Eligibility and Enrollment
Eligibility for another certificate program, such as TI:GER, does not preclude participation in the Transactional Law Certificate Program. Similarly, JD/MBA or other joint degree students can earn the Certificate if they fulfill the requirements.
To enroll in the Transactional Law Certificate Program, students must complete a simple online enrollment form. Following enrollment, they must meet with the Executive Director, Assistant Director, or Program Coordinator for the Center for Transactional Law and Practice to discuss course selection and other matters. Admission to the program is not selective, and students may disenroll from the program at any time by notifying any of the personnel listed above.
View the Transactional Law and Skills Certificate Checklist »
Required Courses
- Doing Deals: Accounting in Action* or Analytical Methods (*Accounting in Action can be waived based on prior equivalent coursework.)
- Business Associations
- Doing Deals: Contract Drafting
- Corporate Finance OR Real Estate Finance
- Doing Deals: Deal Skills
- Federal Income Taxation
- Federal Income Tax: Corporations; Federal Income Tax: Partnerships; State and Multistate Taxation; International Tax; or another follow-on tax course offered by Emory Law
- Capstone course OR completion of an approved transactional externship
- Skills Courses
Doing Deals: Contract Drafting
Students learn how to translate a business deal into contract concepts, analyze a contract from the client's business perspective, and problem-solve through a succession of drafting exercises. Contract Drafting is a prerequisite for Deal Skills and capstone courses.
Doing Deals: Deal Skills
Deal Skills builds on the skills and concepts learned in Contract Drafting and is a prerequisite or co-requisite for capstone courses. It introduces students to business and legal issues common to a variety of commercial transactions. Students learn to communicate with simulated clients and colleagues and engage in other tasks typically required of a junior transactional attorney.
Capstone Courses
Each capstone course focuses on a different type of transaction, such as an acquisition or a commercial lending or real estate deal. Students may take more than one capstone course or fulfill the capstone requirement for the Certificate by completing a transactional externship as described in “Externships” below.
Recent capstone courses are listed below. All include “Doing Deals” as a prefix in the course listing.
- Commercial Lending
- Commercial Real Estate
- Complex Restructurings and Distressed Acquisitions in Chapter 11
- Employee Compensation and Benefits
- General Counsel
- Intellectual Property Transactions
- Mergers and Acquisitions
- Private Equity
- Representing Investment Funds
- Venture Capital
Note: Not all capstone courses are offered every semester. Most are offered once per academic year. All course offerings are subject to change.
Externships
Externships are not administered by the Center for Transactional Law and Practice but can fulfill the capstone course requirement for the Certificate if they are (i) administered by Emory Law for course credit, (ii) focus principally on transactional work (as opposed to litigation), and (iii) are approved for capstone credit by the Executive Director of the Center for Transactional Law and Practice. To seek such approval, email the Executive Director with a description of the nature of the activities involved in the externship. Check with lawexternships@emory.edu for information on externship opportunities.
Electives
Students may consider taking the following electives in addition to the courses required for the certificate.
- Bankruptcy
- Banking Law
- Commercial Real Estate
- Commercial Law: Sales
- Copyright Law
- Corporate Crimes
- Deferred Compensation
- Economic Analysis of Law
- Employment Discrimination
- Employment Law
- Franchise Law
- Intellectual Property
- International Business Transactions
- International Tax
- International Tax and Business
- International Tax Topics (Seminar)
- International Trade Law
- Labor Law
- Licensing
- Mergers and Acquisitions
- Negotiation
- Real Estate Finance
- Real Estate Loan Restructuring (Seminar)
- Regulation of Nonprofit Organizations
- Secured Transactions
- Securities Regulation
- Trademark Law
- Workers' Compensation