John Schooner (JD ’26) is the 2025-2026 Editor-in-Chief of the Public Contract Law Journal (PCLJ) and the GW Law “Boyd Scholar.” We spoke with John about his experience in the GW Law Government Procurement Law Program, why the PCLJ is so special, and tips for students interested in this dynamic field.
Can you share a bit about your background – Where did you grow up, what inspired you to attend law school, and how did you become interested in government contracts?
I grew up in Northern Virginia and, aside from a detour to Ohio for college, have lived here my entire life. Growing up just outside of DC with lawyer parents, I was interested in the government and came to appreciate the important role lawyers played in solving problems and upholding the rule of law.
Even with this early exposure, I had a roundabout way of getting to law school. Since my parents were lawyers, it only made sense as a kid for me to swear I’d never be one. Once I realized I wasn’t cut out to be a major league baseball player, I was certain I’d be a sports journalist. I knew I liked to write, research, and craft arguments on topics I was passionate about, so I thought writing about sports for a living would be a good fit. I got involved in my high school newspaper and even attended a summer journalism program before my junior year. The catch was, I quickly realized during the program that journalism wasn’t necessarily what I thought it was: the rigid structure in writing news articles bored me, and the lack of analysis made me uninterested in my own work product.
These realizations made me consider law school for the first time. The legal profession made sense for me at a variety of levels. I wanted a career that would challenge me. I played baseball until I was 23 years old, and developing an expertise in the legal field felt similar to how I approached the intricate skills required on the baseball field. Above all else, though, the lawyers I grew up around inspired me. I saw how hard they worked and their abundant knowledge. This was the type of career I was looking for, and law school quickly became the obvious choice.
Much like law school itself, I also swore off government contracts when I was younger. I was constantly around lawyers in the field, and my younger self wanted to be different. But what initially turned me off to the field eventually became my motivation to join it: the field was full of some of the best people I knew, and they were all passionate about their work. The field itself also fascinated me. I’m a competitive person, so I was excited by the high-stakes matters that face government contracts attorneys on a daily basis. The scope of the field is also vast: the government buys everything from fighter jets to paper clips. I wanted my work to mean something, and I knew this would never be a question in government contracts.
What makes the Public Contract Law Journal stand out among GW’s journals?
PCLJ is unique among the journals at GW Law. While all of the journals are fantastic, PCLJ is the leading publication of its kind, serving as a birthing ground of discourse in the government contracts community. The bookshelves of government contracts practitioners in all areas of legal practice (law firms, in-house, judges, etc.) are lined with PCLJ copies. It’s not often that law students have the opportunity to make meaningful contributions to the legal profession. Working on PCLJ is, without a doubt, one of those rare opportunities.
Beyond the journal’s prestige and value to the government contracts bar, what further makes PCLJ stand out is the network associated with it. Practitioners across the legal profession truly value PCLJ and want to get to know the students who contribute to it. Whether it be at summer jobs, networking events, or interviews, I’ve found PCLJ to be a launching pad for some of the most interesting conversations and meaningful relationships I’ve formed during law school.
In practical terms, what skills and experiences does the PCLJ offer its members, and why should students consider joining?
Regardless of students’ interests, PCLJ is a formative experience. Writing a scholarly Note on a topic in a complex, highly regulated field presents an opportunity to build research and writing skills beyond those learned as a 1L. Students are fairly confined in what they write during their first-year, but writing a Note offers a creative opportunity that many students look for when starting law school. Along with writing the Note, one of the greatest assets available to PCLJ students is our wonderful adjunct professors. PCLJ’s adjuncts are skilled government contracts practitioners who, beyond helping students write publishable Notes, bring real-world experience that makes our students better writers and legal thinkers. Along with the adjuncts, GW’s full-time Government Procurement Program faculty regularly make themselves available to PCLJ members for Note-writing and career advice. Even if members are not interested in the field at the outset, being exposed to the government contracts community can get students hooked. Often, law students look for “passion” in a particular field during law school. For some, that might come from prior work experience or an “ah-ha” moment when taking a class. Above all else, though, the legal profession is a people industry, and it’s hard to beat the people the government contracts community has to offer.
For students who are particularly interested in government procurement law, however, there may be no better opportunity for skill-building at GW Law than PCLJ. In addition to the networking opportunities, members engage with a variety of government contracts-related sources (e.g., the FAR, GAO and ASBCA decisions, proposed and final regulations) when working on their Notes and production assignments. In writing their Notes, students can satisfy the writing requirement for GW’s government procurement concentration and provide meaningful contributions to discourse in the field.
Tell us about your journey with the PCLJ—from joining as a staff member to becoming Editor in Chief. What challenges and rewards have stood out?
Joining a journal can be intimidating at first. As in-depth as the 1L curriculum is (shameless plug for taking full advantage of GW’s exceptional Fundamentals of Lawyering program), nothing truly prepares you for the type of work on a journal. On production assignments, students are faced with more complex sources and citations, and scholarly writing is completely different from the memo/brief writing we learn as 1Ls.
These challenges become less intimidating when you lean into what I think is the most rewarding part of journal: the people. 1L is very focused on individual success (getting the best grades, earning membership on a skills board, getting the fanciest summer job, etc.). Journal is a different animal. No one can run a journal alone. Working with last year’s Editorial Board and my peers inspired me to do my best work as a 2L and take on a leadership role as a 3L.
While being Editor-in-Chief certainly has its challenges, I’ll stick to the biggest reward so far. Leading a journal requires a lot of discretion, and it’s been a great experience to work with my team to truly make the journal “ours.” We’ve faced a number of challenges already, but it’s been super cool to see what we can accomplish when we put our heads together (again, no one can run a journal alone!).
Your note tackled sustainable procurement. How did you choose that subject, and what was your research and writing process like?
