Law Schedule of Classes

NOTE: Course offerings change. Classes offered this semester may not be offered in future semesters.

Apart from their assigned mod courses, 1L students may only enroll in courses offered as 1L electives. A complete list of these courses can be found on the 1L Elective Listings page. 1L students must use the 1L class number listed on the course description when enrolling.


210.6 sec. 001 - Mindfulness for the Legal Mind (Spring 2022)

Instructor: Judith Ann Cohen  (view instructor's teaching evaluations - degree students only)
View all teaching evaluations for this course - degree students only

Units: 2
Grading Designation: Credit Only
Mode of Instruction: In-Person

Meetings:

W 3:35 PM - 5:25 PM
Location: Law 130
From January 19, 2022
To April 22, 2022

Sa 09:00 AM - 4:00 PM
Location: Off Campus
On 2022-02-26

Course Start: January 19, 2022
Course End: April 22, 2022
Class Number: 32091
This course is open to 1Ls.

Enrollment info:
Enrolled: 27
Waitlisted: 0
Enroll Limit: 27
As of: 07/19 11:58 AM


This course will be an exploration of what it means to bring mindful awareness and mindful thought leadership to the study and practice of law. As you engage in this exploration you'll be testing two hypotheses:

(i) That in any given moment you have the opportunity - and maybe, because of the influence you will have as a member of the legal profession, you have the obligation - to choose who you are, what values are crucial to you, and how you'll honor those values, as students, members of the bar, and members of society; and

(ii) That cultivating mindful awareness and developing mindful thought leadership gives you critical tools to help you make those choices in ways that can result in less conflict and suffering, and more effectiveness, compassion, and wellbeing, for yourselves and your clients, in your profession, and in the wide sphere of influence that you, as lawyers, will have.

Here's another way of saying this, from J. Krishnamurti:

To transform the world, we must begin with ourselves; and what is important in beginning with ourselves is the intention. The intention must be to understand ourselves and not to leave it to others to transform themselves or to bring about a modified change through revolution, either of the left or of the right. It is important to understand that this is our responsibility, yours and mine; because, however small may be the world we live in, if we can transform ourselves, bring about a radically different point of view in our daily existence, then perhaps we shall affect the world at large, the extended relationship with others.

Attendance and class participation are the essential elements of this course. You will be allowed no more than two unexcused absences OR two unexcused missed journal entries OR one unexcused absence and one unexcused missed journal entry, and are discouraged from missing any classes or journal entries. There will be an all-day, off-site retreat on Saturday, February 26th 9AM-4PM, which you will be required to attend. If you are enrolling in this class, please be sure you can attend this date. If you do not attend the retreat, you cannot pass the class. As you might note from course evaluations, in previous years this retreat constituted the final class. This year, the retreat is scheduled towards the beginning of class. Class will continue after the retreat, to the end of the semester.

You will be encouraged to practice both solitary and portable mindfulness every day. You will also be required to submit a short journal entry to the instructor each week (mentioned above), and to submit a final paper of no more than three pages in length.

...
Professor Judi Cohen is an attorney, mindfulness teacher, and lecturer at Berkeley Law. She practiced law from 1984 to 2014, and for ten of those years also taught academic classes at USF School of Law. She began practicing yoga in the mid-1980's and mindfulness meditation in 1993, and has sat more than 150 days of silent retreat. In 2009, she founded Warrior One and developed the Mindfulness for the Legal Mind curriculum, an integration of classical mindfulness, modern neuroscience, and the psychology of the legal mind. In addition to teaching at Berkeley and running Warrior One, Professor Cohen is a founding board member and the Teachers Collective chair for the Mindfulness in Law Society, and a member of the Bay Area Working Group for Law and Meditation.


Attendance at the first class is mandatory for all currently enrolled and waitlisted students; any currently enrolled or waitlisted students who are not present on the first day of class (without prior permission of the instructor) will be dropped. The instructor will continue to take attendance throughout the add/drop period and anyone who moves off the waitlist into the class must continue to attend or have prior permission of the instructor in order not to be dropped.


Exam Notes: (P) Final paper  
Course Category: General Courses
This course is listed in the following sub-categories:
Social Justice and Public Interest

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