College of Law

Law Leadership Summer Institute now running on all cylinders

Toledo-area high school students study at Toledo Law

July 9, 2012

The first class to enter the Law and Leadership Institute (LLI) at Toledo Law will graduate from the program this school year. Supported by the Supreme Court of Ohio, the Ohio State Bar Association, Ohio’s nine law schools, and others, LLI is an initiative to increase the number of minorities involved in the legal profession.

In 2009, Toledo Law’s LLI program began with a single ninth grade class; a new class has joined the program each following year. This summer, for the first time, Toledo-area high school incoming freshmen, sophomores, juniors, and seniors will participate in the five-week program.

During students’ first LLI summer, they complete course work in criminal law and court procedure taught by Toledo Law students, with the assistance of high school teachers. Students meet attorneys and judges in class and on field trips to courtrooms and law offices. The first year program concludes with a mock trial competition that gives participants the opportunity to test their skills in front of practicing judges and lawyers.

Law and Leadership Institutes also will take place at law schools in Cleveland, Akron, Columbus, Cincinnati, and Dayton this summer. The LLI program was piloted in 2008 with a class of 50 students in Cleveland and Columbus. The program has now grown to nearly 400 students statewide.

** MEDIA OPPORTUNITY **
 Judge Jack Zouhary for the U.S. District Court, Northern District of Ohio, will speak to the ninth grade class at 2 p.m. Wednesday, July 11 in room 1012 of the Law Center on the UT Main Campus.

The ninth graders’ mock trial is Thursday, July 26, at 6 p.m., and the twelfth graders’ mock trial, which culminates the LLI student scholar’s experience, takes place Friday, July 20, at 10 a.m. 

For more information, visit the LLI web site at lawandleadership.org or contact Marilyn Preston, professor of legal writing and Toledo Law’s LLI director, at 419-530-2863 or marilyn.preston@utoledo.edu.

Contact Rachel Phipps at 419.530.2628 to arrange a meeting with LLI students.