The University of San Francisco School of Law is one of at least a dozen law schools in the United States where students represent small investors facing big headaches, often because their brokers were more interested in maximizing their own commissions than in giving sound advice. Supervised by law professors, teams of students file motions, interview clients, and make their cases in hearings before arbitration panels. Clinics that used to receive a couple of calls a week have fielded dozens in recent weeks, as investors realize the extent of their losses in the economic downturn. Many cannot afford to hire a lawyer, or their claim is too small to interest one. Most of the clinics started in New York State, with support from settlements that a former state attorney general, Eliot Spitzer, won prosecuting Wall Street firms. More than a half-dozen law schools in the state, including those at Fordham University and Pace University, and New York Law School, now offer free clinics for small-time investors. Similar clinics are operating at Duquesne and Northwestern Universities. In a tanking market, part of the challenge for the student lawyers and clinic staff members is demonstrating that the outcome would have been different if the broker had suggested a wiser investment strategy. Law-school clinics take on cases that private-practice lawyers will not bother with because the potential for recovery is too small. Resolving such a case, however, usually takes longer because students are learning on the job, but clients who have nowhere else to turn rarely complain.