Monthly Archives: March 2012

The Zen of Law School Success

The Zen of Law School Success
By Chad Noreuil
Law Study Skills Collection KF283 .N67 2011

The Zen of Law School Success is a new book in the Law Library collection written by the College of Law’s very own Professor Chad Noreuil.  Professor Noreuil also wrote The Zen of Passing the Bar Exam.  In this new book, Noreuil focuses on the law school experience and details how to put Zen principles such as simplicity, knowing yourself, and staying focused into practice in law school.  He offers a comprehensive approach to succeeding at law school, as well as focused advice on how to deal with the classroom Socratic method, navigate the law school environment (including the competitive atmosphere), manage stress, prepare for exams, and get a job after graduation.  It is an excellent resource for those students seeking to be successful in law school yet maintain balance in their lives.

To read a little bit about Professor Noreuil, go to the  ASU News website.  Be sure to also check out Professor Noreuil’s Law School Zen blog.

Evidence Law Help From CALI

“Nobody can fairly pretend to make the Anglo-American law of evidence easy, because it is essentially very difficult.”
– John MacArthur Maguire, Evidence: Common Sense and Common Law (1947).

While understanding Evidence Law may never be effortless, eLangdell® Press, the publishing component of CALI, has made it easier by offering three chapters of its Evidence Law casebook available for free:

 Best Evidence Rule

 

 

  Rape Shield Rule

 

 

  Jury Impeachment

 

 

 

Each chapter provides a roadmap for addressing the topic through a series of cases and hypotheticals drawn from actual cases.  The chapters can be downloaded as a PDF file, a Word document, or as an ebook compatible with an iPad, Kindle, or other e-reader.

Be sure to download the up-to-date edition of the Federal Rules of Evidence  from the eLangdell® Press website as well – it will be handy to have on your computer for in-class and exam-time reference.

New Books at the Law Library – The Glannon Guide to Property

The Glannon Guide to Property: Learning Property through Multiple-Choice Questions and Analysis
Law Study Skills Collection KF561 .S627 2011

What’s the difference between title to property held in fee simple, fee simple determinable, and fee simple subject to executor condition?   The answer to this question (which you will need to know for your upcoming property exam!) and more lie in the pages of the new edition of the Glannon Guide to Property.  Property is a notoriously difficult subject, but the Glannon Guide offers a clear and ordered review of property topics, organized around multiple-choice questions.  Each chapter contains an introduction to the designated topic, followed by a handful of multiple-choice questions with explanatory answers.  Topics covered in this book include gifts, adverse possession, fee simple estates, defeasible estates, life estates, reversions and remainders, executor interests, the rule against perpetuities, leases and assignments, deeds, and mortgages.

Maricopa County Superior Court Law Library Blog

The Maricopa County Superior Court Law Library has started a blog!  The blog is maintained as the e-newsletter for the Maricopa County Superior Court Law Library, and contains posts on such topics as library news, legal news, research tips, and court workshops and classes.  The blog also provides links to various legal research guides available online.  You can access the blog here.

Get Organized Over Spring Break!

If you’re lucky, Spring Break means lounging on a pristine sandy beach, sipping a fruity drink from a coconut. If you’re a law student, Spring Break probably means that you’ll be outlining and gearing up for exams. While we can’t transport you to a tropical locale, we can show you few tools that might help with your studies.

First a brief explanation on a theory called Getting Things Done (GTD). The theory basically says that you’re not at your most productive when you’re overwhelmed by a million things floating around in your head. GTD inspired the popular site Lifehacker. For more information on the theory visit:

GTD programs built around this theory, aim to give you a place in The Cloud to “brain dump,” organize your thoughts, and break them into manageable chunks. So, here are some ways you can get your head into The Cloud! 

  Dropbox Tired of emailing files to yourself? Check out Dropbox, which lets you store documents in The Cloud and access them from any device. Watch this short Dropbox In Plain English tutorial for more information.
 Google Docs Tired of emailing files back and forth between yourself and your study group? Check out Google Docs. A document is stored in The Cloud, and everyone you share it with can collaborate on it together. You can work on it synchronously or not. You can add comments so you can come back and resolve issues later, or use the chat function for side discussions. This Google Docs In Plain English tutorial will tell you more.
 Evernote If you have a lot of information to keep track of and synthesize, Evernote can be a big help. You can bookmark websites, add photos and voice notes, and upload documents. You can use EverNote online, or install on your computer, phone or other device. You can share (email) notes to friends.Here’s an example of a folder with study aids for Bankruptcy Law:
 ToodleDo ToodleDo is great if you have a lot of tasks to complete and/or need help prioritizing and managing your time. You can set reminders, sync with calendar programs, and send emails to your ToodleDo list. You can estimate how much time tasks will take, then when you have a bit of free time, let ToodleDo know how much time you have, and it will tell you what tasks you should focus on.Our Acquisitions/Serials Librarian Kerry Skinner is an avid ToodleDo user and shares this advice: ToodleDo has a bit of a learning curve, so to really use it as a GTD tool, invest some time upfront learning about the features and thinking about how to organize it best for yourself, since it’s a manifestation of your individual brain.You can watch a thorough (27 min) tutorial here. 

Here’s what a simple ToodleDo list looks like:

There are lots of productivity tools out there, and the trick is to find the right one for you. Check out Pricata’s guide to choosing GTD software if you’d like to learn more.

Hat-tip to Kerry Skinner and Tara Mospan for their assistance!

New Movies at the Law Library

Next week is spring break, and a chance to both get ahead in your studies and relax a little.  The Law Library has two new movies in the media collection which you might enjoy watching during your week off from classes.

Hot Coffee: Is Justice Being Served?
Law Media  KF1250 .H68 2011 DVD

Hot Coffee is a documentary film which discusses the impact of tort reform on the U.S. judicial System.  The film takes its name from the famous Liebeck v. McDonald’s Restaurants case, in which the plaintiff was severely burned by hot coffee purchased from a New Mexico McDonald’s.  The documentary premiered at the 2011 Sundance Film Festival and has aired on HBO.  Watch the trailer on the Hot Coffee website.

 

Thurgood
Law Media KF8745.M37 T487 2012 DVD

Thurgood is an HBO film starring Laurence Fishburne as the late Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall.  The movie is a one-man play filmed at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. which portrays the life and accomplishments of Justice Marshall. Watch the trailer on the HBO website.

Spring Break Library Hours

The Law Library will be open the following hours during Spring Break, March 16-25, 2012:

  • Friday, March 16: 7 am-5 pm
  • Saturday, March 17: 8 am – 5 pm
  • Sunday, March 18: 10 am – 10 pm
  • Monday – Thursday, March 19-22: 8 am – 10 pm
  • Friday and Saturday, March 23 & 24: 8 am – 5 pm
  • Sunday, March 25: 10 am – midnight

Have fun and stay safe!

Law Library Student Survey: Take the Survey for a Chance to Win a Great Prize!

The staff of the Ross-Blakley Law Library would like you to help us improve our services and collections by taking the Ross-Blakley Law Library Student Survey.

At the end of the survey you will have the opportunity to enter into a drawing for prizes. The prizes include:

  • A $10 gift certificate to Amazon.com (10 will be awarded)
  • One Grand Prize: A week-long use of a Law Library Study Room

How cool would that be during the Reading & Exam Period! 

By responding to this survey, you will provide essential information for use in planning goals and objectives. The Law Library will use the survey information to respond to user needs, improve library service, and to anticipate future library requirements for resources and technology.

You will be asked to provide your ASURITE login and password to access the survey. The survey runs from March 5th-19th, 2012.

 Click here to take the survey:

  Ross-Blakley Law Library Student Survey

 

Honoring Professor Rose

Professor Jonathan Rose is being honored at the Willard H. Pedrick Society Dinner this coming Tuesday evening, after 44 years at the College of Law.  Professor Rose is an expert in medieval and early modern English Legal History, and focuses much of his current research on the history of the legal profession and the operation of the medieval legal system.

In celebration of Professor Rose’s career and his passion for legal history, today we are highlighting three new books in the Law Library’s English Legal History collection:

History of the Common Law: The Development of Anglo-American Legal Institutions
Law Reserve K588 .L36 2009
History of the Common Law “explores the historical origins of the main legal institutions that came to characterize the Anglo-American legal tradition, and to distinguish it from European legal systems.”  The book’s two main focuses are the origins and development of the jury system and the division of law and equity, but it also addresses the development of the legal profession and the evolution of legal education.  Over 250 illustrations grace the pages of this text, culled from historical paintings, illuminated manuscripts, and paintings.

A Lancastrian Mirror for Princes: The Yale Law School New Statutes of England
Law English Legal History KD130 1327 .M3 2011
A Lancastrian Mirror for Princes is a monographic study of a 15-century English manuscript titled the New Statutes of England, housed at the Yale Law School Library.  The study’s author, Rosemarie McGerr, is the Remak Professor of Comparative Literature and Director of the Medieval Studies Institute at Indiana University Bloomington.   McGerr examines the legal, religious, and literary discourses related to the manuscript in this new book, and argues that the manuscript was a both a legal reference work and a book of instruction on kingship.

Law and Private Life in the Middle Ages: Proceedings of the Sixth Carlsberg Academy Conference on Medieval Legal History 2009
Law English Legal History KJ135 .L3 2009
Law and Private Life in the Middle Ages is collection of the proceedings of the Sixth Academy Conference on Medieval Legal History, which took place in Copenhagen in 2009.  The text presents information on how the law influenced everyday life in the Middle Ages, and addresses such topics as domestic violence and inheritance.

Petition to Allow 3Ls to Take the Bar Exam

The deans of Arizona’s three law schools have submitted a petition to the Arizona Supreme Court, asking to amend Rule 34 of the Rules of the Arizona Supreme Court and allow law students to take the Arizona bar exam the February of their 3L year.   Under the revision outlined in the petition, 3L students wishing to take the bar exam would have to obtain certification from their law school that they are currently enrolled in a course of study which will result in graduation within 120 days of taking the exam.  The deans state that this change would allow students to receive their exam results in May, rather than October, and consequently enable those who pass the bar to begin work earlier.

The State Board of Governors Rules Committee will recommend whether the Board of Governors should direct the State Bar of Arizona to file a comment to the petition.  The Board will ultimately determine the State Bar’s position on the matter.

If you would like to give input on the petition, you can submit comments through the Arizona Supreme Court’s website through May 21.

As a recent taker of the bar exam, I am not sure whether simultaneously studying for the bar and completing my 3L year would have been possible. . . What are your thoughts?