Welcome New Law Students!

This week in the Law Library we welcome our 1-L students, transfer students, and those taking short courses; provide some law school success resources; and look at Ohio Supreme Court oral arguments.

Join us on Monday from 11:00am – Noon for an introduction to the law library and library resources.

• Room 145 Cohort 1 with Associate Senior Librarian, Legal Technology & Research Instructional Services Shannon Kemen
• Room 140 Cohort 2 with Associate Dean of Library Services & Director, Robert S Marx Law Library Michael Whiteman
• Room 135 Cohort 3 with Associate Librarian, Instructional & Reference Services Law Librarian Ashley Russell
• Room 160 Cohort 4 with Senior Librarian, Associate Director Susan Boland
• Room 245 Cohort 5 with Associate Librarian, Instructional & Reference Services Law Librarian Laura Dixon-Caldwell
• Room 240 Cohort 6 with Senior Librarian, Electronic Resources Instructional Services Librarian Ron Jones

Summer 2025 (May 19 - Aug 24, 2025)

• Monday - Friday: 9:00am - 5:00pm
• Closed Saturdays & Sundays
• Closed for University Holidays:
  • Memorial Day, May 26, 2025
  • Juneteenth (Observed), June 19, 2025
  • Independence Day, July 4, 2025

Fall 2025 (Aug. 25 - Dec. 19, 2025)

• General Hours:
  • Monday - Friday: 8:00am - 6:00pm for law students, faculty & staff (doors to the building lock at 5:00pm)
  • Closed Saturdays & Sundays
• Fall Break Hours (Oct. 13 - 17, 2025)
  • Monday - Friday: 9:00am - 5:00pm
• Closed for the Following University Holidays:
  • Monday, Sept. 1
  • Thursday-Friday, Nov. 27 - 28  

This month’s small display in the Law Library Services Suite, Room 110, is all about resources to help you succeed in law school.

• Cracking the Case Method, Legal Analysis for Law School Success by Paul Bergman; Patrick Goodman; Thomas Holm
  • This book, available through the West Academic study aid subscription, provides an in-depth examination of these critical topics: The Case Method and its relationship to Socratic-style questioning and effective legal analysis. Semester-long strategies for learning how to "think like a lawyer" by getting the most out of reading opinions, attending classes, outlining, and preparing effectively for exams. How to read cases with a focus on legal issues, legal principles, and judges' rationales for adopting and applying those principles. How to prepare case briefs and use them to prepare for class. The major types of legal argument, with many illustrations drawn from actual cases. Using class discussions as opportunities to practice legal analysis, based on annotated excerpts from actual first-year class discussions. Preparing for exams by outlining course materials and practicing exam-taking skills. An approach for analyzing exam questions and writing effective exam answers that display legal analytical skills, with illustrations drawn from actual essay exam questions and annotated answers.
• Critical Reading for Success in Law School and Beyond (with Video) by Jane Grise
  • This book, available through the West Academic study aid subscription, identifies the reading strategies used by expert legal readers and presents the strategies in a systematic sequence. Reading cases and statutes is challenging for students and attorneys. However, everybody can learn critical reading strategies and become effective legal readers and advocates. Readers will learn: (1) the purpose for reading cases, (2) how to read with focus, (3) case structure and important civil and criminal procedure terms, (4) techniques for understanding complex text, (5) strategies for identifying the parts of a case, (6) how to brief a case, (7) legal analysis skills such as analogical reasoning and case synthesis, and (8) strategies for reading statutes. The second edition adds chapters that address reading on screens and techniques for reading bar prep materials. The second edition also has a seventeen part video series with PowerPoint slides. Each video introduces a reading strategy, provides helpful tips, includes a short student exercise, and gives students the opportunity to self-assess their proficiency.
• The Guide to Belonging in Law School by Russell McClain
  • This book, available through the West Academic study aid subscription, accomplishes two discrete goals. First, it requires readers to engage in an authentic, rigorous, mini-law school semester involving reading, studying, five Socratic classes (through the connected website), exam preparation, and exam writing. Second, the book provides a foundation for students from marginalized groups to recognize and manage both subtle and explicit barriers that can impede their progress.
• Expert Learning for Law Students by Michael Hunter Schwartz; Paula J. Manning
  • This book, available through the Lexis Nexis Digital Library study aid subscription, is a reorganization and rethinking of this highly regarded law school success text. It retains the core insights and lessons from prior editions while updating the materials to reflect recent insights such as mindset theory, attribution theory, chunking for use, and interleaving learning. The text includes exercises and step-by-step guides to engage readers in the process of becoming expert learners—including specific strategies for succeeding in law school.
• Law School Success in a Nutshell by Ann Burkhart; Robert Stein
  • This book, available through the West Academic study aid subscription, canswers questions students have as they begin their studies. What is a tort? Hornbook? Should I join a study group? It also explains and gives examples of the best methods for studying and for taking exams. It provides questions and model answers from actual law school exams. The Nutshell also provides information about the types of legal practice that are available to you when you graduate. And it describes the opportunities that will be available to you during your second and third years of law school, such as law journals, law clinics, internships, joint degree programs, and study abroad.

