Упражнения и задания по грамматике

Law study in the U.S.A.


Around the Law School (6-8)


Task 6. General information. Students in the United States usually attend a four-year college and obtain a degree such as a Bachelor of Arts (B.A.) or a Bachelor of Science (B.S.). When they graduate from law school after another three or four years of study, they will receive a Juris Doctor (J.D.) degree. Students will then usually take the bar examination somewhere in the United States. They may return to school later to pursue a Master of Laws degree (LL.M.) in a particular subject, such as international law, intellectual property law, or tax. There are other advanced law degrees available from a few schools. Very few people in the United States have these advanced degrees, which may be known as a Doctor of Juridical Science or a Doctor of Judicial Science (J.S.D. or S.J.D.) If someone does pursue further study, it is more common to seek a degree in another field, such as a Masters of Business Administration (M.B.A.) or a Philosophical Doctorate (Ph.D.) in a particular subject.
Part One - Graduate Law Study in American Law Schools
A strikingly large number of American law schools offer LL.M. and other graduate courses for international law students, as well as American students. The degree programs are varied, but most offer at least some sort of degree in international and comparative law or international business. The study of law in the United States is unlike that in most other countries. First of all, the basic law degree, the Juris Doctor ("J.D."), is considered a graduate level professional degree and students enter the program already possessing a college diploma. With the exception of a mandatory introduction course covering the basics of U.S. law, LL.M. students generally take classes alongside their J.D. counterparts. Depending on the policies of the school, special LL.M. seminars may also be offered, but may be open to J.D. students as well.
Secondly, American legal education is far more participatory than the traditional lecture method used in civil law education. Rather than relying on scholarly treatises, American law schools use the "case method" -studying casebooks containing actual court decisions to derive legal rules. Moreover, professors have traditionally used the "Socratic" method of teaching in which the professor asks a series of questions thereby guiding the student toward the correct responses. All students are expected to read the assignments and take part in discussions. Many professors consider class participation to be an integral component of the final class grade. A student who wants to succeed in graduate study in the United States must be able to read English quickly and with good comprehension. Typical reading assignments may range between fifteen and sixty pages per class. I have had international friends tell me that the most difficult part of their LL.M. experience was trying to complete all the reading assignments.
American law school classes are taught either as lecture courses, or smaller seminar courses. Lecture courses may range in size from approximately fifteen people for a specialized course such as Admiralty or Conflict of Laws to perhaps sixty or more for a class such as Secured Transactions or Corporations. Lecture courses, particularly those which have a large number of J.D. students, generally are taught using the Socratic method and have a single examination at the end of the course which determines the grade. The larger the course, the more likely it is that it will be taught by a full-time faculty member, rather than by a practicing lawyer who teaches as an adjunct professor.