UPDATE (3/24/25): 54 spots left. Also, if you’ve previously paid for a subscription, drop us a note and you’re welcome to join for the April/May 2025 PACER trainings.
This weekend marked the end of the so-called ‘Sunshine Week’ – a public effort that seeks to act as a reminder that government at all levels must remain open and accessible to the people it serves.
And while our reporter friends may quibble with this assertion: there is no branch of government more resistant to sunshine than the courts. From narrow local rules that only allow certain documents to be read at an actual courthouse, to a stubborn refusal to provide public access to most hearings, to conflict of interest forms filed in such a way that make review nearly impossible, to no electronics in most courthouses, to the ridiculous requirement that no recording of a hearing is allowed, even the ones posted on YouTube by the courts, to PACER being so un-user-friendly that it borders on offensive. Almost as offensive as that run-on sentence.
But we buried this post’s lede while standing on our soapbox, so here it is.
For the last few years, we’ve trained thousands (!) of journalists in news rooms big and small on how to traverse the federal court system looking for stories. We’ve also done pop-up trainings for recently laid off reporters and helped nonprofits seeking to expose injustices. We wanted to extend that opportunity to the larger public and also help ensure the sustainability of Court Watch in the long term.
For the first 100 subscribers who upgrade to any paid subscription tier between now and Friday evening (March 28, 2025), we’ll offer three opportunities to attend our online PACER training to learn our tricks of the trade.
The training (a $200 value), typically 45 minutes, goes from the basics of searching the federal dockets to much more sophisticated searches. You get to see behind the scenes of how our quirky brain brings you the best (and only?) roundup of the most fascinating court records every week. Once you upgrade, just drop us a line that you’d like to attend a training. We’ll send details on when and how to attend in the coming weeks.
If you’re not interested in a PACER training, perhaps just upgrade anyway. We’ve been operating on a shoestring budget for the last three years and are consistently but adorably teetering on insolvency. Help us make sure we can continue to bring Sunshine to the Courts for the entire year, not just a fleeting week.
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