Daily Archives: April 30, 2020

Hit an Internship Gap? Try Taking This Bridge to Practice

Summer is a golden opportunity to fortify the legal skills that will make employers notice you. But 2020 is different, and some opportunities to practice law have drifted away because of lifesaving social distancing to limit the spread of covid-19. But the outbreak doesn’t need to put learning on hold.

West Academic can help keep your head in the game even if you are staying home during the pandemic. One series is specially geared toward building practical legal skills by simulating legal assignments. The Bridge to Practice series includes twelve volumes, covering broad doctrinal areas of law such as property or specific practice areas such as immigration law.

The introduction to each of the twelve volumes explains the series’ premise: Simulating the progression of cases and clients’ needs from start to finish. The chapters provide students with learning objectives and introduce the legal doctrines governing the clients’ legal issues. Narratives introduce the client or issue, and many of the simulations also display the documents that lawyers will commonly encounter. Dialog reveals how lawyers tailor their language to respond to requests from clients and to make demands from others on behalf of clients. Appendices in each volume gather documents related to particular clients and other key players.

Cases progress throughout the books. For example, in the immigration book, client Susan Vasquez’s legal concerns arise in Phoenix, where she is arrested on theft and immigration-related charges after visiting a hospital. Chapter 2 includes a client interview with Vasquez that raises new legal questions. In Chapter 3, Vasquez faces an emergency as she reports being transported for deportation, which raises ethical concerns and highlights the need for lawyers to be able to rapidly digest problems and find solutions. Remaining chapters involve legal proceedings and distill the experience of advocating for Vasquez in front of a judge and how attorneys collaborate and share their expertise on particular legal issues.

Throughout many of the volumes, questions and research prompts challenge students to engage directly the key primary and secondary authority in the practice area. Further, the cases emphasize the nuances of particular legal tasks and impart lessons on the variety of skills that students should develop to achieve success as attorneys. They also provide excellent reviews of common legal doctrines, such as offer, acceptance, consideration, and defenses in contract law. Criminal Law Simulations: Bridge to Practicefeatures lessons such as the principles of punishment, the elements of crimes in general, particular crimes, and special issues such as accomplice liability.

The Bridge to Practice series includes the following subjects:

To access the Bridge to Practice series and other study resources, go to West Academic’s webpage. You must use your ASU email address to create an account. West Academic will recognize you as a member of the ASU community and allow you to create an account when you use your email address as your username. Once you create an account, your West Academic login will ensure off-campus access to the study aids and will also enable you to print, download, highlight, and take notes. You can download the West Academic Library Mobile App and study anywhere. West Academic distributes additional resources on developing professional skills. If you have questions about accessing study resources, finding materials to help with legal tasks, or researching legal issues in general, feel free to make an appointment to Meet with a Librarian via Zoom or email.

Andrea Gass, Reference Librarian