First assignments

Professor Kirkwood

As background for the first two lectures, read pages 1-17 of The Casebook:

Ronald A. Cass, Colin S. Diver, Jack M. Beermann, and Jennifer L Mascott, Administrative Law: Cases and Materials (9th ed. 2024)

Professor Kirkwood

As background for the first two lectures, read pages 3-12 and 25-37 of The Casebook and Appendix B:

Paul Rogers III & William R. Andersen, Antitrust Law: Policy and Practice (Carolina Academic Press, 5th ed. 2020).

Professor Maher and Professor Powell

• First Meeting: Monday, August 25, 10:00 am - 11:50 am in Room C5
• Assignment: For the first class, please read Chapters 1 and 2 of Cases and Materials on Business Entities, 5th Ed., by Eric A. Chiappinelli, available on the course’s Canvas page. Please do not hesitate to reach out with any questions. We look forward to meeting you on Monday, August 25!

Professor Seth Endo

Please visit the Canvas page to find your first assignments.

Professor Philipp Renninger

First Meeting: Saturday, Aug. 23, at 1:15-3:30 pm

Assignments Before Class:

• Review the Course Syllabus.
• Review the Course Calendar, which contains a list of cases and textbook pinpoints for each module/week.
• Read the table of contents of the 2024-2025 Federal Rules of Civil Procedure ("FRCP").
•  Read the abbreviated Study Guide in our textbook Learning Civil Procedure (“LCP”), pp. xliii-xlviii, as well as the LCP Comprehensive Study Guide.
• Check which group you have been (alphabetically) assigned to on the Civ Pro Group List.
• Optionally, have a look at the Five First Year Survival Tips.

Assignments After Class:

• Review the Post-Class Resources.
• Complete the Federal Court System Quiz.
• Connect with your respective group. Jointly, complete your Civ Pro Group Formation task.

Professor Park and Professor Epstein 

Please read chapter 1, pages 1-14 of the course textbook. This is also reflected on the syllabus posted on the course’s Canvas page.

Professor Tayyab Mahmud

Read pages 3-24 and App A at pp. 865-872 of Alexander, Bilionis, McAffee, and Bryant, Learning Constitutional Law: Powers, Structure, and the Fourteenth Amendment (2024).

Professor Tayyab Mahmud

Read pages pp. 15 – 33 of Contracts: A Contemporary Approach (Kunz and Chomsky eds. 3^rd ed. 2018).

Professor Mark Verstraete

Monday, August 25th 

Casebook pp. 1-37 (Chapter 1: Introduction)

Jessica Litman, Information Privacy/Property (pp. 1283-88 and 1295-1301 [Intro and Part II])

Litman-InformationPrivacyInformationProperty-2000

Wednesday, August 27th

Casebook pp. 39-73 (Chapter 2: Perspectives on Privacy)

Maria P. Angel & Ryan Calo, Distinguishing Privacy Law: A Critique of Privacy as Social Taxonomy (pp. 507-513 and 529-551 [Intro and Part II])

Angel & Calo_Distinguishing Privacy law.pdf

Professor Rankin

Before our first seminar on Wednesday, August 27, please do 4 things:

• Reflect on the following questions in writing (there's no minimum or maximum length for your response; I might suggest a page or less).
  1. Why are you interested in this clinic? What do you hope to get out of it?
  2. What do you think “homeless rights advocacy” means? Why does homeless rights advocacy matter? Please take a few sentences to describe what homeless rights advocacy means to you.
  3. What words or images do you think of when you think of “homelessness”?
  4. What do you think might be common societal reactions to or stereotypes of people experiencing homelessness?
  5. What do you think might be some significant problems unhoused people face?
  6. Do you have any questions about homelessness? Write down at least a few.
  7. Do you have any questions about the clinic?
• Email me your reflections any time before our first class convenes and bring a copy of your responses to the first class.
• Purchase the only required text, Laura Riley’s Homeless Rights Advocacy.
• Read Chapter 1 of Riley’s book: Historic and Societal Underpinnings of Homelessness Today. This chapter explores the history of homelessness in the United States and provides helpful background context for the clinic, including the historical and root causes of homelessness in the U.S. and concepts such as the right to housing and other key terms.

If any questions arise, please always feel free to call or email me at 206-398-4393 or rankins@seattleu.edu. 

I can't wait to learn with you all!

