Presidents Page
Jim Wren President |
|
Assistant Professor of Law
|
By his own admission, Jim Wren is a person of very limited abilities. He knows how to talk to juries, and he knows how to teach law students and young lawyers to talk to juries. “I’m at a loss trying to list any other useful skills I might have,” he says. It is true that Jim enjoyed a once-promising career in coaching, when he served as assistant coach for his twin sons’ sixth-grade basketball team. Despite the team’s city private school sixth grade championship that year, however, Jim resumed his career in litigation. “You have to be willing to make the tough career choices.” Jim was recruited to the faculty of Baylor Law School in 2006 to teach Practice Court. He comes from a specialization in business litigation, including business fraud, professional liability and fiduciary litigation. While in private practice he was designated by Texas Monthly as a Texas Super Lawyer in Business Litigation each year from the time the designation originated in 2002. He is board certified in Civil Trial Advocacy (by the National Board of Trial Advocacy) and in Civil Trial Law and in Personal Injury Trial Law (by the Texas Board of Legal Specialization). At Baylor, Jim starts class each morning at 7:45 and insists that “in court and class there’s no such thing as on time … you’re either early or you’re late.” (There are no late arrivals.) He teaches advocacy that is “respectfully but relentlessly persistent,” with cross examination built on demonstrating the truth “one undeniable fact at a time.” Classes run the same way, conducted in East Texas English, “spoken as God intended.” Jim presently serves as President of the National Board of Legal Specialty Certification, which is the ABA-accredited national certifying board for civil trial, criminal trial, and other legal specializations. He is a strong believer in the value of board certification, both for the board certified attorneys and for the public they are serving. “People need a way to distinguish the attorneys who have truly achieved in a specialization. Board certification is the only way that really does that. It’s not something that is sold for advertising or based on buddies voting for each other. It has to be earned the hard way. It’s the real deal.” Jim continues to represent clients in various courts around the nation. He is licensed for federal practice before the United States Supreme Court, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, the U.S. Court of Federal Claims, and the Western, Northern, Eastern and Southern Districts of Texas, and appears in other federal and state courts by special admission. He is a graduate of Trial Lawyers College in Dubois, Wyoming, and has served on the teaching faculty of Trial Advocacy College, sponsored by the Texas Trial Lawyers Association. He is a former director of the National Board of Trial Advocacy and of the Texas Trial Lawyers Association, and former president of the Waco chapter of the American Board of Trial Advocates. Jim graduated with a J.D. cum laude from Baylor Law School in 1980. He added an M.A. in International Relations from the University of Kent at Canterbury in 1982. Prior to joining the Baylor Law School faculty, he served for many years as an adjunct professor teaching the Management of Complex Litigation course to third-year students. Jim and his wife, Mindy, have a daughter, Stacy (20), and twin sons, Eric and Jackson (19). The Wrens are active members of University Baptist Church in Waco. |