Author Archives: Sue Silverman

Library Reading and Exam Period Policies

The reading and exam period is from Thursday, April 21 through Friday, May 6, 2022. 

During the reading and exam period you must make a reservation to use a library study room. Mandatory study room reservations begin on Thursday, April 21 at 8:00am; at that time, all study rooms will be locked, and you must go to the first-floor circulation desk to charge out the key to the room at the time of your reservation. The link to the study room reservations is on the library webpage. 

Study Room Policies: 

  • Study rooms are for the use of groups of two or more students. 
  • Study rooms may be reserved for the current day and three days ahead. 
  • The default reservation time is 2 hours, although study rooms may be reserved in 30-minute time slots; your time slots must be contiguous. Use the grid to select your start time and use the drop-down box to select your end time. 
  • Study room use is limited to 4 hours per user per day to ensure availability for all users. 
  • You must use your brooklaw.edu email address to reserve a study room. 
  • Study rooms are subject to availability and reservations may be modified by library staff at any time. 

Library Hours for the Reading & Exam Period: 

  • Thursday, April 21-Thursday, May 5:  8:00am – 2:00am. The circulation/reserve desk closes at 12:00am
  • Friday, May 6: 9:00am – 10:00pm.

Reminders About Noise & Food in the Library: 

  • Please keep your voices down in reading rooms and study rooms.  Your colleagues are also studying. 
  • If you need a space for discussion, the collaboration areas are: the Bernsen reference & reading room (1st floor), the Nash reading room (3rd floor) and the study rooms.  
  • Drinks are allowed in the library. Please use the law school’s designated dining areas for eating. 
  • Brooklyn Law School is a smoke and tobacco free campus. Smoking or vaping is not permitted anywhere in the school, which includes the library.  If you have any questions, please read Brooklyn Law School’s Smoke and Tobacco Free Policy on BLSConnect. 
  • Good Luck on Your Exams! 

Lexis Digital Library Now Available on Lexis+

As you start preparing for finals, remember that the BLS library has an extensive collection of study guides. The Lexis Digital Library hosts the popular Understanding series as e-books which you can easily access through your Lexis+ account. Just go to the homepage, click on the small dots to the left of the Lexis+ logo and select Digital Library. Use your BLS credentials to log in and navigate to Browse Library on the left.

Good luck studying!

Research Guide on Climate Change and Environmental Law

A climate change demonstration in Erlangen, Germany.

Unsplash/Markus SpiskeA climate change demonstration in Erlangen, Germany.

Whenever you are researching an issue, whether for a paper or a note, one of the most efficient ways to get started is to find a research guide. The BLS librarians have created dozens of research guides, available on the library’s homepage (just click on the Research Guides tab), including guides on Career Resources, Paper Topic Selection and Development for International and Foreign Law, Federal Legislative History Research, New York Civil Practice, Researching Copyright Law, and Antitrust and Competition law.

Our latest guide summarizes resources for researching climate change and environmental law . This guide includes links to books, treatises, databases, major environmental treaties, blogs and news sources for researching U.S. and international climate change and environmental law. As noted in a recent report issued by the UN Environment Programme , there has been a rapid increase in climate change litigation with over 1,500 cases filed in 38 countries as of July 2020. Our research guide includes links to climate change litigation databases and other resources that will assist students researching this burgeoning field of law.

Find our Climate Change and Environmental Law Guide under the Research Guides tab at brooklaw.edu/library. Happy Researching!

Free Resources Alert! Law Library of Congress

If you need to do any type of foreign or international law research, the Law Library of Congress (law.gov) offers a trove of (free!) resources that will be invaluable to your research.  Recently, the Law Library redid their website, making it easier to navigate.  Below is a summary of the resources available on law.gov.

The Researcher Resources tab takes you to a page with links to the Library’s Research Guides, Guide to Law Online, the Legal Research Institute, Congress.gov, the Library’s blog, In Custodia Legis, databases, and story maps which are interactive web applications that describe the Library’s collections  through narrative, multimedia, and interactive maps. 

Research Guides

The Law Library has published dozens of research guides, including research guides on the laws of the 50 states and U.S. territories (e.g. Guide to Law Online: Puerto Rico); various topic areas (Nonprofit Organizations Law: A Beginner’s Guide,  U.S. Federal Appellate Courts: Records and Briefs, Public International Law: A Beginner’s Guide); and guides for foreign law (e.g. Guide to Law Online – Australia). Each guide contains links to additional free sources for caselaw, legislation, and other resources and guides to assist in your research.

