PLAP 4500

This university is incredibly fortunate to have Professor Rivero, and this is a wonderful class. Grading is four components: short paper, legal memo (which he guides you through, as it was the first time for many of us writing an issue-spotter type of assignment), longer final paper, and participation. The weekly readings are extremely reasonable in length and also interesting, and the 2.5-hour class is spent with some brief lecturing, then a good bit of discussion about the readings and the week's topic. It's very easy to participate, and there are opportunities for whole-class and small-group participation during class. It is heavily discussion based, and I found the discussions to be less informative than the readings or his lectures, but participating gives students a chance to learn from each other, and he does a good job of leading discussion and commenting on all of the students' observations. Prof. Rivero is just generally a very good guy, he's always more than happy to help in office hours, and really cares about the material and his students, making for a very pleasant experience. Lastly, he gives a tremendous amount of freedom for the final paper; you can choose to write about anything you found interesting from the course, and he will gladly talk through your ideas if you want. An amazing course and an amazing professor, highly recommend! #tCFS24

Such a great class! It is very heavily discussion based ( you spend most of the 2.5 hours in class talking about readings and concepts) but it is very interesting. I really enjoyed the debates with classmates. You have 3 papers, a short paper, a legal memo/issue spotter and a longer paper. The rest of the grade is based on participation and discussion posts. He asks questions and lets you work with a group to discuss possible answers so even if you are nervous to talk, you will have a less scary opportunity to participate. Overall I would totally recommend because not only is it interesting, but the assignments are fun! The professor is so excited about the course material which makes the class that much better! I can’t say enough positive about this class:) If you don’t like reading cases though I probably would not take it because around half of the readings are court cases. #tCFS24

Hands down one of the best professors at UVA. He is knowledgeable about the courts, and his explanations are thorough and easy to follow. He is also helpful on anything and always willing to work with you to find solutions if you are sick.

Rivero's seminar in the Courts and American Democracy is awesome! Just enough of a mix between theory and practice. Weekly classes are 2.5 hours, which were split pretty evenly between discussing topics generally and analyzing the readings. Rivero is a total expert on the material and, although a little awkward in the beginning, did a good job of getting people to engage and eventually started cracking jokes. The only assignments are two midterm papers and weekly discussion questions, and the final is just a paper. If you put in the work on those the class goes smoothly and you learn a lot! I came out of it wanting to learn more.