Why the Legal Studies Program at SCC

• ABA Approved
  
  
• All J.D. teaching staff

• Alumni Association

Through the leadership of Professors Green and Camenker and a number of SCC Legal Studies graduates, an alumni association was recently established.  The association will afford many advantages to SCC grads and students, including student memberships, networking opportunities mentoring of students, continuing education opportunities and job placement. The SCC Legal Studies Alumni Association should be fully operational later this summer. Watch for additional news and announcements in the near future.

• Small class sizes

At SCC, we focus on the individual, and we know that individual attention cannot be accomplished with large classes. Our classes typically range in size from 15-25.

• Mock trials and hearings 


• 100 percent employment rate*

• Internships in legal settings

Our curriculum requires that each student participate in a paralegal internship before graduation, in order to expose students to the practical, day-to-day operations of a real law office or law department of a government agency or corporation. They have the opportunity to observe and participate in theory being turned into reality. This allows our students to gain valuable on-the-job experience in a real-world environment.

• Strong academic and practical skills curriculum

• Basic and advanced computer assisted legal research training

In addition to our excellent paper law library, as part of our required curriculum, each student has available a wide array of electronic sources for legal research on the computer, including Westlaw and Lexis Nexis. In Legal Research and Writing I (PLA 1104), each student is taught the basics of computer assisted legal research (CALR). Following that course, an elective course in Advanced CALR is available which delves deeply into the nuances of CALR concerning Westlaw, Lexis, Loislaw and dozens of other electronic legal research sources. The combination of these two courses allows our students to obtain employment as a paralegal and "hit the ground running" when their duties include legal research. They prove their great value to their employer from the very first day.

• Bachelor's degree transfer opportunities
  
  
• Responsive to the needs of students, the bench and bar and paralegal employers
  
  
• Innovative and flexible
  
  
• Outstanding reputation in the community
  
  
• Incorporates high tech into instruction

• Conducts its own job fair for its students

Ours is the first and only Legal Studies program in Florida which conducts its own Legal Studies Job Fair exclusively for our students and graduates. A wide variety of paralegal employers attend this yearly event, including clerks of the courts from nearby Judicial Circuits and some of Florida's largest and most prestigious law firms, such as Lowndes, Drosdick, Doster, Kantor and Reed, P.A.

• Fast-paced and demanding curriculum but concentrated on students' needs

• Helps students accomplish their dreams

We are absolutely dedicated to helping each student succeed in the law and achieve their goals and realize their dreams for a better, happier, more satisfying and financially secure life. That is our highest priority and our primary job. We are largely successful in this endeavor because we expect and accept nothing less than a student's best efforts, and rarely pass up an opportunity to teach students more about the law and the practice thereof, even when the information may not be directly related to the specific course material for a particular class. This "holistic" approach to teaching has stood our students well in their various jobs. Often, our grads tell us that they discovered that upon taking their first, entry level position, that they know and understand so much more about the law than their fellow paralegal employees, most of whom have been working in the field for several years.

* Note: This means that all graduates who wish to work in the field, find work in the field.