CIVIL PROCEDURE
Professor Gregory Sisk
Ground Rules
Class
Attendance and Participation
The work of a
lawyer is our society is a vitally important one, on which the fate of
individuals and even the republic may hang.
If a lawyer fails to uphold his or her responsibility, an innocent
person may go to jail, a wrongly injured person may be left destitute, or a
person who did not act negligently may be held unjustly responsible. In sum, the work of a lawyer is too important
to be left to the careless or the lazy.
For
that reason, we professors have a duty to the bar which you seek to join and to
the public which may rely upon you for representation (and to you as well) to encourage
you to work diligently in “learning the law” and to hold you to high standards
of professionalism. As developing
lawyers, you should get in the habit of treating each of your classes as
something like a court appearance, which means that you should be prepared,
come on time, and act with respect (although my classroom will remain a more
informal place than most courtrooms).
In addition to
studying the materials in the casebook and supplement, classroom discussions
are a vital part of the law school learning experience. For each class, I will prepare a lesson plan
designed to further explain the subject, prompt you to critically analyze the
materials for yourself, emphasize the important points, and supplement the
reading materials with illustrations and additional comments. The contributions of your fellow students in
class discussions and your own consideration of questions asked in class will
enhance your understanding of the subject, as well as contribute to your
ability to interact with other (future) lawyers, analyze questions more
thoroughly, and advocate a position before a group. Moreover, you will be tested upon the
material that is discussed in class, and material may be tested on the
examination that is raised only in class.
In sum, class attendance and class participation are important.
Attendance Policy
For
these reasons, I have adopted a uniform mandatory attendance policy. Under this policy, students with eleven (11)
or more absences will not be permitted to sit for the final exam. Although mandatory, the policy is very
liberal. Ten absences — which amounts to
more than three weeks of class time — should be more than sufficient to cover any
absences due to participation in the mentor program and any other unavoidable
absences, such as routine illnesses, personal problems or appointments,
etc. Of course, the required attendance
is a bare minimum; it is my hope that you will attend every class unless you
have a compelling reason not to do so.
If a student has
an unfortunate extended absence by reason of family responsibilities or
extended illness, etc., and thus misses more than ten classes, the unfortunate
fact would remain that the student would not have been a full-time participant
in the course and thus should not be granted credit for the course that
semester. Any student who, because of
illness or other serious personal crisis, anticipates that he or she will miss
a substantial number of classes, should contact both me and Director of Academic
Achievement Scott Swanson before those absences accumulate, to discuss what
effect such absences may have on the grade,
how we might be of help with respect to any problems, how we might be
able to assist the student in meeting course responsibilities, a possible
emergency reduction in course load for the semester, or withdrawal from classes
for that semester. When this has
occurred, I have been more than willing to work with the administration and
student to bring the student to completion of Civil Procedure in the
future. While class discussion is so
central to legal education that we must insist upon regular attendance, I and the
rest of the law school faculty and administration truly want to help you
succeed, so seek us out.
Beginning
on the second day of class (everyone receives credit for attendance on the
first day), an attendance sheet will be circulated around the class and must
be returned to me in the front at the end of class. The attendance sheet will be the conclusive
evidence of your attendance. It is your
responsibility to see that you initial it each day you attend. It should go without saying that initialing
for a day on which you did not attend is a serious Honor Code violation, as is
initialing on behalf of another person.
Preparation
and Participation Policy
In
addition to attending class, we expect you to be prepared to participate. The exchange between the professor and
students and among students is one of the most valuable aspects of a good legal
education, with benefits that extend well beyond the classroom and beyond the
particular course. This purpose,
however, cannot be achieved unless students are actively prepared to engage in
that discussion. Each student is
subject to be called upon at any time, and several students are likely to be
called upon each day. The fact that you
may have been called upon the previous week or even the prior day does not
necessarily immunize you from being called upon again.
In addition,
students are encouraged to volunteer, so as to contribute new ideas or ways of
understanding the material, to add to or challenge comments made by myself or
other members of the class, to attempt to answer a difficult problem, etc. If you and your classmates will commit yourselves
to creating a challenging environment of vigorous discussion and examination of
ideas, not only will the class be more interesting and enjoyable, but you and
your classmates will develop and sharpen the critical analytical skills that
are essential to being a good lawyer.
