Professor Keri K. Gould
Assistant Dean for Professional Skills, Professor of
Clinical Education, and Director of the Center for Professional
Skills. B.A., Union College; J.D., American University.Professor
Keri K. Gould directs the Professional Skills Program and created
the
Center for Professional Skills in 2004.The Center for
Professional Skills seeks to prepare law students for lawyering in
the real world through experiential education and real-life legal
opportunities for learning and reflection. Courses and programs
offered through the Center include: The Externship Programs (the
General Externship, Civil Externship, Criminal Justice Externship,
Judicial Externship, Summer Externship, Special Education
Externship, International Human Rights Externship seminars, and
Matrimonial ADR seminars); Criminal Defense, Prosecution and
Domestic Violence Litigation Clinics; Trial Advocacy Programs
(criminal and civil concentrated trial advocacy courses and the
intensive trial advocacy course); the Polestino
Trial Advocacy Institute (student organization dedicated to
bringing training, education and competitions in trial skills to
the law school community); and the Peter
J. Johnson-National Civil Rights Trial Competition (annual
national mock trial competition in civil rights law). As the
Assistant Dean for Professional Skills and the Director of the
Center for Professional Skills, I believe in challenging our
students academically, giving students opportunities to reflect
upon their professional growth and experiences and providing a
strong platform upon which our students practice and excel in
lawyering
skills.
Prof. Gould joined the St. John's faculty after having
directed the externship programs at Fordham University School of
Law from 1995-1998 and New York Law School from 1991-1994. She also
taught at University of Utah College of Law from 1994-1996. After
law school, she practiced with several public interest
organizations, including the Legal Aid Society (Manhattan Criminal
Defense Division) and the Mental Hygiene Legal Service (NYS
Appellate Division, First Department). She has published numerous
articles and is a frequent lecturer on clinical legal education,
trial advocacy and extra-curricular student competitions and
therapeutic jurisprudence. Professor Gould is the Faculty Advisor
to the Polestino Trial Advocacy Institute and the Peter J. Johnson
National Civil Rights Trial Competition.Professor Gould is very
interested in the global application of experiential education. To
that end, she has served as a legal education expert consultant for
the American Bar Association Rule of Law Initiatives. Professor
Gould went to Oman in 2009, working with the Asst. Dean of the
Qaboos University College of Law to write a proposal creating the
first law school clinic in Oman, to Lebanon in 2008 working with
professors at the University La Sagesse Law School in Beirut on
strategic planning, curriculum development, skills training and the
development of a new Human Rights Clinic, as well as creating and
teaching courses in ethics and legal writing, and, in 2006
Professor was in Phnom Penh, Cambodia where she designed an ethics
course syllabus and lesson plans using interactive and
participatory teaching methodologies. Most recently,she returned
from a life-changing experience in Poland where she was a Legal
Education and Observer and Participant (and photographer) for a
week-long course on Genocide and Mass Atrocity Prevention in
Military Practice held in Krakow and Oswiecim (the town where the
Auschwitz and Birkenau camps are located). The program, organized
by the Auschwitz Institute for Peace and Reconciliation (AIPR)
www.auschwitzinstitute.orgwas
open toselected students from the Fort
Leavenworth Command and General Staff College. Situating the
program in the shadow of the infamous work and death camps gave new
meaning to the concept of experiential learning; there the sights,
sounds and smells resonated with the fascinating and provocative
course content.She was also the law school’s representative and
delivered a lecture, “Teaching Lawyering Skills in a Global World”
at the International Conference on Globalization and the Role of
Law Schools at Yeungnam University, Daegu, South Korea in 2005.Each
year Professor Gould writes the casefile for the Peter J. Johnson
-National Civil Rights Trial Competition. The inaugural National
Civil Rights Trial Competition (“NCRC”) was launched in February
2004. In 2008 the National Civil Rights Trial Competition was
renamed in honor of Peter James Johnson ’49, a law school graduate
who has dedicated his legal career to excellence in the practice of
law. The competition is the only national civil rights trial
competition in the country. Sixteen teams from law schools around
the country demonstrate their trial skills while being evaluated by
experienced trial attorneys. The law school provides two
predetermined witnesses to each team. First year law students are
encouraged to learn about the court system and litigation practice
by serving as witnesses during the competition. The initial rounds
of the competition take place in real courtrooms at the Nassau
County Supreme Court, often in front of sitting judges. Later
rounds are held at the Law School. The 2011 competition case
Zarr v Greenwood City, seeks a declarative judgment on the
civil rights of a state employee to adhere to his or her religious
beliefs while at work and the corresponding obligation of the
government to reasonably accommodate the religious beliefs of its
employees. The plaintiff, a corrections officer, wishes to wear a
religious head covering while on duty. Each year the casefile
is based upon a different area of civil rights law.