Fall 2026
5397 Mindfulness in Law - HOFFMANL- 26143
Professor(s):
Lonny Hoffman (FACULTY)
Credits: 3
Course Areas: Law And Society/ Interdisciplinary
Time: 2:30p-4:00p MW Location:
Course Outline: This course explores the challenges to well-being facing law students and legal professionals and examines sustainable ways of responding to those challenges. The exploration primarily involves practicing several complementary mindfulness techniques. One of those approaches is what we call mindful communication, a practice inspired by Marshall Rosenberg’s Nonviolent Communication. We will also engage in a range of mindful embodiment practices, including guided mindfulness exercises both in and outside the classroom, weekly slow-movement practices, and a field engagement project in which, near the end of the semester, you will teach what you have learned to others.
Collectively, these mindfulness practices are meant to advance the class’s primary objective: to help students develop greater awareness of how their minds and bodies work, with the aim of discovering for themselves how clearer awareness can support more durable well-being.
As should be clear from this description, this is a highly experiential course. The benefits students gain depend in significant part on a shared willingness to participate with openness, care, and attention. Students are therefore expected to help co-create a learning environment that supports trust and appropriate vulnerability. If you are not willing to make that commitment, this course is unlikely to be a good fit for you. I would encourage you to read the posted course syllabus for more detailed information about the class before enrolling.
Course Syllabus:
Course Notes: (Face-to-Face) The UH registration system instruction mode for this course is listed in parenthesis. For this instruction mode, instructors and students are expected to normally be physically present in the classroom. If the course has a final examination, it will be in a classroom requiring your physical presence. Other assessment, such as a mid term exam, may also be in a classroom. Whether this instructor will offer “remote presence” (starting a zoom meeting from the podium computer to enable student remote access on an occasional basis) for part or all of the semester is not known, but students should not rely on an expectation that remote presence will be available.
Quota=20.
This three-credit course is limited to twenty students.
Grading:
This course satisfies UHLC’s experiential course requirement. However, if you do not need the experiential credit (because you have taken or plan to earn the required credits in other ways), then this course can be taken on a pass/fail basis and I would strongly encourage you to consider doing so. There are three components to grading in this class:
Class Engagement. Part of your grade will be based on your constructive engagement with this class. Although this is more commonly referred to as class participation, we believe engagement is a better term and the modifier is important. Constructive engagement certainly does not turn on the number of times that a student speaks. Active listening is just as important as speaking and, ultimately, the quality of your engagement with this course is what matters, which is we are allocating 15% of the final grade for this element.
Short Reflective Papers. You will write three short, non-anonymous reflective papers (usually no more than two to four typed, double-spaced pages). Assignments will be noted in the syllabus and you’ll get more detailed guidance so everyone can know what is expected of them and how they’ll be evaluated. The short papers, collectively, are worth 15% of the final grade.
Presentation and Longer Paper. Students will also do a presentation about their field assignment. As discussed below in the syllabus (and we’ll cover this in much more detail in class), the field assignment is near the end of the semester. Students will teach some aspect of what they’ve learned in the course to others and then do a presentation to the entire class on their learning experience from this assignment. The presentation is worth 20% of the final grade.
Finally, students will write one longer non-anonymous paper based on the topic that they chose for their field assignment. This paper should be between 8-10 typed, double-spaced pages.
As with the short reflective papers and the presentations, we will separately provide more detailed guidance as to the expected content of the long paper and how it will be evaluated. The long paper is worth 50% of the final grade.
Prerequisites:
First Day Assignments:
Final Exam Schedule:
This course will have:
Exam:
Paper:
Satisfies Senior Upper Level Writing Requirement: No
Experiential Course Type: simulation
Bar Course: No
DistanceEd ABA: No
Pass-Fail Student Election: Conditional Availability (not for required credits)