CIVIL PROCEDURE
Professor Gregory Sisk
Learning Objectives and Assessment
Learning Objectives for Civil Procedure
By the end of this semester (and by the time of the final examination),
you should be able to:
●
Explain basic procedural law, including the underlying theories
and policy rationales, in the following areas:
• selection of the forum for suit (subject matter jurisdiction,
personal jurisdiction, venue, and the Erie doctrine on state
law applying in diversity cases in federal court)
• service of process and waiver of service of process by mail
• pleading a case (notice pleading, plausibility pleading,
heightened pleading, responses to complaints, and
amendment of pleadings)
• joining multiple claims and multiple parties to a lawsuit,
including counterclaims, cross-claims, third-party claims,
and compulsory joinder
• motions to dismiss at the pleading stage
• ethical restraints on submissions to court
• discovery (interrogatories, requests for admission, and
requests for documents; relevance; privilege; work-product
protection; protective orders; discovery of testifying and
consulting experts; physical and mental examinations; and
sanctions for discovery misconduct
• pretrial adjudication (dismissal, default, and summary
judgment)
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• pretrial conferences
• right to trial by jury
• trial and post-trial motions for judgment as a matter of law
and for a new trial
●
Apply the relevant statutes and procedural rules to reach the
correct (or best) legal answers to hypothetical problems of civil
litigation involving the areas set out above
●
Appreciate the use of procedural rules to advance client goals
and solve litigation problems, including making strategic
decisions about selection of a forum, how to frame a pleading or
motion, whether to seek sanctions, how to gain information
from opponents in discovery, and how to present or respond to
pretrial and trial stage motions
●
Appreciate the ethical limitations on pleadings, motions, and
discovery devices in civil litigation, including prudential
judgments about how positions advocated will be received by
the court
●
Recognize that creation of and revisions to a procedural system,
even with the best of intentions, require difficult choices that
may advantage some and disadvantage others, given finite
resources for investigation, advocacy, and adjudication, so that
students come to appreciate the real-life consequences,
especially for the disadvantaged, of procedural problems,
limitations, and changes
These course specific learning outcomes most directly address the
following law school learning outcomes (as set out in Part III.1.A of the
Academic Policy Manual):
Learning Outcome 1 (by addressing
professional and ethical responsibilities in civil litigation); Learning
Outcome 2 (by teaching basic concepts, underlying theories, policy
implications, and rules of law in civil procedure); and Learning
Outcome 3 (by guiding students in analyzing and assessing strategies
for resolving civil litigation problems, including both legal and non-legal
issues). These course specific learning outcomes also address, but less
directly, Learning Outcome 4 (by encouraging students to speak in
class), Learning Outcome 5 (by evaluating the legal authorities), and
Learning Outcome 6 (by addressing the differing impacts of procedural
choices on those who are disadvantaged or from different cultures).
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Formative Assessment
Formative assessment provides opportunities for students to evaluate
their knowledge, check their understanding, and practice applying
what they are learning and then receive feedback from your professor
— before the entire semester’s grade is on the line. During the course
of the semester, you will receive my feedback on your work in at least
three ways:
Daily Classroom Exchange:
First, a limited form of formative
assessment will occur on a daily basis in class as I ask questions of
students who are called on and the class as a whole, thereby giving one
of you at a time a chance to participate directly. Through our exchange,
those who are participating will get the immediate feedback of seeing
whether their contributions are moving the discussion forward or not.
Thus, one more reason to volunteer in class is the opportunity to gain
that immediate feedback.
Multiple Choice Questions With Clickers: Second, on a nearly daily
basis, both to present materials in a hypothetical problem setting and
to review materials, I will present multiple choice questions and each of
you will be able to record (anonymously) your selection of an answer
through the electronic clickers we’ll use in class. The multiple choice
questions are designed to be instructive but are also examples of the
kinds of questions that will be included in the multiple choice segment
of the final exam and that are included in the Multistate Bar
Examination. After students have selected answers, we’ll then identify
the right and wrong answers in class discussion with my guidance —
including of course why those are the right and wrong answers.
Midterm Exam: Third, before the fall break, you will take a midterm
exam. While this midterm exam does factor in to your final grade, as
explained below, it is a relatively small part of your grade and is
designed primarily to give you feedback well before the final exam at
the end of the semester. For most of you, the Midterm Exams will part
of the learning curve for your initial introduction to legal studies;
indeed, that is a primary reason we offer Midterm Exams in the first
year.
When the Midterm grades are released, you will have an opportunity to
review your Midterm Exam and learn how you could improve your per-
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formance on future examinations. For each exam, I will have filled out a
detailed key or score sheet, so that you can see directly what you got
points for and what you did not. In addition, I will prepare a model
answer that further illustrates how to analyze the issues. So you will be
able to review the Midterm Exam answer that you wrote, look at the key
to see what you got and what you missed, and compare that to the model
answer for further explanation. If your comparison of the exam, key, and
model answer do not answer your questions, our Director of Academic
Achievement, Scott Swanson, is then available to meet with you and go
through the Midterm exam and key for your exam in detail.
Graded Assessment
The overall grade in this course will be based on a Midterm Exam
(worth a relatively small fraction of the grade) and a Final Exam (worth
the larger share of the grade).
The Midterm Exam will be scheduled by the Associate Dean’s
office for each of your classes and will take place during a class period.
For my Civil Procedure section, the Midterm will cover only the
material included in “Part One – Forum Selection” in the overview.
The Midterm will involve a single essay question to be answered in
about an hour.
The Final Exam will be three-hours-and-forty-five-minutes at the
end of the semester. The Final will consist of (1) a multiple-choice
segment (worth 40 percent) and (2) an essay question segment (worth
60 percent). While they will not be separately timed, I expect you will
need approximately 45 minutes to complete the multiple choice
segment and three hours for the essay segment.
Both the Midterm and Final are limited open book examinations.
You may bring with you the following items: (1) the casebook, (2) the
rules, (3) your notes from class, (4) class handouts (if any), (5) print-outs
of material from the class web page, and (6) any outline that you played
a substantial role in creating. You may not bring any other materials,
such as purchased outlines, treatises, or examinations and model
answers from previous years. Everyone then will be on the same even
playing field for these exams in terms of materials. Your compliance
with these requirements will be assumed under the honor code.
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A “matrix” showing how the grade for the Midterm combined with
the grade for the Final Exam produce a final grade is set out at the top
of the next page. And when a student makes an especially dramatic
improvement from the Midterm to the Final, I may exercise discretion
to bump the grade up one level further.
Civil Procedure – First-Year Grade Matrix
Midterm Exam Grade
Final
Exam
Grade
A
AB+
B
BC+
C
CD+
D
D-
DB
BBC+
C
C
CD+
D+
D
D-
D
B
B
BC+
C+
C
CCD+
D
D-
D+
B+
B
BBC+
C
C
CD+
D
D-
CB+
B
B
BC+
C+
C
CD+
D
D
C
B+
B+
B
BBC+
C
CD+
D+
D
C+
AB+
B
B
BC+
C
CCD+
D+
BAB+
B+
B
BC+
C
C
CD+
D+
B
A
AB+
B
BC+
C+
C
CCD+
B+
A
AB+
B
BBC+
C
C
CC-
Final Semester Grade = Point in Grid Where
Midterm Exam Grade (Top Row) and Final Exam
Grade (Left Column) Meet (E.g., A Student With a
Midterm Exam Grade of C and a Final Exam Grade
of B Would Receive a Final Semester Grade of B-)
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AA
AB+
B
B
BC+
C+
C
CC-
A
A
A
AB+
B
BBC+
C
C
C-