Law Commons^™

Click Here: Externship Data Management Tools To Increase Productivity (And Promote Sanity), Jodi S. Balsam, Lauren N. Donald, Carolyn Young Larmore, Sarah Shalf

Externships (X) Conferences

The most significant challenge externship programs face is “insufficient administrative support,” followed closely by “other demands on the faculty’s time,” according to the CSALE survey. And the pressure is only getting worse. The increased record keeping requirements of Standard 304(c), increased student participation due to the ABA’s 6-credit experiential learning requirement and new paid externship positions, plus the ever-present pressure of tight budgets, together are driving the need to find innovative approaches to these mounting administrative burdens.

For many of us, the answer to these challenges is finding online data management tools that can manage vast amounts of data efficiently …

Improv & Internships: Using Improvisation Techniques To Teach Vital Lawyering Skills, Leah Young, Alison Lintal

Externships (X) Conferences

How students choose to collaborate and communicate can have a significant impact on the outcome of a workplace project as well as their legal career. Additionally, the importance of face-to-face communication, body posture, and learning to interpret body language cues is crucial for building professional relationships. Through these interactive exercises, students get the opportunity to practice responses in a setting that fosters student development and growth. Furthermore, improvisation provides the legal profession with tools that can be used to enhance communication, active listening, collaboration, agility, trust, authenticity, and resilience.

An important emphasis in externship courses is a focus on cultivation …

Seize The Data! Using Evidence From Externship Courses To Measure Law School Learning Outcomes, Christine Zellar Church, Robert L. Jones Jr., Kendall L. Kerew, Kelly S. Terry

Externships (X) Conferences

With the adoption of ABA Standards 302 and 315, law schools are now required to establish institutional learning outcomes for their graduates and measure whether their graduates are achieving competency in those outcomes. Given this mandate, all law schools will need to determine the best method to measure whether they are meeting these articulated outcomes. This session will focus on the role that clinical education and externships, specifically, can have in the assessment of institutional learning outcomes. The goal of the session is to provide attendees with guidance on the role that student performance data from externship courses can play …

Teaching The Tough Stuff: The Opportunities And Challenges In Teaching Implicit Bias, Diversity And Inclusion To Supervising Attorneys, Kinda Abdus-Saboor, Gillian Dutton, Rachel Reeves, Marjorie Silver

Externships (X) Conferences

We entrust supervising attorneys with the critical responsibility of providing law students with a meaningful experiential learning experience. Supervising attorneys ultimately control the nature of work students receive, the delivery of feedback, and the work environment that the student inhabits. Thus, it is vital that we equip our supervising attorneys with the basic skills necessary to navigate student supervision effectively. Among those basic skills is the ability to traverse the cross-cultural complexities inherent in working with students whose cultural identities may differ from the supervising attorney. Equally important are the cross-cultural issues that may arise among students and the clients …

Building The Whole Lawyer: Preparing Students For Entry-Level Success, Courtney Brooks, Jeff White, Nicole Killoran, Beth Locker

Externships (X) Conferences

What competencies best assure entry level success for new legal professionals? Survey feedback from more than 24,000 hiring professionals offers solid guidance. The survey was conducted by Educating Tomorrow’s Lawyers, an initiative of the Institute for the Advancement of the American Legal System and published in 2016 as Foundations for Practice: The Whole Lawyer and The Character Quotient (FFP). The authors found “characteristics (such as integrity and trustworthiness, conscientiousness, and common sense) as well as professional competencies (such as listening attentively, speaking and writing, and arriving on time), were far more important in brand new lawyers than legal skills.”

So …

Digital Literacy: Detecting Fake News In A Post-Truth Era, Carol A. Watson

Continuing Legal Education Presentations

Discusses the origins and impact of "fake news" and implications for a law practice.

Searching High And Low: Advanced Search Tips And Tricks, Wendy Moore

Continuing Legal Education Presentations

Searching is easy; so much so, that you can be surprised when the desired information is not retrieved in the first few search results when doing a basic Google search. A basic Google search, while a good place to begin, should not also be the end of your search. This paper gives you search strategies to apply when a basic Google search does not produce the results you

The Theory Of The Case: Competitive Intelligence Tips For Attorneys, Suzanne R. Graham

Continuing Legal Education Presentations

Explores web-based or web-hosted tools that help in three important areas of online legal research: competitive intelligence, business intelligence, and investigative research. The tools are new and shiny, but the strategizing and intellectual legwork needed to use them effectively mirrors how an attorney prepares a case for trial. Shares notable tools with guidance on shortcomings and strengths.

Using Social Media Research To Your Advantage, Endia S. Paige

Continuing Legal Education Presentations

We live in a time when Facebook, Twitter, and other social media networks have become so integrated into daily life that it is critical for attorneys to maintain a basic understanding of the most popular platforms and how they can benefit his or her legal practice.

Social media has made it easier to gather information about litigants and other professionals in the legal field. This paper provides an overview of the most popular social media platforms used by adults in the United States and gives insight into how attorneys can use them to conduct legal and investigative research.

From The Capitol To The West Wing: Making The Most Of Federal Law And U.S. Government Information On The Web, Anne Burnett

Continuing Legal Education Presentations

When searching for federal government materials and federal law on the web, researchers are more likely to encounter an overabundance of information than a lack thereof. Fortunately, free federal government and non-government sites have made great strides in improving accessibility to these materials through better organization and finding tools.

This paper directs researchers to both official and unofficial free sites providing access to federal government materials, including federal law. These sites are an alternative to fee-based services, including Westlaw, LexisNexis, Bloomberg BNA and FastCase, although most do not contain all of the bells and whistles that these commercial services offer. …