Professor Rankin

Before our first in person meeting on Sunday, August 24, please:

• Reflect on the following questions in writing (there's no minimum or maximum length for your response; I might suggest a page or less).
  1. Why are you interested in this clinic? What do you hope to get out of it?
  2. What do you think “homeless rights advocacy” means? Why does homeless rights advocacy matter? Please take a few sentences to describe what homeless rights advocacy means to you.
  3. What words or images do you think of when you think of “homelessness”?
  4. What do you think might be common societal reactions to or stereotypes of people experiencing homelessness?
  5. What do you think might be some significant problems unhoused people face?
  6. Do you have any questions about homelessness? Write down at least a few.
  7. Do you have any questions about the clinic?
• Email me your reflections any time before our first class convenes and bring a copy of your responses to the first class.
• Please bring a copy to our first in person clinic meeting; if any questions arise subsequent to the first meeting, please always feel free to call or email me at 206-398-4393 or rankins@seattleu.edu

Then, before our first regularly scheduled seminar session on August 27, please complete the following:

• Purchase the only required text, Laura Riley’s Homeless Rights Advocacy.
• Read Chapter 1 of Riley’s book: Historic and Societal Underpinnings of Homelessness Today. This chapter explores the history of homelessness in the United States and provides helpful background context for the clinic, including the historical and root causes of homelessness in the U.S. and concepts such as the right to housing and other key terms.

I can't wait to learn with you all!

Professor Maher

First Meeting: Monday, August 25, 2:30 pm - 3:50 pm in Room 109

Assignment: For the first class, please:

• Review the syllabus and course expectations;

• Read Section 1(a), (b), and (c) of the Internal Revenue Code (which can be found easily on the Cornell's Legal Information Institute here or by googling "IRC 1"); and

• Read pp. 1-13, 18-38, 44-46 of the casebook (i.e. Chapter 1, Sections 1, 3, and 4, along with the portion of Section 6 prior to "Note on the Constitutional Tax Provisions").

Please do not hesitate to reach out with any questions. I look forward to meeting you on Monday, August 25!

Professor Chon

Please consult the course’s Canvas page to view your first assignment.

Professor Chon

Please consult the course’s Canvas page to view your first assignment.

Professor Erin Carr

• Review the course syllabus and policies, and familiarize yourself with the course Canvas page
• Read Chapter 2 of Essential Lawyering Skills: “Becoming a Professional” (pp. 7- 24) 
• Locate and review the Washington Rules of Professional Conduct and read “Fundamental Principles of Professional Conduct,” and Rules 1.1, 1.2, and 1.3
• Read The Legal Writing Handbook (LWH) §57.2.1.a (Assumptions and Expectations in U.S. Legal Culture, pp. 867-874)
• Read Leah Goodridge, Professionalism as a Racial Construct, 69 UCLA L. Rev. Disc. 38, 40 (2022)
• Watch the TED Talk “Why you think you're right -- even if you're wrong” (scout vs. soldier mindset)

Recommended

• Read Foundations for Practice survey report, “The Whole Lawyer and the Character Quotient”
• Listen to Hidden Brain Podcast, “Finding Meaning At Work: How We Shape And Think About Our Jobs”

Professor Seth Endo

Please visit the Canvas page to find your first assignments.

Professor Kelli Rodriguez and Professor Fred Rivera

Required Text: Matthew J. Mitten, Timothy Davis, Jeremi N. Duru & Barbara Osborne, Sports Law and Regulation Cases, Materials, and Problems (6th ed. 2023).

Aspen Publishing

ISBN13: 9798889060505

First Assignment: Chapter 1, pages 1-19

Professor Randall Hegarty

Hello class - It is just a little over a week until our first meeting, so I decided it was time to briefly introduce myself and send out the reading assignment for the first class.

I have taught three previous classes at SU law, but this will be my first time teaching Securities Law and Regulation (and the first time SU has offered it this decade). The Securities and Financial Services world is the main substantive area that I practiced in, so I am hoping I can provide you with a practical primer to help you learn to navigate a complex and regulation-heavy area of the law. I will do my best to have fun, even if half of my jokes are made at the expense of the SEC. I also plan to bring in a guest speaker or two, including the general counsel of a public company (which she took public) with a wealth of M&A experience.

The text for this class is Cox, Hillman, Langevoort, Lipton, "Securities Regulation - Cases and Materials, Tenth Edition" ("Cox Text"). Your assignment for the first class is to read pages 1-26 of the Cox Text. The Cox Text's Connected eBook is available online and should provide access to the supplement and selected Statutes and Rules of interest.

You can find a bit more information on my background and the class in the syllabus on Canvas, which I just published this afternoon. In the meantime, I look forward to meeting you and please feel free to reach out with any questions.

Professor Bender 

Please see the course’s Canvas page to view your first assignment.

Professor Cumbow

First Class Assignment

The class meets for the first time on Tuesday afternoon, August 26, 2025, in Room 327, from 4pm to 5:50pm. Please come to class having read the following:

Text:

• 33-37: Borchard, "A Trademark Is Not a Patent or a Copyright ... "
• 624-30: Dastar Corp. V. Twentieth Century Fox Film Corp.
• 67-71: Kellogg v. Nabisco
• 217-27: Readings on the trademark protection process

Appendix A:

• 1201-02: Lanham Act 33
• 1210-11: Lanham Act 43(a)

Supplement:

• 2: Revised Summary Table for Borchard article
• 13: Jack Daniel's v. VIP

Additional Required Reading:

• "Five Common Misconceptions Regarding Trademark Protection"
• "Trademark Myths Debunked"
• "The Most Important Trademark Fact You Probably Didn't Know"

Assigned readings are found in the assigned Textbook or its 2025 Supplement or in PDF format on the Additional Required Readings page in the "Pages" section of the course Canvas site, arranged by the class date for which each is required.

Required Course Materials

The required Text for the course is the Seventh Edition of Trademark and Unfair Competition Law by Ginsburg, Litman, Kevlin (identified in the Syllabus as "Text"). It is available in several formats at varying prices, including standard hardcover text, eTextbook for a variety of devices and platforms, looseleaf, and ring-bound. I encourage you to look at the options and choose the format that works best for you. You can see all of the options here.

Some required readings will be from the Supplement. The 2025 Supplement for the Casebook is a free download: GinsburgTrademarkUnfairCompLaw7e2025SuppWM.

The Additional Required Readings are listed in the Syllabus and are provided as PDF documents in the Additional Required Readings page in the "Pages" section of the course Canvas site.

All required readings are listed in the Syllabus under the class date for which they are required.

Please familiarize yourself with the policies, standards, expectations, and day-by-day Syllabus found on the course Canvas site.

Professor Feldman

Please add this course (TORT 100 B) through Canvas prior to the first day of class. There, you will find the syllabus, supplemental reading materials, and a PDF copy of the assigned readings for the first week of class (in case you need it). Please read the syllabus through the first few assignments on page 4.

For our first class, please read pages 3-13 of the textbook, which is Keeton, Sargentich, Keating, Fleming & Feldman's Tort and Accident Law (5th edition 2023). The publisher, West Academic, has given me a code (WASEATTLE) that can be used to obtain a 15% discount for any print or eBook purchases directly from West's online store (https://www.westacademic.com). I have also been told that students who sign in to their West Academic account or create one and then log in will receive free ground shipping with the use of the code.

In preparing for class, please consider the following questions:

• Garratt: What sort of intentionality is sufficient under Garratt to establish the intent element of battery? How was intentionality to be established in Garratt? Should the law of battery reach such unintended consequences?
• Blyth: What did the waterworks do that caused harm? What should it have done? Why should tort law impose liability for accidental harms? What societal interests are served in doing so?
• Hand Formula (BPL): Applying BPL (a rough analysis), would the waterworks be liable in Blyth? How does one measure the loss (L) when it might include loss of life and limb as well as property?

I call on students alphabetically, so if your last name begins with A (or possibly B) you are likely to be called on during the first few classes.

Optional: Please send me an email that includes any nickname you prefer, your pronouns, any help you want to give me to properly pronounce your name, and/or any other information you'd like to share with me at this time. My email is Lfeldman@seattleu.edu.

Professor Mark Verstraete

Casebook pp. 1-21 (Sales), 27-29 (Leases), 39-40 (CISG), and 43-44 (Real Estate) 

Cases: Ragus v. City of Chicago, Challenge Printing v. Electronics for Imaging, Cook v. Downing

       Problems: 1.2, 1.3, 1.5, 1.6, 1.7, 1.9, 1.10, and 1.11

Professor Bender

Please see the course’s Canvas page to view your first Assignment.