Facebook pixel Mediating the Litigated Case™ Irvine | Pepperdine Caruso School of Law Skip to main content
Pepperdine | Caruso School of Law

Mediating the Litigated Case™ Irvine

Irvine graduate campus Orange County Center

Irvine, California

Dates coming soon

Mediating the Litigated Case is a five-day training program.

 

Did you know

We recommend using google chrome web browser for registration.

View the Mediating the Litigated Case flier. 

A sophisticated six-day program for experienced litigators, in-house counsel, and other practitioners. Professionals can study the mediation of litigated cases to either become a mediator or to be a better advocate.

The recent surge in mediation's popularity signifies a dramatic shift in the practice of law. Attorneys are now using professional neutrals to facilitate settlement negotiations for litigated cases. In the past, settlement efforts in the litigation arena have been limited to settlement conferences in which the focus is usually on the judge's case evaluation. As increasing numbers of courts are requiring parties to mediate in order to accommodate an overburdened legal system, there is a growing demand for professionals who, in addition to being able to evaluate a case, can also facilitate negotiations between adversarial parties to reach innovative solutions.

Now lawyers and other established professionals can use their expertise to break into a new area of practice with tremendous possibilities. The Mediating the Litigated Case program offers a unique opportunity to learn about the mediation process in a format geared specifically toward civil litigation cases. Taught by experienced lawyers, who have made the transition from litigation to mediation practice, course participants will learn the essential skills required to serve as mediators.

The program will focus on the various stages of the process, identifying and working with different negotiation styles, and facilitating problem solving regardless of whether the case involves contractual, tort, personal injury, employment, partnership, or securities issues.

In addition to providing mediation skills training, the program will deal with issues specific to the adversarial setting including managing attorney advocates, the parameters of confidentiality, and concerns about discovery. It will also focus on issues of particular concern to attorney-mediators including the proscription against dual representation, providing legal advice, conflicts of interest, drafting mediation agreements, and other ethical dilemmas.

Program Topics and Schedule

Day 1

  • Dispute Resolution Continuum
  • STAR Approach to Mediation
  • Mediator's Stylistic Grid
  • Mixed-Motive Exchange in Consensus Processes
  • The Predictability of Distributive Bargaining
  • Opening Offer Strategies
  • Facilitating Distributive Bargaining

Day 2

  • The Integrative Approach to Negotiation
  • Focusing on "Interests" Not Issues
  • How to Discover Underlying Interests
  • Creativity in Negotiation
  • Facilitating Integrative Bargaining
  • Mediator Timing in Facilitating Negotiation
  • Settlement Conference Mediation Model
  • Interest-Based Mediation Model

Day 3

  • The Mediator's Job of Providing Structure
  • What to Include in an Opening Statement
  • Reframing and Broadening the Issues
  • Communication Facilitation Techniques
  • Effective Use of Caucus
  • Validation

Day 4

  • Techniques to Facilitate Closing the Deal
  • How to Present Risks and Costs
  • Ethics and Bullying
  • Mediator Timing When Facilitating Closure
  • Concluding a Mediation That Doesn't Settle
  • Convening
  • Agreement to Mediate

Day 5

  • Fairness and Neutrality
  • Attorney Advocates in Mediation
  • Emotions in Mediation
  • Bias and Cross-Cultural Awareness
  • Multi-Party/Multi-Issue Mediation

Quotes from previous Mediating the Litigated Case program participants

"I learned so much in the Mediating the Litigated Case program that I enrolled in Pepperdine's master's degree program in dispute resolution."
-- Sam Cianchetti, retired judge Inland Valley Arbitration and Mediation Services

"My attendance at this program has been an important cornerstone for my mediation practice."
-- George D. Calkins, JAMS Los Angeles (formerly with Cox Castle and Nicholson, LLP)

 Registration

Registration for Mediating the Litigated Case is $4,495. The governmental and non-profit rate is $3,795.