Because
preparation and participation are essential, your grade may be reduced if you
prove to be unprepared when called upon, subject to the rules laid out
below. (To be prepared, check the web
site each day for the assignment for the upcoming class.) For most of you, the elaborate rules below will
be unnecessary detail as you will be regularly prepared for class. However, it is best for everyone to peruse
these rules so that you will not be caught unprepared or be surprised if these
rules are applied to you:
• Rule
1: Anyone may have days on which
he or she is less than fully prepared, because of the demands of other classes,
recent illness, or personal problems. On
such occasions, I would prefer that you come to class rather than stay away for
fear of being called-upon when unprepared.
For that reason, if you are unprepared, you need only leave me a note on
the podium at the front of the classroom just before (but never after) class begins. You do not need to give me an explanation or
excuse — simply leave the note telling me that you are unprepared on that
particular day.
There are two limitations on this opt-out
rule:
(1) You may use
this unprepared excuse only four (4) times during the semester and no more than
twice in any given week (you can’t hoard these “passes” and use them all in the
last two weeks of class). That’s more
than a week of class time, which should be more than enough to cover any other
demands or outside problems that you have.
After claiming your right to declare that you are unprepared on these four
occasions, you will no longer be permitted to opt-out. So be wise in deciding when to use one of
your “opt-outs”.
(2) You must
tell me that you are unprepared before
class begins. Once I have opened class,
you will have waived the opt-out outlined here in Rule 1 and will be subject to
Rules 2 and 3 below. The fact that you
may be late to class is not an excuse (and should not occur in any
event, without a very good reason). If
you would be late to class because, for example, of a doctor’s appointment and
wish to use one of your “opt-outs” on that day, you can leave me a note or send
me an e-mail in advance.
• Rule
2: If you are in attendance,
have not declared that you are unprepared for that day (as outlined above in
Rule 1), and I call upon you and find that you are not, in my opinion,
prepared, I will lower your final grade one notch from your exam grade
(e.g., if you received a grade of B on the final exam, your grade would be
lowered to B-). I do not wish to use
this penalty, and hope it will not be necessary. Please understand that I do not expect
perfect answers from any student, but will look for strong evidence that the
student has read the material and made a good faith effort to think about the
issues. The fact that a student does not
fully understand the material will not result in any penalty as long as the
answers show that he or she has read and thought about the material. However, I would advise against trying to
“bluff” if you are truly unprepared; you would be better off to admit that you
are unprepared and try to avoid the penalty through Rule 3.
• Rule
3: If you are caught unprepared
and thus are subject to the penalty described in Rule 2, you may expiate the
penalty (that is, avoid the lowering of your final grade by one notch) by
agreeing to be fully prepared to lead class discussion on each of the following
two class periods. On each of those two
days, you will be called upon,
although you will not be grilled any harder or any longer than any other
student called upon that day. (For
obvious reasons, Rule 3 will not be available at the very end of the semester
when fewer than two days of class remain.)
This expiation rule is subject to the following limitations:
(1) If you wish to take advantage of Rule 3 and
volunteer to be fully prepared for the next two class periods, you must either
tell me such at the time you are caught unprepared or must come up to me
immediately after class and say that you wish to so volunteer. If I do not hear from you before class begins
on the following day, I will assume that you simply accept the lowering of your
grade and I will not further call upon you in class.
(2) If you then
fail to attend class or are not fully prepared on either of the following two
class periods, then the Rule 2 penalty goes into effect without any further
opportunity to avoid it. Only truly
exceptional excuses will be accepted for failure to fully comply with Rule 3 if
the student wishes to avoid the Rule 2 penalty.
Small
Section Thursday
As
a first-time experiment to give you the experience of a smaller class section
in one of your three doctrinal classes, I’ve asked the Dean’s office this year to
schedule two class sessions on Thursday by breaking our larger section into two
sub-sections. Don’t worry—this doesn’t
mean you’ll have to attend class twice on Thursday. In fact, so that the sub-sections do remain
small, you are only permitted to attend Civil Procedure once each Thursday and must
attend the sub-section to which you are assigned (not that many of you likely
would choose otherwise).
