Advising: Prelaw seeks to provide our students with advice useful to preparing for and applying to law school. In addition to assisting prelaw students with law school selection and admissions counseling, the program is also directed to correcting deficiencies identified by low scores in any of the LSAT test areas. As a requirement of the program, during the junior year, prelaw students must enroll in POSC 4300 LSAT Review Course.
Cooperative Admission Program with South Texas College of Law : Candidates for the cooperative admission program with South Texas College of Law earn bachelor’s degrees from UST and will have participated in the University Prelaw Program. Please see the Prelaw Advisor for instructions on how to complete the application process.
Faith and Reason
Law Day Service: The Law Day ecumenical service, at the Chapel of St. Basil on the UST campus, is an occasion in the spring when UST prelaw students share the University Chapel with the legal and academic community, to pray for those in public office to share a renewed vigor to exercise virtue in respect to the offices entrusted to them. Students, faculty, administrators, and lawyers and public servants with ties to the University, are invited to the service.
Scholarship: The University believes that the best preparation for law school is the broad background in the humanities and sciences provided by the University's core curriculum. Success in law school and in the legal profession requires a strong ethical foundation, an excellent command of the English language, highly developed analytical and critical thinking skills, and academic and professional proficiency in the law. Important to the prospective law student are the intellectual proficiencies, ethical, political, historical, behavioral, social, and economic, that inform a University of St. Thomas graduate. A goal of the University is to provide the student interested in the law with the opportunity to explore the discipline and develop an informed understanding of the function of law in American culture. Prelaw students participate in the University’s core curriculum and declare and participate in a major discipline.
Although law schools accept applicants with a baccalaureate degree from any major, the University believes that certain curricular choices are not only preferable but highly desirable. After selecting a major, the prelaw student will enroll in prelaw courses that help prepare for the rigors of the Law School Admissions Test (LSAT ), Socratic examination and case briefing. Prelaw courses will also provide information about our constitutional system and common law heritage, a background critical to discerning and understanding normative values reflected in the law.
The Prelaw Program begins with the First Year Experience and continues as the student’s interests in law evolve. Incoming first year students should tell the FYE advisor about their interest in law and visit with the Prelaw Advisor. Through participation in the LSAT Review class and Mock Trial, students will hear from practitioners and speak with law school admission counselors.
To remain in the prelaw program, a student must maintain a cumulative GPA of 3.00 and make no less than a B- in any prelaw course, be assessed according to the program's requirements, and show continual progress toward remedying deficiencies identified by pre-LSAT scores in any of the areas tested (reading comprehension, analytical reasoning, and logic). Required courses: POSC 3333 Law and Society or POSC 3342 Judicial Process; a course in the history of the law from HIST/POSC 3302 History of the Common Law, POSC 3303 Hale, Coke and Blackstone, POSC 3304 The Marshall Court; POSC 3355-American Constitutional Law; POSC 4300 LSAT Review; and POSC 4393 Mock Trial.
In addition to prelaw courses, prelaw students are encouraged to take law courses specific to their major (COMM 3382 Mass Communication Law; ENVR 4352 Environmental Law; INST 4393 International Law; PHIL 4350 Philosophy of Law: Tradition of Natural Law; THEO 4324 Christian Ethics and the Law; BSAD 4331 Business Law).
The Law Lecture Series: The Prelaw lecture series supports and promotes normative thinking about the law. The purpose of the lectures is to make accessible some of the thoughts of remarkable professors, lawyers and jurists to students, faculty and the public. One objective of the series is to share some of the intellectual and cultural excitement associated with developments in American Constitutional law that may affect the lives of all of us.
Advocacy
The undergraduate mock trial program at St. Thomas is designed to give undergraduate students an opportunity to learn first hand about the advocacy work of attorneys, understand the judicial system, enhance critical thinking skills, and refine oral communication competencies. Progress toward meeting these goals will be accomplished when a student participates at any level of this program.
Prelaw students enroll in the Mock Trial course for the fall semester and learn the techniques, procedures, and information necessary to compete in American Mock Trial Association sanctioned tournaments. Each team of six or more students will be assisted by a local attorney. During February and March, the teams will compete in regional tournaments against Baylor, Rice, Texas, Texas A&M, Houston Baptist, University of Houston, SMU, and other schools. The top teams compete nationally. Mock trial students, their assisting lawyers and others are invited to the Mock Trial dinner held during the fall semester.
Schedules
