Featured Faculty: James Seckinger
Intensive Trial Advocacy
Notre Dame Law School alumni, Notre Dame undergraduate alumni, and lawyers without a connection to Notre Dame have gathered at Eck Hall of Law to serve as mentors to aspiring advocates during the week-long Intensive Trial Advocacy course, January 4-8.
“I think we learn best by doing,” says Professor James Seckinger of his approach to the Intensive Trial Advocacy course at Notre Dame Law School. “After a week of simulated courtroom exercises, our judges couldn’t believe they were the same students. Many commented that they were better than some of the lawyers they see practicing in their courtrooms.”
While teaching at the National Institute for Trial Advocacy in 1973, Seckinger developed his own case-study approach to teaching trial advocacy. He brought the innovative method with him when he began teaching at Notre Dame in 1974 and, consequently, was charged with developing the Law School’s trial advocacy programs.
He began the popular and challenging Intensive Trial Advocacy course in 2003. The course provides students the opportunity to develop their trial practice skills and gain litigation experiences through simulated courtroom exercises. One of the major pieces of the program’s success is that top litigators from major law firms as well as judges and justices from across the country come to campus to advise and coach students.
Second and third year law students are eligible to enroll in the course, which begins a week before the start of each semester. “We cover all parts of the trial and go 8:30 a.m. until 6:30 p.m.,” says Seckinger. “The students get really excited about it and are able to get feedback everyday from different people. It is not something they can get from a traditional law class.” Another aspect of the course’s popularity is it’s attraction to second year law students who are able to use their experience in the intensive trial advocacy course in their summer clerkship.
Intensive Trial Ad participants continue to meet once a week throughout the duration of the spring semester. During that time, each student acts as a trial lawyer in two trials—one jury and one judge trial—and also serves as a witness or observer in one jury and one judge trial.