While I will be repeating the class twice on Thursdays, you as students should face no additional burdens from this experiment (other than that half of you will have to meet at a different time on Thursday than our class times on Monday and Wednesday). Well, I guess there is one other important difference for Small Section Thursday that impacts students – which I see as a blessing! Because the number of students in each sub-section will be half as many as on Monday and Wednesday, you are more likely to be called on during class on Thursday.
The assignments for and substance of class on Thursday probably will not differ dramatically from Monday and Wednesday, other than beginning each Thursday session with some review questions. Primarily, my hope is that the classroom discussion will e somewhat more informal and students will feel even more comfortable participating in discussions and asking questions. In addition, I hope that we will get to know each other a little better in the smaller group.
At
the end of the semester, I’ll ask you to give me your verdict on Small Section
Thursday by adding a question to the student evaluations or asking you to write
in your comments. And if you have
thoughts about how to get the most out of our Thursday sessions during the
course of the semester, I’ll certainly take them under advisement.
Appropriate
Use of Materials
You may not
possess, read, or otherwise use any notes, outlines, print-outs of web pages or
PowerPoint slides, or any other form of printed or electronic materials that I
distributed to prior Civil Procedure classes, or that were prepared in whole or
in part by any former student of my Civil Procedure class. While you are encouraged to work and study
together with other classmates in this year’s section, you need to develop your
own understanding as first-year students and not piggy-back on the “work-product”
(now there’s a good civil procedure phrase, as you’ll see) of prior year’s
sections. I reserve the right to lower
your grade by as much as I deem appropriate if, in my sole judgment, you
violate the letter or spirit of this rule.
Classroom Decorum
As
Professor
You
are welcome to take class notes on a laptop computer. Although an increasing number of law
professors are experimenting with bans on laptop computers in class, so that
students are more focused on class discussion, I am not yet ready to follow that
course. However, improper or disruptive
laptop use may result in a loss of laptop privileges in class for the remainder
of the semester. Improper or disruptive
use of laptops during class includes instant messaging, using e-mail, gaming,
shopping, and accessing internet sites not related to the classroom topic. All such activities are distracting to other
students. If you are bored, you may
daydream, doodle with pen on paper, or occupy yourself in any other
inconspicuous, low-tech fashion. Of
course, you bear the risk that any time or attention you take away from the
class discussion will have negative consequences for your performance on
examinations.
Please
do turn off cell-phones before class, unless you have an emergency need to keep
it on.
Assignments
The
assignments in the syllabus that follows are not designed to be covered
in one class period. Some assignments
will take more; some will take less. Depending
upon the length of a particular assignment, you should be prepared at least one
assignment beyond where we ended during the previous class period. Most importantly, check the class web site
each day, as the assignment for each upcoming class will be posted there. The syllabus is subject to modification or
omission during the course as warranted.
Class
Materials
For
this course, you will need the following materials:
Stephen
C. Yeazell, Civil Procedure (7th ed. 2008).
A
Student’s Guide to the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure
Supplement (which you are now reading).
This
Supplement contains additional United States Supreme Court decisions, other
significant or helpful federal and state cases, and legal articles that further
explain the material or propose new approaches.
Some of these materials replace cases assigned in the casebook; others
are supplemental. Follow the
assignments in the syllabus closely so that you do not read material in the
book that has been omitted and replaced by material in the Supplement. In addition, I have included some summary or
review material at the end of certain major sections of the Supplement (which
have proven popular with and helpful to students in the past).
I
have assigned to you the “Student’s Guide to the Federal Rules of Civil
Procedure” instead of an alternative bare-bones rules/statutory supplement. At about the same price, the “Student’s
Guide” includes valuable explanatory material and will be useful beyond law
school as a resource. You’re only
responsible for what we cover in class, and you are only required to read the
short texts of the statutes and rules that are assigned. But you may find it helpful to explore the
subject further by reading the commentary included in this “Student’s Guide.” Together with the summaries that I include in
the Supplement, the books you’ve purchased should have everything you need for
the semester.
However,
if you are looking for additional study materials, I suggest the following
treatises or hornbooks, which should be available in the library and the
bookstore. I recommend that you try them
in the library and only then, if a particular treatise or book is valuable to
you, pay the cost to purchase a copy in the bookstore.
Joseph W. Glannon,
Civil Procedure — Examples and Explanations (4th ed. 2001). This book uses the problem method to teach
about civil procedure.
