CELL Blog | Center for Engaged Learning in the Law

The Problem:

Two-hundred students sign duly executed contracts with Spiral University of Rhetorical and Rancorous Engagement in All [but the] Law (hereinafter “SURREAL”) whereby they agree to pay (or finance) an astronomical sum of money at 6% interest over 3 years in exchange for a legal education, parceled out in 2-3 hour courses taught by a variety excellent professors with excellent pedigrees, excellent professors without excellent pedigrees, and professors with only excellent pedigrees. SURREAL assures these students, in writing, they will be well-prepared to pass their courses and the Bar exam throughout these 3 years, thus constituting the required consideration for its part of this contract.

Of the 200 students having signed contracts with SURREAL, 35 choose an elective course called “Procedural Adventures In Neverland” (hereinafter “PAIN”) and study diligently, often compiling 55-page outlines complete with tables of contents; translating hundreds of pages of impenetrable Supreme Court Sanskrit; creating PowerPoint slides to rival the gods; and actually paying more attention to the professor (who falls into Category Three Pedigree, above) than to the most current Scrabble game. These 35 students were told the course would be graded on the basis of a single, final exam. This exam was advertised in writing in the syllabus, but only after two weeks of the course had already gone by. Still, the 35 students remained in PAIN, prepared to take this final examination, having studied PAIN diligently and worked hard to understand the basics, as-taught by the professor (who was, they were told, an expert in PAIN). Prior to the exam, the professor assured the students the exam would cover topics taught throughout PAIN, and the students prepared to be tested in PAIN accordingly.

Upon receiving the exam, the 35 students of PAIN realized they had either been misled or that they had received the wrong examination. None of the 35 students recognized the call of the question, nor did any of them have any idea what the question was asking them to do. None of the words used in the calls of any of the questions bore any relationship to PAIN although, ironically, the questions did manage to illicit a lot of agony, despair, hopelessness, panic, and even prayer (I’m told Jesus just laughed and mumbled something about having had nothing to do with that convoluted pile of _____). None of the outlines of any of the students were of any use to any of them, nor was the textbook, nor any of the cases, nor any of the facts in the 2-page fact pattern preceding the question itself. As one student aptly analogized afterward, “It was like being trained to be a mechanic – learning how to fix the problems of a car that was already right in front of you based on general principles of car maintenance – and then showing up for your mechanic’s exam and being asked not to fix a car, but rather to design and build one from scratch. Obviously, the mechanic would fail, and obviously, so did all of us.”

Your Task:

You are a law student (or law professor) having already taken Contracts I and II. Thirty-five students come to you telling you this tale of SURREAL PAIN, asking for your advice. Prepare a blog comment in the space provided below outlining the following:

(1) whether SURREAL is liable for an affirmative misrepresentation of PAIN;

(2) whether the SURREAL professor of the course is liable for an affirmative misrepresentation of PAIN;

(3) whether the SURREAL contract was unconscionable on the basis of PAIN;

(4) whether the delay in receiving the PAIN syllabus constitutes a breach of the SURREAL contract, or any part thereof, or whether the students remaining in the course after having received said syllabus 2 weeks late constitutes implied acceptance of PAIN’s terms on their parts;

(5) whether, under the UCC, receipt of a final exam bearing no resemblance to the one for which the students contracted constituted a breach of the contract without a corresponding letter of accommodation, or whether the taking of the exam in spite of this fact constituted the acceptance of non-conforming goods via counter-offer by the students

As you write, bear in mind to following quote by someone who, granted, did not go to an American Ivy League school, but did go to Oxford, which is way better than American Ivy League schools anyway. In considering this quote, please discuss its relationship to the Separation of Powers Doctrine and to the Doctrine of SURREAL PAIN.

“Pain is an event. It happens to you, and you deal with it whatever way you can.”

– Hugh Laurie, The Gun Seller

Yes, indeed, Hugh. Yes, indeed. PAIN is, indeed, an event, and you deal with it whatever way you can. Like, for instance, by blogging… or by failing miserably.

…………SPLAT!