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10. Proofread.
In Evidence and elsewhere in the curriculum, law students learn about presumptions and
burdens of proof. When it comes to evaluating a law student’s—and eventually a practicing
attorney’s—writing and the arguments being made in that writing, most readers start with a
presumption that sloppy writing (e.g., misspellings, erroneous punctuation, noun-pronoun
disagreement, and grammatical mistakes) connotes sloppy thinking. Too many mechanical
errors in a text can be so distracting that they obscure almost totally the argument the writer is
trying to make. In today’s wordprocessing age, there is no excuse for turning in a paper that
has not been thoroughly reviewed. The student can catch up on sleep after the paper has been
submitted.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Marshall B. Kapp teaches at both the Wright State University School of Medicine and the
University of Dayton School of Law, 300 College Park, Dayton, OH 45469; (937) 775-3392; fax
(937) 775-2851; [email protected].
56 | National Law University, Delhi