Jack
H. Friedenthal, Mary Kay Kane & Arthur R. Miller, Civil Procedure (4th
ed. 2005). This is the leading
one-volume treatise on civil procedure, including both jurisdictional and
civil litigation process.
Daniel
John Meador, American Courts (2d ed. 2000). If you do not have
a basic understanding of the American systems of federal and state courts, you
might consider this book as optional background reading before first day of
class.
Examinations
The
grade in this course will be based upon a Midterm Examination (worth a fairly
small fraction of the grade) and a Final Examination (worth the larger share of
the grade). A matrix showing how the
grade for the Midterm combined with the grade for the Final Exam produce a
final grade is set out below. The Midterm
Examination 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
syllabus. The Midterm will involve a
single essay question to be answered in an hour.
The Final
Examination will be three-hours-and-forty-five-minutes at the end of the
semester. The Final will consist of (1)
a multiple-choice segment and (2) an essay question segment. It will cover all of the material in the
course. You will be given 45 minutes to
complete the multiple choice segment of the Final. For the essay question segment of the Final, you
will be given three hours.
Both the Midterm
and Final are limited open book examinations. You may bring with you the following items
and the following items only: (1)
the casebook, (2) the rules supplement, (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. Your
compliance with these requirements will be assumed under the honor code.
Civil
Procedure – First-Year Grade Matrix
Midterm Exam Grade
|
|
D- |
D |
D+ |
C- |
C |
C+ |
B- |
B |
B+ |
A- |
A |
|
|
Final Exam Grade A |
B |
B |
B+ |
B+ |
B+ |
A- |
A- |
A- |
A |
A |
A |
|
|
A- |
B- |
B |
B |
B |
B+ |
B+ |
B+ |
A- |
A- |
A- |
A- |
|
|
B+ |
B- |
B- |
B- |
B |
B |
B |
B+ |
B+ |
B+ |
B+ |
B+ |
|
|
B |
C+ |
C+ |
B- |
B- |
B- |
B |
B |
B |
B |
B |
B+ |
|
|
B- |
C |
C+ |
C+ |
C+ |
B- |
B- |
B- |
B- |
B- |
B |
B |
|
|
C+ |
C |
C |
C |
C+ |
C+ |
C+ |
C+ |
C+ |
B- |
B- |
B- |
|
|
C |
C- |
C- |
C |
C |
C |
C |
C |
C+ |
C+ |
C+ |
B- |
|
|
C- |
D+ |
C- |
C- |
C- |
C- |
C- |
C |
C |
C |
C+ |
C+ |
|
|
D+ |
D+ |
D+ |
D+ |
D+ |
D+ |
C- |
C- |
C- |
C |
C |
C |
|
|
D |
D |
D |
D |
D |
D+ |
D+ |
D+ |
C- |
C- |
C- |
C |
|
|
D- |
D- |
D- |
D- |
D |
D |
D |
D+ |
D+ |
D+ |
C- |
C- |
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-)
Office Hours
My
office is on the fourth floor of the law school building, Room 460. My office telephone number is 651-962-4923
and my e-mail is gcsisk@stthomas.edu. I
generally keep no regular office hours and instead attempt to maintain an
open-door policy. (My door actually may
be closed to keep out noise, but don’t hesitate to knock, as I often will be in
and available.) If you ever have any
difficulties finding me in when you’re available, feel free to send an e-mail
and we’ll work out a time. By far, the
best time to catch me with a short question is immediately after our scheduled
class time.
However, I
generally will be unable to meet with you during the hour before each class
that I teach and of course when I am teaching, which means that I ask you not
to come by on Mondays and Wednesdays before the afternoon and on Thursdays
before 4:30. Accordingly, the best times
to talk with me on Thursday would be right after class. The best times to find me are Monday and
Wednesday afternoons.
Web
Site
For this course,
I have created a web page that you should consult regularly. On the web page, I have included these ground
rules and the syllabus, as well as links to civil procedure and court related
web sites. In addition, I will post the
assignment for each upcoming class and other announcements, as well as the
PowerPoint slides used in class.
Although subject to change, the current URL
for the web site is:
http://courseweb.stthomas.edu/gcsisk/civilprocedure.home.html
Note: If you type in “www” at the beginning of the
URL, it will not work.