Had him for Corporate Reorganization. Very well known bankruptcy attorney and definitely knows his stuff, but don’t be tricked by the 1 credit, final paper requirement, and no bankruptcy prereq. He expects you to already have some basic bankruptcy knowledge and will run through tons of information way too fast. Also difficult to contact by email. Office hours are unclear because there’s no syllabus.
Do not recommend. First, while he says no prereqs, if you want to understand what’s going on, you should take corporate lawyer first. (That said, you don’t have to understand what’s going on—I didn’t and pulled off an A- based on the final 10-page paper.)
He is disorganized: there was no syllabus, and he didn’t realize he didn’t publish Canvas before the class started—thus we had literally no course information until we walked into the first session).
He is unresponsive to students. He didn’t respond to student emails regarding the lack of pre-first class information, regarding a student auditing the course, regarding issues with one of the methods to turn in our final paper… he wasn’t available during his listed office hours (and when he finally got in, he had a scheduled call so had to rush us along).
I would counsel against taking corporate reorganization for a few reasons:
1) The description says that basic bankruptcy is not a requirement; this is technically true, but if you haven’t taken it he’ll request you read a 150 page supplement before class starts. He gave notice of this & assigned 150 other pages of reading before the first day of class.
2) There’s no syllabus, a good deal of reading to do, and we ran behind schedule frequently, meaning it was kind of a crap shoot as to what we were discussing in class each day. The professor was definitely disorganized: classes were often disjointed.
3) The name of the class should be something more akin to “Hot Topics in Bankruptcy”. It was basically a survey of issues the professor found interesting or caselaw he made. That’s not bad, per se, but it also wasn’t arranged in a coherent way.
4) This class gave more reading week-in and week-out than Corporate Lawyer, Securities Regulation, and all of my doctrinals. Some weeks we had close to 200 pages. We never discussed a lot of them, either, so it felt like a waste of time.
The professor, himself, is fine. The course is just a bit of a mess.
Will be boring if you haven’t taken bankruptcy or secured transactions. However, if you’re interested in bankruptcy, it is a super interesting class. Super low ask in terms of coursework and final, and worth sitting through the lectures for the dinners alone. Bienenstock is also one of the most prominent names in the field of restructuring.
MLaw Prof Reviews
Had him for Corporate Reorganization. Very well known bankruptcy attorney and definitely knows his stuff, but don’t be tricked by the 1 credit, final paper requirement, and no bankruptcy prereq. He expects you to already have some basic bankruptcy knowledge and will run through tons of information way too fast. Also difficult to contact by email. Office hours are unclear because there’s no syllabus.
Do not recommend. First, while he says no prereqs, if you want to understand what’s going on, you should take corporate lawyer first. (That said, you don’t have to understand what’s going on—I didn’t and pulled off an A- based on the final 10-page paper.)
He is disorganized: there was no syllabus, and he didn’t realize he didn’t publish Canvas before the class started—thus we had literally no course information until we walked into the first session).
He is unresponsive to students. He didn’t respond to student emails regarding the lack of pre-first class information, regarding a student auditing the course, regarding issues with one of the methods to turn in our final paper… he wasn’t available during his listed office hours (and when he finally got in, he had a scheduled call so had to rush us along).
I just don’t recommend him.
I would counsel against taking corporate reorganization for a few reasons:
1) The description says that basic bankruptcy is not a requirement; this is technically true, but if you haven’t taken it he’ll request you read a 150 page supplement before class starts. He gave notice of this & assigned 150 other pages of reading before the first day of class.
2) There’s no syllabus, a good deal of reading to do, and we ran behind schedule frequently, meaning it was kind of a crap shoot as to what we were discussing in class each day. The professor was definitely disorganized: classes were often disjointed.
3) The name of the class should be something more akin to “Hot Topics in Bankruptcy”. It was basically a survey of issues the professor found interesting or caselaw he made. That’s not bad, per se, but it also wasn’t arranged in a coherent way.
4) This class gave more reading week-in and week-out than Corporate Lawyer, Securities Regulation, and all of my doctrinals. Some weeks we had close to 200 pages. We never discussed a lot of them, either, so it felt like a waste of time.
The professor, himself, is fine. The course is just a bit of a mess.
Will be boring if you haven’t taken bankruptcy or secured transactions. However, if you’re interested in bankruptcy, it is a super interesting class. Super low ask in terms of coursework and final, and worth sitting through the lectures for the dinners alone. Bienenstock is also one of the most prominent names in the field of restructuring.