Clear and effective writing is a fundamental skill for any successful lawyer. A lawyer’s primary goal is to communicate, and a lawyer most often communicates through writing. The Law School’s Writing Center gives students the opportunity to develop clear and effective writing skills and strategies they will need in classes and in practice.

Writing Specialists Thom Brown, Jenny-Anne Gifford and Hadley Van Vactor work one-on-one with students to assess and diagnose common writing problems or organizational issues that need improvement. Any law student can use the Law School Writing Center through either self referral or professor referral. The Writing Specialists can assist with many topics including:

• Diagnosis of common writing problems relating to style, organization, or technical writing issues
• Large-scale document organization and small-scale paragraph organization
• How good topic sentences can elevate the quality of a paper or document
• Sentence structure and clarity
• Idea cohesion within the paper or document
• Depth of analysis
• Technical aspects of writing including grammar, punctuation, and capitalization
• Strategies to successfully start a writing project and to overcome writer’s block
• Strategies for ESL students

To schedule an appointment with one of the Writing Specialists, e-mail legalwrt@lclark.edu. In the e-mail please provide a general description of the writing issues or project to be discussed and general availability for the appointment.