Mediation Certificate Elective

The Legal Studies Program offers an elective course, LS 5359: Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR), which is designed primarily to complement the paralegal skills taught in the Legal Studies Program but also to help people who would like to mediate employment, landlord-tenant, neighborhood, and other interpersonal disputes.  The ADR course combines lectures with practical assignments and role plays.  You will not only learn negotiation and mediation theory, you will also acquire the practical skills necessary to mediate interpersonal disputes.  Assignments and role plays focus on communication and negotiation skills, active listening, appropriate questioning, generation and evaluation of options, reality testing, and agreement making.

Students who enroll in LS 5359: Alternative Dispute Resolution, attend at least forty hours of class, and complete all course requirements with a grade of “B” or higher will earn a mediation certificate.  

The mediation certificate will be issued by the department and will not appear on your transcript.

The mediation certificate, by itself, does not constitute an ABA-approved program for paralegal study. The mediation certificate does not qualify a person to practice law.