PLEASE NOTE!!!  Should a paid participant be unable to attend, the registration payment, less a $500 cancellation fee, will be refunded or a substitute may attend the program.

Refunds for registrations paid by check will require a W-9 form submitted to the University. This is for internal purposes only to generate a refund check. The refund is not taxed nor would a 1099 be issued.

The governmental/nonprofit rate is for FULL-TIME employees only. Please be sure to list your governmental/company address and email on the registration form. You are agreeing that we may contact your employer to verify full-time employment.

Registration includes all materials, a continental breakfast, and lunch each day. Since enrollment is limited, participants should register early. Should a paid participant be unable to attend registration, less the $500 non-refundable deposit, will be refunded or a substitute may attend the program.

PLEASE NOTE: There is a $50 administrative fee for transferring to another program. When canceling, we require 72 hours of notice prior to the program start date or there will be an additional $50 food service fee deducted.

 Faculty

(Faculty members are confirmed as of August 2019.  Straus reserves the right to change faculty due to illness or unavoidable scheduling conflicts.)

Sukhsimran Singh and Peter Robinson (Co-Lead Trainers)

Sukhsimranjit Singh practices, teaches, and trains in dispute resolution. He is Managing Director of the Straus Institute for Dispute Resolution and an assistant professor of law and practice at Pepperdine School of Law where he also directs the LLM program in dispute resolution. He specializes in cross-cultural dispute resolution and has published numerous articles in that field, and in 2015 he delivered a TED Talk on cross-cultural communications in Salem, Oregon. He has mediated intercultural and commercial cases in the United States, India, and Canada, among other countries. An Honorary Fellow with the International Academy of Mediators, he is also a council member of the Section of Dispute Resolution of the American Bar Association and board member at Weinstein International Foundation. He has trained lawyers and law students in more than 30 states and 22 countries. Singh obtained his Ph.D from National Law University, Delhi, master of laws in dispute resolution from University of Missouri-Columbia and was a Fellow at the Dispute Resolution Institute at Hamline University School of Law. An avid reader and an amateur photographer, he loves to travel with his family. He is passionate for music, sports, and interacting with new cultures.

Peter Robinson is professor of law at Pepperdine University School of Law and former managing director of the Straus Institute for Dispute Resolution. He has presented advanced negotiation and mediation skills courses throughout the United States and in more than 10 foreign countries. He has served on the boards of the California Dispute Resolution Council, the Southern California Mediation Association (SCMA), Dispute Resolution Services of the LACBA, the Ventura Center for Dispute Settlement, and the Christian Conciliation Service of Los Angeles. The SCMA recognized him as Peacemaker of the Year in 1999. He is a Fellow of the International Academy of Mediators and was recognized as a Southern California Super Lawyer in the area of mediation in 2006 and 2008. After being appointed by the Los Angeles City Attorney, he successfully mediated all the environmental objections to building the Farmers Field football stadium in downtown Los Angeles.

Stephanie Blondell is an assistant professor of law and assistant director of the Straus Institute for Dispute Resolution. She supervises the Mediation Clinic and teaches Mediation Theory and Practice, Psychology of Conflict, and Criminal Law. Prior to joining Pepperdine, she served as the manager of the King County Alternative Dispute Resolution Program and Interlocal Conflict Resolution Group, a tri-county labor-management and public policy mediation program in the area around Seattle, Washington. Prior to this she was the alternative dispute resolution coordinator for the City of Seattle where she designed and implemented a labor and employment mediation program for city government. Before joining Straus full-time, Blondell served as an adjunct professor at Straus, the Seattle University School of Law, and the University of Washington master of public administration program. Blondell earned her BA with honors in American civilization from Brown University, and her JD from the University of Washington School of Law.