Legal Reports
The Law Library of Congress produces reports on foreign, comparative, and international law in response to requests from Members of Congress, Congressional staff and committees, the federal courts, executive branch agencies, and others. Selected reports are provided for the public for reference purposes. This can be a great brainstorming resource if you are looking for a foreign, international, or comparative topic to write on.  Some recent reports include: Citizenship through international adoption; Children’s online privacy and data protection in selected European countries; and Legal provisions on gender equality. You can browse these reports or search for reports on a specific topic using the search feature on top of the page.

Reference Librarians at the Law Library of Congress
If you have any questions about a resource or obtaining a source of foreign or international law (or any law), you can ask the reference librarians at the Library using the Ask the Library feature.  The Law Library of Congress employs experts in different areas of the law and countries and is thus well-equipped to provide guidance on finding sources on a wide variety of topic areas and jurisdictions.

Stay in the Know: Current Awareness Resources

Whether for a class, a note topic, or just for the sake of staying informed, you no doubt want to keep up with today’s current events. The BLS Library offers a wide variety of subscription news sources to the BLS community. Explore just some of the resources we have below and if you have any questions about accessing any of these sources or others, just ask a librarian at askthelibrary@brooklyn.edu. Happy newsing!!

NEW YORK TIMES

Students and members of the BLS community are entitled to a free subscription to the NY Times. To register, go to https://nytimesineducation.com/access-nyt/, choose Brooklyn Law School from the drop-down, and then follow the instructions to register.  For your initial registration, you must either be on campus or go through Brooklyn Law School’s proxy server (see Proxy Server Instructions) AND you must use your brooklaw.edu email account to register.  Once you have registered, you can use your login name and password to access the site from anywhere.  Each year you will need to login from on-campus or using the proxy server in order to keep your access active. 

FINANCIAL TIMES

…and students and the BLS community also have access to the Financial Times! To create your FT.com account, follow the instructions at this link: https://join.ft.com/63059ceb-a0f6-4354-9471-4154de1e50da . Next, you will be sent an email with password creation info. (NOTE, there might be a delay before receiving the email). Once you have created your account, go to www.ft.com and sign in with your account details to access unlimited content and tools.

WALL STREET JOURNAL

While we do not have student subscriptions to the Wall Street Journal, you can access the Wall Street Journal on ProQuest and Lexis+.

Wall Street Journal: access via ProQuest (Proxy Server required) or via Lexis+ (login required).

LEGAL NEWS

Finally, for legal news, check out these sources below:

Law360: (access via Proxy Server) www.law360.com

Law.com: (access via Proxy Server) includes national and local news sources: www.law.com

​Bloomberg Law News: (login via Bloomberg Law here) 

And that’s not all! For even more resources check out our News Access Research Guide!

Keeping Up with Legal Publications through SmartCILP

If you are writing a note, seminar paper, or you are interested in a particular area of law, you will want to be apprised of the latest publications on that topic.  An easy way to stay up-to-date on new journal articles is to set up an alert that will inform you of any new publications in the topic areas of your choice.  


HeinOnline recently introduced SmartCILP, a weekly publication that alerts you to the latest articles indexed in the Current Index of Legal Periodicals, also known as CILP.  CILP indexes by subject heading, the most recent issues of primarily American law journals and includes more than 650 legal publications organized within 104 relevant subject headings. The University of Washington Marian Gould Gallagher Law Library has maintained CILP and sent out weekly updates to subscribers for nearly 90 years.  Now users can subscribe directly to these updates through HeinOnline. 

To set up your SmartCILP alerts, and customize the topic areas for which you would like to receive updates, go to: https://heinonline.org/HOL/CILPDownloads?collection=cilp and click on “Create New SmartCILP User.”

Then, enter a BLS email address, and choose the topics, subjects and/or specific legal journals of interest.  Remember that if you are off-campus, you will need to have the proxy installed (https://www.brooklaw.edu/Library/Proxy-Server).

Note that you likely would receive your first SmartCILP email on a Monday.  This email could be caught in Mimecast, so please check Mimecast and click “Permit” to allow future SmartCILP notifications to appear in your “Inbox.”If you have any problems or questions, email askthelibrary@brooklaw.edu. 

