Looking for a sweet IP gig?
My current gig at the AU Washington College of Law - Practitioner-in-Residence at the IP Clinic - is pretty sweet. I supervise energetic, IP-obsessed law students as they help a wide variety of clients, from musicians to bloggers to documentarians to start-ups, with every conceivable IP issue. It’s an exciting time to be at WCL - we just moved into a gorgeous new building just steps from the Tenley/AU Metro stop on the red line, a new dean will be taking the helm next year, and a national consensus has formed that experiential learning in general, and IP clinics in particular, are an extremely valuable part of legal education. The AU clinical program is a national leader (always in the top two or three in the country), and the practitioner-in-residence program is a leading incubator for young clinicians, and for professors generally. You get support for scholarship as well as an opportunity to teach outside the clinic.
Anyone interested in moving from practice to the academy but retaining a very real connection to practice should seriously consider this opportunity. The full ad for the position is below:
American University, Washington College of Law is seeking applications for Practitioners-in-Residence for academic year 2016-17 in five of our in-house clinics: Janet R. Spragens Federal Taxation Clinic, Immigrant Justice Clinic, Glushko-Samuelson Intellectual Property Law Clinic, International Human Rights Law Clinic, and the Women and the Law Clinic. American University’s in-house, “live-client” Clinical Program, comprising ten (10) in-house clinics and serving approximately 240 students per year, is respected for its leadership in scholarship, development of clinical methodology, contributions to increasing access to justice for under-served clients and breadth of offerings.
The Practitioner-in-Residence Program, created in 1998, is a program designed to train lawyers or entry-level clinicians interested in becoming clinical teachers in the practice and theory of clinical legal education. Many graduates of the Practitioners-in-Residence program (approximately 25) have gone on to tenure-track teaching positions at other law schools. Practitioners supervise student casework, co-teach weekly clinic seminars and case rounds, and engage in course planning and preparation with the clinic’s tenured faculty. They also teach a course outside of the clinical curriculum. The Practitioner-in-Residence Program provides full-year training in clinical theory and methodology and a writing workshop designed to assist Practitioners in the development of their clinical and doctrinal scholarship.
Minimum qualifications include a JD degree, outstanding academic record, three years’ experience as a lawyer and membership in a state bar. The salary for the position is $90,000 for the one-year term of the appointment (AY 2016-17). American University is an EEO\AA employer committed to a diverse faculty, staff and student body.
Applications that include a curriculum vitae and cover letter should be submitted online via: http://apply.interfolio.com/34203. Please contact Michael Finazzo, Faculty Coordinator, at [email protected] (202-274-4002) if you have any general questions regarding the application process and Professor Robert Dinerstein, Associate Dean for Experiential Education, [email protected] for any other questions about the positions. The positions will remain open until filled.
American University is an equal opportunity, affirmative action institution that operates in compliance with applicable laws and regulations. The university does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, national origin, religion, sex (including pregnancy), age, sexual orientation, disability, marital status, personal appearance, gender identity and expression, family responsibilities, political affiliation, source of income, veteran status, an individual’s genetic information or any other bases under federal or local laws (collectively “Protected Bases”) in its programs and activities. American University is a tobacco and smoke free campus.