Denise R. Madigan has been mediating full-time for over 20 years. She entered the field in the early 1980s as associate director for the Harvard-MIT Public Disputes Program at the Program on Negotiation at Harvard Law School. After practicing law at Arnold & Porter in Washington, D.C., she joined the pioneering ADR firm, Endispute, Inc., which later merged with JAMS. Her mediation practice is extraordinarily broad, and includes complex commercial, entertainment, intellectual property, insurance, mass accidents, public entity, and healthcare disputes, among others. In addition to her full-time mediation practice, Madigan has been an adjunct professor at the Straus Institute since 1996. She has designed and/or taught hundreds of tailored negotiation, mediation and other ADR courses for courts, law firms, government agencies, universities, nonprofits, and corporations in the United States, Asia, Latin America, and the Middle East. Madigan graduated with honors from Harvard Law School – where she served on the Harvard Law Review – and with a master's degree in public policy from the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University. Madigan now mediates through MadiganADR, based in Los Angeles.

Honorable Alexander H. Williams III (Ret.) is a mediator, arbitrator and discovery referee in private practice with ADR Services, Inc. in Los Angeles. He served as a judge of the Los Angeles Superior Court from 1984 to 2008. He presided for 8 years in a felony criminal trial department and for another 13 years in a general jurisdiction civil trial department, handling thousands of cases and conducting hundreds of court and jury trials. A trained mediator, he spent his final three years presiding over a full-time settlement court, where he daily conducted settlement conferences and settled hundreds of cases. Williams was the chair of the Judicial Education Subcommittee of the Court's Alternative Dispute Resolution Committee. Before taking the bench, he served as a police officer, Navy judge advocate, and federal prosecutor.

 MCLE

These activities have been approved for 42 hours of MCLE credit by the State Bar of California including two hours of ethics. Pepperdine University Caruso School of Law certifies that the activity conforms to the standards for approved education activities prescribed by the rules and regulations of the State Bar of California governing MCLE. Participants from outside of California should submit the California MCLE form to their state bar for approval after the program is completed.  Please be sure to sign in each day in the CLE sign-in forms located in the classroom. Straus programs have been accepted for MCLE credit across the nation.

 Guarantee

All programs of the Straus Institute for Dispute Resolution are offered with a satisfaction guarantee. If a participant completes the program and is dissatisfied with the course content or performance of the faculty, the tuition fee will be refunded.

 Tax Deduction

Education expenses (including enrollment fees, course materials, and travel costs) may be deductible if they improve or maintain professional skills. Treas. Reg. Sec. I 162-5.

 Location, Times, and Hotels


Location

Irvine program will take place at the Pepperdine University Orange County Center at 18111 Von Karman Ave., Irvine, California 92612.

Schedule and Parking

Class schedule is 8:30 am to 5:00 pm on Thursday and Friday.  Saturday schedule will be 8:30 am to 4:15 pm.  Lunches are 45 minutes as they are served to you in the building.  This allows ending 45 minutes early on both Saturdays (February 8, and 22, 2020).  Please use this time as you book airline flights.  Parking is validated each day only for the designated parking structure - please be sure to park in the parking structure listed in the directions you'll receive after you register.

Hotels

Irvine Hotel List

For the 2020 program the Marriott Irvine has a Pepperdine room block with a rate of $169.00 per night, plus tax.  The Marriott has a daily fee for parking a car.  You can walk to the Pepperdine Irvine Campus from the Marriott Hotel.  Some participants take a taxi or Uber to the Marriott Hotel and not rent a car during their stay.

Room Block 1:  2/5/20 - 2/9/20

Book your group rate for Pepperdine University  

Marriott Reservations: 1 (800) 228-9290
Cut-off date to reserve is 1/15/20

Room Block 2: 2/19/20-2/23/20

Book your group rate for Pepperdine University

Marriott Reservations: 1 (800) 228-9290
Cut-off date to reserve is 1/29/20

Questions may be directed to Lori Rushford: 310-506-6342 or lori.rushford@pepperdine.edu