Eastern Students visit Connecticut's Supreme Court

Professor Broscious and the students from PSC 341 Judicial Process visited the Connecticut State Supreme Court in Hartford on October 15, 2015. The class observed proceedings in two cases: State of Connecticut v. Kenneth Jamison and Standard Oil of CT, Inc. v. Administrator, Unemployment Compensation Act. The purpose of this trip was to allow students to experience the judicial process in practice in the state's highest court.

After the observing oral arguments, the class returned to Eastern for lunch and discussion. Discussion focused on unpacking the arguments made by the attorneys, evaluating the questions posed by the justices, and differentiating between the processes of a trial court and an appellate court.

Student Comments

"This trip gave me insight on details of the courts I could never have learned from books, such as the importance of confidence and presentation. It was a great experience." - Emilio Estrella

"I thought it was really cool I really liked getting see all that we keep reading about in action. I also really like to get to see the attorneys and justices as people. We read about lawyers and we see them in movies but in person, they got nervous, fumbled their words, and say uhh..uhh…" - Benjamin Brady

"The trip to the Supreme Court was not what I expected. I thought more people showed up to hear the proceedings like in a regular trial without the jury. I was surprised by the level of interaction by some of the justices with the attorneys, I didn't think they would have interacted as much as they did." - Crystal Mayo

"The trip to the CT Supreme Court was awesome. It was educational and fun at the same time, especially the political and law debates that stemmed from it on the ride home. All in all it was great!" - Jordan True

"Going to the Supreme Court was an enjoyable experience, it was my first opportunity to be inside our Supreme Court building. The paintings on the walls, and the architecture was very interesting to see, and listening to the lawyers plead their cases reminded me of how excited I am to go to law school next year." - Raagan Wicken

"I really liked the trip overall but what I liked the most was that for someone who has never been to court it was a very informational trip, being able to see it in person was much easier to put together than just learning about it! The way the court worked was very interesting to see, it's different than seeing a court proceeding on television or like I said before learning about it through a textbook." - Shafaq Chaudhry