |
| LAW-2988 | Mediation Skills Training | 1 |
| LAW-2414 | Movement Lawyering | 2 |
| LAW-2987 | Negotiating Business Transactions: A Simulation Course | 3 |
| LAW-2283 | Negotiation | 2 |
| LAW-2807 | Negotiation & Mediation | 4 |
| LAW-2831 | Patent Litigation Practice | 2 |
| LAW-2301 | Patent Prosecution I - Drafting Formerly: Patent Application Practice I | 2 |
| LAW-2531 | Practice Ready Legal Research | 2 |
| LAW-2304 | Pre-Trial Civil Litigation | 3 |
| LAW-2299 | Private Placements & Venture Capital Practicum | 2 |
| LAW-2958 | Problem Solving: Legal Writing And Research for Practice | 2 |
| LAW-2975 | Process Improvement and Legal Project Management | 2 |
| LAW-2357 | State Criminal Practice | 2 |
| LAW-2457 | Trademark Practice: PTO | 2 |
| LAW-2986 | Transactional Skills | 3 |
| LAW-2736 | Transactional Skills: Intel Property | 2 |
| LAW-2009 | Trial Advocacy | 2 |
| LAW-2363 | Trial Advocacy Intensive | 3 |
| LAW-2970 | Twenty-First Century Legal Profession | 2 |
| LAW-2799 | Urban Mechanics: Boston Practicum | 2 |
FAQ
Q: Can credits earned for trial team, moot court and other simulation based competitions qualify as a simulation course or count towards the required experiential credits?
A: No, unless these activities are part of or accompanied by a required classroom component.
Q: Does Pro Bono or other work experience count?
A: No, only activities that are credit bearing count.
Q: Can one course satisfy the Legal Writing Requirement and experiential credits?
A: No, one course cannot satisfy both the upper level writing requirement and the experiential learning requirement.
Requirements
Guidelines for Completion
Students entering Fall 2015 or later are subject to the Experiential Learning and Professional Development Requirements.
Prior to graduation, every student must satisfactorily complete:
- Six credits of upper-level experiential learning courses in accord with ABA Standards 303 & 304,
- Two continuing legal education seminars, and
- A minimum of 50 hours of practice-based learning completed through in any of the following ways:
- First Year Summer Internship Program-Judicial placement;
- 50 hours of legal work completed through the Pro Bono Program; or
- 50 hours of legal work completed through the supervision of an attorney.
Upon completion of Sections 2 and 3 of this requirement, all students must submit certification of completion to the Office of Academic Services.
Part-time students in the Evening Division are exempt from section 3 of the requirement, but are encouraged to complete it.
Guidelines for completing Section 1:
Experiential opportunities are essential in preparing to be ready to work with real clients solving real legal problems. Toward that end, students are required to complete six (6) credits of experiential courses in order to graduate. Experiential courses fall into three categories: (1) a law clinic that provides students with substantial lawyering experiences that involve advising or representing actual clients; (2) an externship that includes a field placement that provides students with a substantial lawyering experience that is reasonably similar to that of a lawyer advising or representing clients or engaging in other lawyering tasks, as well as a classroom component; and (3) a simulation course in which students are provided substantial experiences similar to those of lawyers advising or representing clients or engaging in other lawyering tasks in a set of facts and circumstances devised or adopted by faculty.
All experiential education courses (clinics, externships, and simulations) will conform with ABA Standards 303 and 304.
Guidelines for completing Section 2:
It is important for law students to develop an appreciation for the importance of continuing legal education (CLE) and become active members of the legal community. To promote law student professional development, the Law School requires every student to attend two continuing legal education seminars prior to graduation. Students are encouraged to attend member free programming delivered through the Boston and Massachusetts Bar Associations identified as “Suffolk PDR,” but may attend any program offered through other CLE providers that meet these guidelines. In order for a CLE seminar to qualify as satisfying Section 2, the program must: (1) have a minimum duration of 75 minutes; (2) provide professional education for licensed lawyers related to substantive law, practice and procedure, lawyer ethics and the rules of professional conduct, practical experiences in legal practice, and/or current cutting-edge issues related to legal practice and the delivery of legal service; and 3) be delivered live and attended in person. Students must register for each CLE program prior to attending and are responsible for obtaining a certificate of completion and submitting it to the Office of Academic Services. CLE qualification questions should be addressed to your PCD counselor or the Associate Dean for Professional & Career Development.
Guidelines for completing Section 3:
Practical work experience is an essential part of legal training. Students may satisfy the practice-based learning requirement by completing a minimum of 50 hours of legal work under the supervision of an attorney through part-time or summer employment, the Law School’s Pro Bono Program, and/or a First Year Summer Internship Program- Judicial placement. All Day Division students must submit one or more completed Professional Development Requirement Form [PDF] - Employment Certifications to the Office of Academic Services after they complete 50 hours of paid or volunteer work for a licensed attorney or judge.
Legal Writing Requirement
Suffolk Law's legal writing program has been ranked in the Top 10 in the nation from 2013 to 2019 by USNews and World Report. Here are the policies and requirements for Legal Writing at Suffolk Law.
Prior to graduation each student must complete a substantial piece of legal writing that demonstrates both proficiency in writing skills and mastery of the subject matter, known as the “Legal Writing Requirement.” It is strongly recommended that students complete the Legal Writing Requirement no later than their next-to-last semester prior to graduation. To satisfy the Legal Writing Requirement, students must satisfy the rules, requirements, and procedures listed below.
- General Rules
- A paper intended to satisfy the Legal Writing Requirement must be substantial, meaning a length of at least 20 typewritten pages of double-spaced text (at least 4,000 words, not counting appendices). If in the judgment of the supervising faculty member, two or more pieces of written work cumulatively are the equivalent of a substantial piece of legal writing, they may jointly qualify to satisfy the Legal Writing Requirement.
- The student’s research and writing for the paper should reflect the student’s own individual effort. It should be the student’s original work. A writing that is in whole or in part a product of plagiarism does not meet the standards of this requirement, much less the rules related to Academic Integrity set out in Regulation II (F), which should be reviewed by the student at the outset and which governs the student’s conduct. The student may not receive any assistance on the paper from anyone, unless the supervising faculty member has given the student express permission. The paper, or substantially the same paper, must not have been submitted for credit in any previous course. If in extraordinary circumstances, a student is authorized to submit the same work, or parts of the same work, in satisfaction of more than one requirement, written consent of all persons to whom the work is to be submitted must be obtained in advance and be on file with the Academic Services Office. To assure compliance with the rules related to academic integrity, and in order to submit a paper to satisfy the Legal Writing Requirement, each student should be given a copy of this Legal Writing Requirement and shall certify before undertaking it that the student has read and understood the Legal Writing Requirement, including the rules relating to Academic Integrity (Regulation II (F)).
- Each student should use The Bluebook, A Uniform Manual for Citation or its equivalent for all citations.
- The student’s paper must demonstrate proficiency in writing skills and a mastery of the subject matter. In assessing whether the student has succeeded, the following criteria will be relevant:
- the quality of the student’s research;
- the manner in which the student treated and examined open questions;
- the creativity of the student’s ideas or synthesis of those of others;
- the organization of the paper;
- the clarity of the writing;
- the quality and accuracy of the analysis;
- the editing and proofreading of the paper;
- the student’s understanding of the topic; and
- the degree to which the student’s paper concisely and simply communicates the student’s ideas and analysis.
- In the discretion of the supervising faculty member, the faculty member may consider other factors in determining the student’s proficiency in writing skills and a mastery of the subject matter, including the student’s failure to meet any of the established requirements, procedures or deadlines.
