Getting face time in front of a judge or a jury is a relatively rare opportunity for new lawyers that also presents a chronic challenge for law firms. With the high cost of litigation, most cases settle before reaching the courts. But when they do, clients want experienced litigators making their arguments.
In many firms, associates spend their early years in the law library doing research for legal briefs or in front of tons of corporate documents doing tedious discovery for civil lawsuits, all on behalf of more senior attorneys. Courtroom appearances are rare, and the opportunity to argue a motion or cross-examine a witness is even more unlikely.
Indeed, trials are less common as the time and cost of pursuing litigation makes settling a case an economic alternative to putting a case in the unpredictable hands of a jury. As a result, it takes longer for new attorneys to get courtroom experience.
The Trial Advocacy Mentoring Program gives new lawyers early courtroom exposure to improve their trial practice skills.
The program provides access to federal and state judges to talk about courtroom protocol and places new attorneys with seasoned attorney mentors where they can try actual cases together.
The Trial Advocacy Mentoring Program provides participants with a unique opportunity to gain real world jury or bench trial experience while receiving one-on-one coaching and mentoring from seasoned litigators.
What Our Participants Say
The CAMP program provides an exceptional opportunity for our junior lawyers to gain valuable real world trial experience and mentorship. In today’s market, with fewer trials, budget constraints, and client requests for controlling costs, it is becoming more difficult to provide real world trial experience to our younger lawyers. We believe our clients and firm benefit by our continuing to develop trial lawyers with the requisite experience and confidence to deliver in the courtroom. The CAMP program does just that.
Mollie Benedict, Chair, Medical Device & Pharmaceutical Liability Group Tucker Ellis LLP
I would like to think that I’m a good mentor for what I am, but my experiences are vastly different from the “old guys” who routinely tried 4-5 jury trials a month often with very little time to prepare. Those days will never return and with jury trials quickly becoming an endangered species, I have to wonder what the profession will look like in another 15 or 20 years. It strikes me that now – more than ever- we all need to be sharing what we know with younger attorneys or jury trials in this country will disappear.
Rob Jones, Mentor, In-House Counsel State Farm Insurance