UT Law - Faculty - Wayne Schiess

Wayne Schiess

Senior Lecturer; Director - The David J. Beck Center for Legal Research, Writing, and Appellate Advocacy

Education

JD Cornell

Areas of Specialty

Wayne Schiess is the director of the David J. Beck Center for Legal Research, Writing, and Appellate Advocacy. He teaches legal writing, legal drafting, and plain English and speaks frequently on those subjects. He has written dozens of articles and four books on practical legal-writing skills. He graduated from Cornell Law School, practiced law for three years at the Texas firm of Baker Botts, and in 1992 joined the faculty at Texas.

Honors: In 2012, he was chosen as the Law School's legal-writing teacher of the year. In 2011, the Texas Pattern Jury Charges Plain Language Project, for which he was the drafting consultant, was named a finalist for a ClearMark Award by the Center for Plain Language. In 2009, five of his short articles were featured in the Scribes Journal of Legal Writing "Best of" series. In 2007, his legal-writing blog was selected for the ABA Journal Blawg 100: "The best Websites by lawyers for lawyers."

Recent Publications

Frequent Contributor, Austin Lawyer, 2007-Present.
Writing for Litigation (New York: Aspen Publishers, 2011) (with Kamela Bridges).
Issue Statements: Different Kinds for Different Documents, 50 Washburn Law Journal 341 (2011) (with Elana S. Einhorn). View Article

Full list of publications…

Recent Activities

Seminar speaker

2012

Various

Speaker on legal writing for Austin Bar Association, State Bar of Texas, Texas Criminal Defense Lawyers Association, Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, Texas Department of Aging and Disability, Appellate Judges Education Institute, and Center for Plain Language / Clarity / Scribes annual conference.
Award finalist

2011

Center for Plain Language

Drafting consultant for the revised Texas Pattern Jury Charges, which were named a finalist for a Clearmark Award.
Seminar Presenter

2011

Various

Seminar speaker on legal writing for the State Commission on Judicial Conduct, Teacher Retirement System of Texas, and the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals.