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Learning Outcomes

Approved by Law Faculty 10/08/19

The following Learning Outcomes outline what the faculty believes to be central to a comprehensive legal education for each student.  The list is not exclusive.  The Outcomes support the law school’s mission statement of “[p]reparing a diverse community of students to be thoughtful counselors, skilled advocates, compassionate leaders in the Jesuit tradition of academic rigor, pursuit of justice, and service to others.”

Every course in the law school curriculum will be designed to meet some of the Learning Outcomes.  Students will be apprised of each of the Learning Outcomes to be captured by each course, and students will be assessed to ensure success in the Learning Outcomes.  

 

Graduates will be able to:
A.    understand and distinguish between civil and common law systems, 
B.    demonstrate knowledge of substantive and procedural rules of law; the processes through which law is created, applied, and changed; the policies underlying laws; and the methods used to resolve legal disputes.

Graduates will be able to:
A.    identify legal issues, 
B.    apply the rules of law and policy to facts, 
C.    construct arguments and analyze counter-arguments, 
D.    adapt arguments as facts change and are discovered,
E.    exercise practical judgment, 
F.    use facts, law, and policy to persuade. 

Graduates will be able to:
A.    Investigate facts, 
B.    prepare a narrative based on facts, 
C.    perform legal research.

Graduates will be able to:
A.    articulate legal issues, 
B.    write objective and persuasive analysis, 
C.    draft legal documents, 
D.    listen actively,
E.    communicate orally and in writing with various stakeholders.

Graduates will be able to:
A.    construct solutions in light of a client’s objectives,
B.    assess risks and consequences.

Graduates will be able to:
A.    Exercise proper professional and ethical responsibilities to clients and the legal system, 
B.    Organize and manage individual work and deadlines, 
C.    Understand the importance of cross-cultural competence,
D.    Collaborate with others.

Graduates will be able to:
A.    recognize issues facing the vulnerable populations in society and the tools available to lawyers to affect change,
B.    be alert to the Jesuit mission of service to those communities.