University of San Diego

front of warren hall

School of Law
Law Student Affairs

Sidebar
May 18, 2026— Volume 15, Number 37

We wish you a wonderful summer!

Congratulations on wrapping up another academic year! We hope you all have a restful and productive summer. Please note that Sidebar will be sent less frequently during the summer months. As always, if you have any questions or require support, please contact lawstudentaffairs@sandiego.edu

 Happy Summer 2026

Register Your 2026-2027 Student Organization by May 31st!

All student organizations need to register their student organization every year. To register your student organization for the 2025-2026 academic year, please follow the registration instructions found here and submit the Law Student Organization Registration Form by May 31st, 2026. If you have any questions, please contact lawstudentaffairs@sandiego.edu.

Parking Impact Commencement Week

Today and tomorrow until 5:00 p.m. the S11 law lot will be closed for the Shiley STEM Groundbreaking event weekend. Later this week, three consecutive days of Commencement ceremonies will begin on the morning of Friday May 22, and conclude on the afternoon of Sunday, May 24. In addition, the School of Law and Graduate Programs Mass will be held at 4 p.m. on Thursday May 21, in Founder’s Chapel. All Commencement ceremonies will be held in the Jenny Craig Pavilion. You can review the full Commencement weekend schedule online, including links to programs and livestreams.

Please expect heavy traffic beginning at 7:30 a.m. on Friday, May 22, as our graduates and guests arrive on campus for the first graduate ceremony at 9 a.m. We anticipate an even larger number of attendees for the 2:30 p.m. Graduate II ceremony. Traffic will be impacted following each ceremony.

Upcoming Events

Tuesday, May 19

Admit on the Spot—LLM in Taxation

Admit on the Spot—LLM in Taxation
Tuesday, May 19, 2026 // Noon
Warren Hall, Room 218

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                 

Thursday, May 21

Armenian Bar Association Careers in Law

Armenian Bar Association Careers in Law
Thursday, May 21, 2026 // 5:30 p.m.
Warren Hall, Grace Courtroom

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                 

Friday, July 17

11th Annual USD School of Law - RJS LAW Tax Institute

11th Annual USD School of Law - RJS LAW Tax Institute
Friday, July 17, 2026 // 5:30 p.m.
Joan B. Kroc Institute for Peace and Justice, Theatre

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                 

Announcements

Announcements from SBA

Campus Concerns and Comments Form

USD Legal Clinics: Openings for Summer 2026

Do an internship right here on campus. Join our on-site law office and gain skills working with actual clients on real legal cases. This is an experience that can boost your resume and prepare you for legal practice. We have openings for the Summer 2026 session in the following direct client service clinics: Civil, Education and Disability, Federal Tax, Housing Rights, Immigration, and Veterans. Apply online today. Please contact usdlegalclinics@sandiego.edu or (619) 260-7640 with any questions about registration. Visit the Legal Clinics webpage for more information about our clinic offerings.

https://www.sandiego.edu/law/clinics/clinical-education/application-procedure.php

Nominations Open for the 2026 Gasaway Award

The Order of the Coif presents one award each year for exceptional scholarship authored collaboratively by a student and a faculty member. The award celebrates the high level of intellectual achievement at its member schools.

Award winners’ scholarship must be of the highest quality. The work shall exhibit originality, in-depth thought and analysis, and professional writing. It must make a substantial contribution to the scholarly discourse. At least one student and one faculty member must be named as primary authors of the work.

The Lolly Gasaway Student-Faculty Scholarship Award was established in 2022 to honor Lolly Gasaway for her many years of exceptional service to the Order of the Coif as Treasurer-Secretary. Lolly Gasaway retired from this role in 2022.

