First-Year Legal Research and Writing Program

The First-Year Legal Research and Writing Program (LRW) is a series of sequenced, interrelated exercises introducing students to the way lawyers analyze and frame legal positions in both litigative and transactional settings, conduct legal research, and present their work in writing and in oral argument. Instruction in legal research and writing is led by thirteen Climenko Fellows, the director of the program, and research librarians, as well as upper-class teaching assistants.

• Course Description
• Introduction to LRW
• Statement of Rules and Understandings

Climenko Fellowships

First-year law students are instructed in the Program by thirteen Climenko Fellows, promising legal scholars with high academic achievements and a strong interest in pursuing a career in law teaching.

Information for Prospective Climenko Fellows

2011-2012 Climenko Fellows

Andrew Bradt

Michael Coenen

James Coleman

Seth Davis

Elisabeth de Fontenay

Thomas Donnelly

Avlana Eisenberg

Stella Burch Elias

Maria Glover

Jill Goldenziel

William Magnuson

Leah Plunkett

Andrew Woods

2009-2011 Climenko Fellows 

Jake Brooks

Mike Burstein

Jaime Dodge

Zack Gubler

Rebecca Haw

Eloise Pasachoff

Cora True-Frost

Director & Staff

Susannah Barton Tobin
Director, First-Year Legal Research and Writing

 E-mail: stobin

Susannah Barton Tobin is the Director of the First-Year Legal Research and Writing Program. She received her B.A. in classics, magna cum laude, from Harvard College in 2000, where she was the recipient of the Newbold Rhinelander Landon Memorial Prize. She received an M.Phil. in classics from the University of Cambridge in 2001, and a J.D., cum laude, from Harvard Law School in 2004. While in law school, she was a senior editor of the Harvard Civil-rights Civil Liberties Law Review and summered at the ACLU of Massachusetts and Ropes & Gray. She then clerked on the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts for Judge Mark L. Wolf and on the United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit for Judge Levin H. Campbell.  She advised hundreds of Harvard undergraduates as a resident tutor for ten years in Leverett House, for which work the College recognized her with the Marquand Award for Exceptional Advising and Counseling.  She was a recipient of the 2010 Dean's Excellence Award at Harvard Law School. She serves as a trustee of The Harvard Crimson and The Winsor School and as a member of the Cambridge Historical Commission.

Karen Bell Thomas

                 Staff Assistant

 E-mail: kthomas 

Karen is the First-Year Legal Research and Writing Program's Assistant.  She received her B.S. in Communications with a concentration in Educational Media from Boston University and an A.S. in Radio/TV Communications from Endicott College. She worked at the Harvard Business School News Bureau for seven years producing brochures and fielding media inquiries.  Following her work at HBS, managed print production for medical and educational journals and developed PR and marketing materials for construction and engineering firms in the Boston area.  She is an active member on the HLS Green Team Committee and was awarded a 2010 Harvard Green Carpet Award in recognition of her efforts to help make Harvard a more sustainable campus.

Contact:

LRW@law.harvard.edu