Exam Resources

It’s that time of year! As exam season approaches, there are several resources that the library offers to assist you in your studying. The library’s 1L Resources, Tips and Tools: Library Information Guide has links to study aids and other resources to help you succeed on your law school exams. For upper-level students, the library has created several research guides to aid you in your research: Library Research Guides.

If you are not on campus, you can access several digital resources such as the Lexis Digital Library which includes the Understanding study aid series in first year and upper level courses.

To access digital resources off-campus, make sure you install the proxy server. If you would like to study in the library, you will need to reserve a seat beforehand. Remember that you will need to submit a negative COVID test and abide by the law school’s safety procedures in order to enter and use the library.

Finally, if you have any questions, please reach out to us at askthelibrary@brooklaw.edu or use the chat feature on the library’s homepage.

Stay safe this holiday season and good luck with the remainder of the semester!

Researching legislation related to the coronavirus? Check out the Law Library of Congress’s Coronavirus Resource Guide

If you are researching legal issues related to the coronavirus pandemic, you will definitely want to check out the comprehensive coronavirus resource guide published by the Law Library of Congress, which provides links to laws, regulations and executive actions in the United States at both the federal and the state level, and in various countries.  The guide is updated at least weekly and in addition to direct links to laws and regulations, it includes Congressional Research Service reports which provide information to Congress about the coronavirus, law library blog posts, and articles from the Law Library of Congress Global Legal Monitor which tracks global legal developments. 

Some interesting Congressional Research Services reports listed in the Coronavirus Resource Guide include:

Todd Garvey, Constitutional Considerations of Remote Voting in Congress, Congressional Research Services(Apr. 14, 2020)

Colby Leigh Rachfal, COVID-19 and Broadband: Potential Implications for the Digital Divide, Congressional Research Services (Mar. 13, 2020)

Marc Labonte, COVID-19: Potential Economic Effects, Congressional Research Services (Mar. 11, 2020)

The Law Library of Congress’s Global Legal Monitor has dozens of articles organized by region which track individual country responses to the coronavirus, such as an article detailing Germany’s changes to its rules of procedure in Parliament and one discussing legislation in China that punishes the trade and consumption of wild animals.   

The guide also includes a link to a law library report on Legal Responses to Health Emergencies. Though written five years ago, the report provides useful summaries of regulations addressing health emergencies in 25 jurisdictions as well as a comparative summary and bibliography that may be useful in analyzing the level of preparedness of different countries for the current pandemic.

COVID-19 – Information for Studying

Though the library as of the date of this post, remains open, students are encouraged to stay home and avoid crowded areas, including mass transit when possible. For an explanation of why it is so important to heed these warnings, even if you are not at high-risk for severe complications, see the NY Times Article, Flattening the Coronavirus Curve .

If you need to access Library Resources from home, or need help with your research, the Library staff has created this helpful guide: http://guides.brooklaw.edu/remoteaccess.

For information on the Coronavirus, including tracking the virus in NY, the U.S., and globally; information on symptoms and what to do if you are sick; government responses and guidelines; and articles dispelling myths about the virus, see our guide: http://guides.brooklaw.edu/coronavirus

Study Aids at the Library

Need a little extra help with your classes? The library has a robust collection of study aids to assist with your mid-semester cramming. Check out the following resources:

“Understanding” Series from LexisNexis  
Check out the LexisNexis e-Book library at the link above for practice guides and study aids, including the “Understanding” series which covers a range of topics including Administrative Law, Contracts, Criminal Law, Civil Procedure, Torts, Evidence, Property, International Law, and the First Amendment.

“Nutshell” Study Aids

Constitutional Law in a Nutshell
Civil Procedure in a Nutshell
Contracts in a Nutshell
Criminal Law in a Nutshell
Property in a Nutshell
Torts in a Nutshell

Examples & Explanations Series
Civil Procedure
Constitutional Law
Contracts
Criminal Law
Property
Torts

This is just a sample of the available study aids. The Nutshell and Examples & Explanations Series also cover upper level courses such as Conflict of Laws, Bankruptcy and Corporations.

1Ls: Remember to refer to the 1L Research Guide for links to study aids and library resources. And remember you can always stop by the reference desk for assistance in finding study aids to help you get through the semester.