April 27, 2006
TJSL Student Receives Prestigious 2006 Burton Award For Legal Achievement
SAN DIEGO –- A student at Thomas Jefferson School of Law here is one of only 15 law students across the nation to receive the highly competitive and highly coveted Burton Award for Legal Achievement for 2006, an honor soon-to-be cum laude graduate Jennifer Siverts will gladly add to her resume.
Jennifer Siverts, the recipient of the 2006 Burton Award for Legal Achievement, during a light reception on April 27. Members of
Law Review, ADR, Mock Trial and Moot Court were also recognized that evening for outstanding achievements during the academic year.
Siverts was selected from a pool of candidates nominated by law school deans across America. Each law student nominee was judged on a published law review note. Siverts won for her article “Punishing Thoughts Too Close to Reality: A New Solution to Protect Children From Pedophiles,” published in the Spring 2005 issue of the Thomas Jefferson Law Review. Here is a link to her winning article.
“We are extremely proud of Jennifer’s great accomplishment and the tremendous honor she brings to our law school,” said Dean Rudolph C. Hasl of the Thomas Jefferson School of Law. “To be recognized as one of the top law student writers in our nation is an immeasurable achievement when you consider that Jennifer competed against the best students from the highest ranked law schools.”
Jennifer Siverts and Dean Hasl.
As a recipient of the prestigious Burton Award, Siverts and a guest will be flown all-expenses-paid to Washington, D.C., on June 12 for the elaborate award ceremonies and dinner in the Great Hall of the Library of Congress, for which nationally syndicated columnist George Will is slated to be the guest speaker. The theme is “Legends of the Law” and more than 400 guests are expected to attend, including judges, law school deans, managing partners in the nation’s largest law firms, professors and other members of the legal community.
During the ceremonies, Siverts will be presented with an inscribed crystal obelisk to commemorate her status as one of the top fifteen law student writers in the nation.
The Burton Awards Program is in its seventh year, founded in 1999 as a volunteer, not-for-profit academic organization dedicated to rewarding effective legal writing and hailed as one of the premier awards programs in law. The program, run in association with the Library of Congress and its law library, honors law students as well as partners in law firms who use “plain, clear and concise language in their legal writings and avoid archaic, stilted legalese.”
Thomas Jefferson School of Law has been recognized nationally for the quality of its legal writing program. In 2005, the law school was ranked 16th in the country in U.S. News & World Report’s first ever survey of legal writing programs. The ranking is based on a survey of randomly selected legal writing professors nationwide.
Located in historic Old Town San Diego, Thomas Jefferson School of Law is fully accredited by the American Bar Association, the Committee of Bar Examiners of the State Bar of California and the Western Association of Schools and Colleges. The law school’s more than 5,000 graduates include the District Attorney of San Diego and a U.S. Congressman.