Nominations for the 2026 Gasaway Award must be submitted by July 31, 2026: https://orderofthecoif.org/gasaway-award

Law Journal Membership - Write-On Competition

Interested in being a member of a Law Journal?  Complete the Write-On Competition! The packet will be available starting at 8:00am on May 16 and must be submitted by 11:59pm on May 22.
Fill out the RSVP form to receive email updates and reminders about the Write-On

Website: https://sites.google.com/view/usdlaw2026write-on/home?authuser=0

RSVP: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSe5iXZbaG2QUM2EJZ9mKp_bxI2DQyeRCS4EB4pCUH7VXIujkw/viewform

SDLR

Scholarship

Outside Scholarship Highlights

Below is a partial listing of outside scholarships of interest to USD Law students. For a complete listing, please visit Outside Scholarships on the USD School of Law Financial Aid website.

Family Law Executive Committee Scholarship $1,000 - Available to 3L students who are passionate about Family Law to achieve their career goals and make a meaningful impact in this area of law. The scholarship is intended to help defray some of the costs associated with taking the Bar exam. Application Deadline - May 15, 2026.

Graduate Student Life

Are you interested in connecting with other grad students across USD? Grad Life offers a wide variety of programming for grad and law students. See the events calendar and sign up for the newsletter! Check out the Grad and Law Student Handbook as well!

Student Writing Competitions

Law Student Writing Competition: June 15th Submission Deadline

The College of Labor and Employment Lawyers is pleased to announce their 2026 writing competition.

This competition is open to articles written while the author is an active student at an accredited law school in the United States. Authors may not have graduated from law school prior to December 1, 2025. Graduate students in law school (LLM candidates) are not eligible.

Prizes are as follows: First Place: $3000; Second Place: $1000, and Third Place: $500. In addition, the author of the first-place paper will be a guest at the Annual Induction Dinner where they will be recognized during the evening program. The College reserves the right not to select any article for publication or award any prizes if, in their judgment, the submissions do not meet their standards for outstanding legal writing.

https://theclel.org/law-student-writing-competition/

CalFresh Program

We recognize the importance of the CalFresh Program available to eligible, enrolled students and strongly encourage all to apply. CalFresh provides food resources in the form of an Electronic Benefit Transfer (EBT) card, which works like a debit card. This program helps many graduate and professional students purchase groceries 12 months a year. Visit CalFresh at https://students.getcalfresh.org/ to start your application. If you have questions about eligibility or need assistance with your application, please contact a CalFresh representative. Approval is determined by CalFresh and the State of California. Please contact the USD School of Law Financial Aid Office  at lawaid@sandiego.com to request a CalFresh letter to submit with your application as supporting documentation. It is also recommended to include a copy of the 25-26 FAFSA Submission Summary (The FAFSA Submission Summary summarizes the information you reported on your FAFSA form and includes your estimated eligibility for federal funding, and your Student Aid Index (SAI) received by email from the Department of Education - Federal Student Aid after submitting the FAFSA) along with the CalFresh application, and USD supporting letter.    

USD Food Pantry and Torero Closet

The USD Food Pantry in Hahn University Center (UC) 116 includes: food, school supplies, hygiene supplies, laundry detergent, etc. Additionally, we have a refrigerator and freezer to offer students fresh produce, dairy, and additional protein options.

The Torero Closet’s mission is to provide support and resources to members of the USD community who are low income students who express need, identify as former foster youth, homeless or at risk for homelessness, and those students who were emancipated minors or in legal guardianships.  It is located at 5330 Linda Vista Road, just south of the West Parking Lot

Food Pantry

TimelyCare

TimelyCare provides students with 24/7 access to campus health and counseling resources—anytime, anywhere.

Timely Care

Sidebar is a weekly enewsletter prepared by the Office for Law Student Affairs and is emailed to all USD law students every Monday morning. It contains important deadlines, announcements and upcoming events for the following two weeks. Past issues of sidebar can be found online.

Submit your listing request online by noon on the Thursday before you wish the listing to run. Listing requests may be edited. Announcements will not be posted for more than two weeks.

Law Student Affairs

Phone
(619) 260-4651
Email
lawstudentaffairs@sandiego.edu
Meet with an Advisor
LSA & ASBP
Instagram
@usdlawstudentaffairs

University of San Diego

School of Law
5998 Alcala Park
San Diego, CA 92110-2492