Kristen Zaehringer and Timothy Cowan Participate in Quinnipiac Law School’s Gateway to Practice

1/05/2024

HSSK attorneys Kristen Zaehringer and Timonthy Cowan will participate in “Gateway to Practice,” an innovative program for first-year law students attending Quinnipiac University School of Law, Kristen’s alma mater.

The annual two-day experiential initiative, which will take place on January 8-9, 2024, is designed to help future lawyers develop the practical skills needed to practice law. Kristen, Tim and other invited practitioners will play an active role in the program, which includes accurate simulations of life working in a law firm handling transactions and disputes.

The program provides several benefits to aspiring legal practitioners:

First-year students learn the basics of law and legal analysis. This program shows students how lawyers use doctrine and basic legal skills to assist clients in the everyday practice of law.
Students supplement their classroom experience with activities ordinarily not part of the first-year curriculum, including deriving facts from a client interview, brainstorming strategies with law firm colleagues, explaining options to clients and engaging clients in decision-making.
The program integrates transactional lawyering and litigation and helps students to better understand the relationship between legal theory and practice.
The program helps students prepare for summer employment and gives them a start in developing networking skills.

In a press release issued by the law school last year, Associate Dean of Experiential Education Carolyn Wilkes Kaas shared: “The Gateway to Practice program helps students imagine themselves as lawyers at an early stage in their legal education by requiring them to apply the doctrine they are using in the classroom, in the same way, lawyers use the law in service of their clients every day.”

This is Kristen’s fifth year and Tim’s first participating in the program.