- Each student must file a form with the Academic Services Office by his or her last semester prior to graduation, indicating the manner in which the Legal Writing Requirement will be satisfied and making the required certification. It is strongly recommended that students complete the Legal Writing Requirement no later than their next to last semester prior to graduating. A student may satisfy the Legal Writing Requirement in only one of the following ways:
- Full-time faculty supervised writing: A student may satisfy the Legal Writing Requirement by writing a paper under close supervision or oversight by a member of the full-time faculty, certified by the faculty member as meeting the standards of the Legal Writing Requirement. For example, a paper written for a course or seminar, or work as a directed study project or work prepared as a research assistant to a full-time faculty member, may qualify.
- Adjunct faculty supervised writing: A student may also satisfy the Legal Writing Requirement by writing a paper under close supervision or oversight by a member of the adjunct faculty in a course or seminar, with the approval of an Associate Dean, and certified by the adjunct faculty member as meeting the standards of the Legal Writing Requirement.
- Journal writing: If the student is a member of the Journal of High Technology Law, Journal of Health & Biomedical Law, Law Review, or Transnational Law Review, the student may satisfy the Legal Writing Requirement by writing a case comment, note, or other document that has been approved by that publication's Faculty Advisor(s), by writing it under close supervision or oversight by a member of the full-time faculty, certified by the faculty member as meeting the standards of the Legal Writing Requirement. The submitted writing must be accepted for publication or certified by the Board of Editors as of publishable quality. If the student is not a member of an Honor Board, a student may satisfy the Legal Writing Requirement by writing a case comment selected through the summer author competition and accepted for publication.
- Moot Court writing: If the student is a member of the Moot Court Board, a student may satisfy the Legal Writing Requirement by completing a bench memorandum, brief, or other writing under close supervision or oversight by a full-time faculty member and certified by the faculty member or the faculty advisor to the Moot Court Board as meeting the standards of the Legal Writing Requirement. Other writing may include writing for the Journal of Trial and Appellate Advocacy, if it is accepted for publication in the Journal, or certified by the Board of Editors as of publishable quality, and otherwise meets the standards of the Legal Writing Requirement.
- Writing for competition: A brief prepared for an interscholastic moot court competition may be used to satisfy the Legal Writing Requirement only if such work is completed under close supervision or oversight by a full-time faculty member and is certified by the faculty member as meeting the standards of the Legal Writing Requirement. If the rules of a competition prohibit faculty involvement in a student’s preparation of a brief for the competition, then that brief may not be used to satisfy the Law School’s Legal Writing Requirement, unless the brief is substantially revised under the close supervision of a faculty member after the conclusion of the competition. No student may use a co-authored or team brief to satisfy the Legal Writing Requirement unless the supervising faculty member certifies that the student wrote a distinct portion of the brief that independently meets the standards of the Requirement.
- Restriction on fulfilling the experiential learning requirement: A course that is used for the Legal Writing Requirement may not also be used to satisfy the Experiential Learning requirement.
- Procedures, Requirements, and Deadlines Fulfilling the Legal Writing Requirement requires due diligence and steady progress by the student involved. Every student must follow the procedures, requirements, and deadlines below in order to complete the Legal Writing Requirement, except as expressly modified by the supervising faculty member to fit the needs of a paper for a course or alternative described in section H (1) (f) (i-v). These procedures, requirements, and deadlines are ordinarily the minimum that students should be expected to meet. No student shall seek exemption from these Legal Writing Requirement procedures, requirements, and deadlines except for reasons of severe illness or for personal emergencies of the most serious nature. Prior to the due date of the paper, students must submit a signed request for extension to the supervising faculty member, which sets forth in detail the extraordinary circumstances believed to justify the exemption.
In responding to the student submissions set out below, the supervising faculty member should offer feedback to assist the student’s success, including one or more opportunities for the student to meet with the supervising faculty member. The supervising faculty member may also respond by commenting on the submissions received, suggesting ways to improve the work, and requiring, when the supervising faculty member deems it appropriate, submission of additional work or drafts by the student
- Topic The student must submit to the supervising faculty member for such member’s approval a brief topic statement (not exceeding one page) describing the topic selected and the scope and focus of the paper. SUGGESTED DUE DATE: By the end of the second week of the semester.