My Note focused on the FAR Council’s effort, through overhauling FAR Part 23, to promote procurement of sustainable products and services. Like any other PCLJ student (or student on any journal, for that matter), picking a Note topic felt like a daunting task. I knew I wanted to write on something more “macro” (as opposed to a particular case study), but beyond that, I wasn’t sure. When considering what topics in the procurement space are most relevant to current events, sustainable procurement continued to stand out: climate change is one of the biggest challenges facing our society, and the government has a unique role in driving businesses to implement sustainable solutions. I was also inspired by reading two excellent Notes on sustainable procurement by GW Law graduates Evan Matsuda and Michaela Thornton. Sustainable procurement is an area that has, unfortunately, been neglected, so contributing to the scholarship on the issue appealed to me.
The Note-writing process was one of the highlights of my 2L year. PCLJ places students in small groups with an exceptional group of adjunct professors and skilled student Notes Editors. My adjunct, Sammy Block, and my Notes Editor, Leia Ficks, provided me with fantastic advice throughout the Note-writing process. We also had consistent meetings with our adjuncts, writing workshops led by the journal’s Senior Notes Editor, and interim deadlines to keep us on track. Writing a Note is a big undertaking, but the resources on PCLJ make it a manageable and enjoyable process. I also can’t overstate how cool it is seeing the finished product: every year, PCLJ students add interesting contributions to the discourse in the field. I found this particularly motivating.
What advice would you give new PCLJ members on balancing editing responsibilities with coursework and other commitments?
I like to call PCLJ a “choose your own adventure” experience. In terms of balancing responsibilities, the work is manageable. Some journals require multiple production assignments a month. PCLJ does not. If your only goal in being on a journal is to write a Note and learn about source collection, that’s totally fine. If you want to be on the Editorial Board, publish your Note, and attend various events throughout the year, that’s also an option (although it definitely takes more work!). Members get a ton out of the PCLJ experience regardless of how much they dive into it. Obviously, I’d recommend a full nosedive into the deep end, but it’s far from a requirement.
Accordingly, my advice would be to identify what you want to get out of journal membership, and give your best effort to those goals. Your goals might change, but the more intentional you are with your time, the better work you will produce. It’s impossible to do everything in law school, but you’ll rarely look back and regret giving your very best effort to something, regardless of what that something is.
Reflecting on your 2L summer, what placements or projects did you pursue, and in what ways did GW’s government contracts offerings influence your experience?
During my 2L summer, I was a Summer Associate at Crowell & Moring LLP. I was largely drawn to Crowell during my 1L summer job search because of its Government Contracts practice group, which is one of the largest and most reputable of its kind. Getting to work with many of the field’s top attorneys on matters involving “big hitter” clients excited me. The practice group is also filled with GW Law alumni, which further drew me to the firm.
I was not assigned to a particular practice group during my 10 weeks at the firm, but I was able to complete six government contracts assignments, working with GW Law alumni on five of them. The size of Crowell’s government contracts practice allowed me to work on a variety of different legal issues on those assignments, showing me the breadth of work I can do, even as a future attorney in a “niche” field. While I am far from an expert, my 2L year coursework gave me a level of familiarity that made me more comfortable (and excited) when grappling with complex legal issues. On multiple assignments, I found myself thinking of class discussions and reading assignments that addressed similar issues to the ones I was facing in real-time government contracts matters. I am confident that another year of government procurement coursework will continue to put me in a fantastic position when I return to Crowell as an Associate after taking the bar exam next summer.
You and your partner, Ryan Marcus, reached the finals of the Arnold & Porter Government Contracts Moot Court. What did that competition teach you about advocacy in this field?
The competition was a formative experience. I really enjoyed oral argument work during my 1L year, both in my Fundamentals of Lawyering class and in the First Year Moot Court Competition. The Government Contracts Moot Court is very different than those experiences.
First, government contracts issues are highly technical. To master last year’s problem (a Court of Federal Claims bid protest cleverly devised by Kristina Zaslaskaya and Rebecca Van Vliet), my peers and I had to go beyond simply knowing facts and law. We needed to fully understand, and be able to explain, the ins and outs of the fictitious contractor’s product on a technical level. Second, government contract law is super complex. The sources of law, acronyms, and terms of art are seemingly countless. In an oral argument, it’s the attorney’s job to make these complex issues simple. Distilling multifaceted jurisdictional and technical issues into succinct, digestible sentences was difficult, but incredibly helpful in becoming more confident speaking on government contracts issues. Nothing quite tests your knowledge of a new field more than having to explain it to others. Through writing briefs, practicing oral arguments, and ultimately competing, my peers and I grew as government contracts thinkers on a daily basis.
I’m incredibly thankful to Professors Christoff and Williamson, Kristina and Rebecca, the judges from both the preliminary and final rounds, and all of my peers involved in the competition. I was particularly lucky to work alongside Ryan, a terrific moot court partner and an even better friend. Having the opportunity to argue in front of a bench of real judges in a real courtroom is an experience that I’ll carry with me long after I leave GW.
Finally, for students curious about a career in government contracts—what concrete steps or resources would you recommend to get started?
Familiarize yourself with what GW Law has to offer, and try something out! The offerings are seemingly unlimited, so you can’t hit everything. Whether it’s going to a networking event, applying for PCLJ, or even just joining the Government Contracts Student Association Listserv, the hardest step is often the first one. I know that putting yourself out there in law school can be tough, but that’s where the nature of the government contracts bar and GW Law’s Procurement Program comes into play: the people want to get to know you and be a part of your journey, whether you’re a 1L curious what a government contract is or a 3L who’s completed the concentration. The only way to guarantee you won’t get access to this incredible resource is if you don’t take the leap: if you do, I can tell you with confidence you won’t regret it.
