Paralegal Studies

HEGIS: 5099

SUNY CODE: 2272

The program’s focus will be on acquiring training in the core legal content areas such as torts, property/real estate law, contracts, wills trusts, and estates, legal research and writing, civil procedure and litigation, criminal law, family law, and legal ethics.

The goals of this program are to enable students to:

• maintain redundant legal calendaring, client trust fund accounting and file tracking systems;
• describe the essential elements of contract law;
• describe the process for initiating and maintaining a civil lawsuit in the federal and state court systems;
• describe the major legal principles of real estate and property law, tort law, family law, and the law concerning the administration of wills, trusts and estates; and
• describe the process for conducting legal research on assigned topics / issues from contract, family, criminal, real estate, wills/trusts/estates, and tort law using both manual and computer assisted legal research and to summarize these legal research findings in the format of a legal memorandum.

Successful graduates from this program will be able to:

• Demonstrate knowledge of legal concepts in the areas of contracts, torts, real property law, civil litigation and procedure, administration of wills, trusts, and estates, and domestic relations law,
• Apply the ethical rules and aspirations governing the legal profession to specific factual scenarios,
• Conduct legal research on defined issues via computer-assisted and manual methods, and
• Prepare drafts of legal memoranda and select pleadings pertinent to various legal content areas.

Career Opportunities:

The certificate program is for individuals interested in seeking employment as paralegals/legal assistants in law firms, District Attorney’s Offices, Public Defender’s Offices, business, governmental agencies, or other settings where paralegals are utilized.