For more information on accessing our study aids, view our Introduction to Study Aids video and our 1-L Study Aids page on the 1-L Survival Guide.

You can view the live stream of oral arguments on the Court’s website or see them after the arguments take place in the Ohio Channel archives.

Tuesday, August 19, 2025

State v. Brinkman - (1) whether a three-judge panel in a capital sentencing proceeding must find that the aggravating circumstances outweigh the mitigating factors; (2) whether the panel improperly shifted the burden to the defendant to prove that his mitigating factors outweighed the state’s aggravating circumstances; (3) the panel’s refusal to recognize two defense expert witnesses as relevant experts and to give any weight to their report and testimony violated his constitutional rights to a fair sentencing proceeding and created an arbitrary barrier blocking his mitigation evidence; (4) whether the panel’s allowance and consideration of several victim-impact statements, before
imposing death sentences on Brinkman, denied his rights; (5) whether the panel should have placed much greater weight on the defendant's multiple serious mental illnesses as a factor which weighs heavily against a death sentence in his case; and (6) whether the death penalty violates the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments (and Ohio’s counterpart), and/or the state and federal constitutional requirements of individualized sentencing in capital cases, when imposed against an offender with serious mental illness. Court News Ohio Oral Argument Preview

Maurent v. Folley - whetherthe State can appeal a writ of habeas corpus granted to an inmate if the inmate has been released by a common pleas court. Court News Ohio Oral Argument Preview

Moore v. Mercy Med. Ctr. - (1) whether the “sham affidavit rule” applies when the testimony in an affidavit contradicts prior statements that weren’t made under oath?; and (2) whether an inconsistency or contradiction within an affidavit justifies a court order striking the affidavit. Court News Ohio Oral Argument Preview

Wednesday, August 20, 2025

State v. Khalif - (1) whether a reference in a jury verdict form to "as charged" in a specific count of the indictment is sufficient to satisfy the degree of the offense as required by Ohio Rev. Code sec. 2945.75(A)(2) when the jury instructions, court record, and evidence indicates that no lesser included charge or other forms of the offense were submitted to the jury; and (2) whether a defendant who is tried after the effective date of the “Stand Your Ground” amendment to Ohio Rev. Code sec. 2901.09 (April 6, 2021 ) for an offense committed prior to that date is entitled to have the jury instructed that he had no duty to retreat before using force in self-defense if he was in a place in which he lawfully had a right to be.  Court News Ohio Oral Argument Preview

State v. Hikec - (1) whether a court’s limiting instruction to the jury can make the admission of illegally obtained evidence harmless; and (2) whether admission of other acts evidence for the purposes of proving a defendant’s propensity to commit a crime in prohibited under Ohio Rule of Evidence 404(B) and requires retrial.  Court News Ohio Oral Argument Preview

State ex rel. AWMS Water Sols., LLC v. Mertz - (1) whether the suspension of a brine disposal well’s operation a total or partial taking of the property; (2) whether the appeals court overstepped its authority by declaring a partial taking of disposal well property and establishing a damages award; and (3) whether a property must create an imminent threat of harm to be declared a public nuisance. Court News Ohio Oral Argument Preview

Posted August 18, 2025 by Susan Boland

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