William & Mary Law Journals
Opportunities to Hone Writing and Researching Skills
by Annabel Steele '25
When a new academic year begins, the 2Ls and 3Ls are tackling not just their classes but also their journal obligations. William & Mary Law School has five legal journals for students to join: the Bill of Rights Journal (BORJ), the Business Law Review (BLR), the Environmental Law & Policy Review (ELPR), the Law Review and the Journal of Race, Gender and Social Justice (RGSJ).
Students don’t need to worry about journal until the end of their first year of law school. The journal application process, which is called the Joint Journal Competition (JJC), starts a few days after the last exam in the spring semester. Competitors first rank all five journals based on their personal preferences and interests, then fill out an application that tests their writing and citing abilities via several different tasks. Current journal members grade the applications and then the journals select their new members in a draft process that takes into account journal needs and competitors’ preferences. At some point in June, the journals reach out to their new members to welcome them onto the staff.
The timeline for journal assignments is different for each journal, but the earliest obligations start around early August, when some rising 2Ls start to think about their Notes. A Note is an original piece of legal scholarship produced by a journal member over the course of their 2L year. For months, 2Ls research, write, refine, edit and polish their Notes; after turning them in, 3L journal staff select some of them for publication in the journal. For Law Review, the Note can be about any legal topic; for the specialty journals, the Note must be tied to the journal’s area of expertise (so, for example, a BORJ Note would focus on an issue of constitutional law).
The other major task 2L journal members complete is the citecheck. A citecheck is essentially a review of a portion of an article published by the journal. The citechecker reads through the portion, ensures that the cited materials actually support what the author says, finds additional citations if needed and checks for citation and grammar mistakes. 2Ls may have between three and six citechecks in a year, depending on their journal.
Though joining a journal is in no way required, many employers look positively at journal membership. And being on a journal is an excellent way to improve writing and researching skills while in law school.