- Research Plan and List of Authorities The student must submit to the supervising faculty member a research plan that includes a list of authorities, relevant to the topic selected, which the student proposes to examine. SUGGESTED DUE DATE: By the end of the fourth week of the semester.
- Outline The student must submit to the supervising faculty member an outline of the paper, showing the organization of the issues relevant to the topic, including what the student will discuss and how that discussion will be organized; how the authorities are to be integrated into a discussion of the issues; and the basic structure of the student’s analysis and conclusions. (A detailed outline should essentially be a “skeleton” for the first draft of the paper, so that, for example, a mere list of authorities would not be adequate to meet this standard. At the same time, students whose research and analysis lead them into new directions should feel that they can improve on their outline for their first draft.) SUGGESTED DUE DATE: By the end of the eighth week of the semester.
- First Draft The student must submit to the supervising faculty member a first draft of the paper’s discussion and analysis of the topic with appropriate citations and footnotes. SUGGESTED DUE DATE: By the end of the tenth week of the semester.
- Final Paper The student must submit to the supervising faculty member the final version of the paper for evaluation by the supervising faculty member. Because meeting deadlines is an important professional obligation, and supervising faculty need the opportunity to submit student grades in a timely manner, no paper submitted after the last day of the grading period for that semester will be deemed to satisfy the Legal Writing Requirement. An exception may be made where late delivery occurs with approval of the supervising faculty member, after he or she considers the student’s written statement of the extenuating circumstances and supporting documentation, which the student must submit with the paper for any requested late delivery to be considered. Late papers without such approval may receive an incomplete or unsatisfactory grade or other late sanctions of the faculty member as well as be deemed not to be in compliance with the standards to satisfy the Legal Writing Requirement. DUE DATE: No later than the last day of the grading period.
Perspectives Menu (Optional)
All students should take at least one of the Perspectives courses listed below before graduation. The purpose of the recommendation is to help students develop an analytical perspective on our legal system, by viewing it through the lens of another discipline, probing the foundations, values or assumptions underlying our legal institutions, or studying alternatives to our own doctrinal approach to legal problem
Courses:
Race, Equity, and Law (REAL) Requirement
All students who entered in 2022 or later must complete one course from the Race, Equity, and Law (REAL) menu in order to be eligible for graduation. The courses on the REAL menu teach students to appreciate law’s relationship to past and present conditions of social justice and equality. These courses also foster recognition of how a person's own position shapes understanding of the law and its impact on those with different positions. The REAL menu requirement helps ensure that all graduates are prepared to represent their clients and fulfill their responsibilities in a professional and culturally informed manner.
Access to Justice – 2 credits
Advanced Immigration Law - 2 credits
Advanced Topics in Constitutional Law: Race, Equal Protection and Due Process - 3 credits
Asian Americans and the Law – 2 credits
Children and Disability Law – 3 credits
Civil Disobedience - 3 credits
Civil Rights Litigation: Police Misconduct - 2 credits
Critical Race Theory – 2 credits
Diversity/Inclusion and the Legal Profession - 2 credits
Education Equality and the Law – 2 credits
Employment Discrimination – 3 credits
Federal Indian Law and the Rights of Indigenous Peoples in the U.S. - 2 credits
Housing Discrimination – 3 credits
Human Rights Project - 3 credits
Human Rights Protection in Europe - 2 credits
Human Rights Survey – 3 credits
Immigration Law – 3 credits
Intro. To Islamic Law – 2 credits
IP and Social Justice – 2 credits
Lawyers as Inclusive Leaders – 2 credits
Mass Incarceration - 2 credits
Race and American Law – 2 credits
Race, Ethical AI, Cyber Civil Rights - 2 credits
Race, Gender, and the Law - 2 credits