Round and Round We Go: Options for How to Structure & Facilitate Rounds

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Session Type: Lightning Sessions

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The ability to present a case, discuss case and legal issues, explore professionalism in practice settings, and “group-source” how to approach difficult challenges, are foundational and emerging lawyering skills. Rounds is one of the traditional pedagogical tools that clinics and externships have used to build and reinforce these skills. In conversations with colleagues, we have discovered that different schools, clinics, and externship programs structure rounds in very different ways, each with its own unique attributes and benefits. This session will highlight both the traditional foundation of rounds and the ways in which clinicians have built on that foundation over time by exploring the variety of ways that students can engage in group discussions about their client work and placement experiences in rounds. More specifically, many clinics and externships use the “traditional” five-stage format, some programs adjust the format and others use entirely different methods. Moreover, rounds are not used exclusively for student learning. Clinicians can implement rounds for strategic planning and also benefit from their own rounds discussions. Clinics and externships can adjust rounds’ structure, facilitation, time allotment, placement within or outside of seminar, and many other aspects to meet specific programmatic needs and learning goals. In this session, facilitators will share their own rounds structures, elicit sharing from session participants about their own designs, and facilitate brainstorming to identify new and creative options for rounds. In this way, the session will provide participants with fresh ideas about structuring group discussions related to client representation, extern fieldwork, and supervision.