Issue link: http://read.uberflip.com/i/87421
Several apps with immense potential were built by Georgetown students, largely for people who cannot afford lawyers. Legal research is only one part of the practice of law that has improved with innovation. We have automation for reviewing and producing documents. There are tools to manage cases, clients and conflicts. And, of course, there are numerous tools to communicate, collaborate, mediate and even litigate from your desktop. There's no reasonable way to teach law students about all these products, but it is possible to present ways the process of practicing law has changed over time. Taken from our class and others, here are examples of legal process innovation introduced to our students, often with guest lecturers, both remotely and in the classroom. With each, it is useful to see how an innovative process is implemented; it's less important to learn about differences between different products that perform similar functions. Predictive Coding and Automated Document Review: Electronic discovery continues to be a big topic for any ILTA conference, and litigation lawyers use a variety of partners for discovery tasks. In class, we go beyond discussing e-discovery tools and talk about predictive coding, which uses technology to assist in reviewing, coding and sorting documents for discovery. Maura Grossman, Litigation Counsel at Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz, has talked about her research in this area and provided concrete examples of successful technology- assisted document review initiatives. 76 AALL/ILTA White Paper Unbundling Legal Services: More jurisdictions have begun to allow lawyers to unbundle legal services, providing options for lawyers to provide limited-scope representation to more clients. This is often in the areas of estate planning, wills and some contracts. Couple these developments with tools for managing client interaction online, and we have another important process improved by technology. Students learn far more from seeing the unbundling process in action than from reading practice rules or exploring practice support software tools. The New Normal: Paul Lippe of Legal OnRamp has spoken with our students about the new normal for law practice and provided examples from his ABA Journal column. "New normal" as a buzz phrase has taken hold, but it only makes sense with some understanding of what normal is or has been. Some students have questioned what "old normal" was like. There are many other processes that can be incorporated into classroom learning. However this is done, it's important for students to learn how law firm practice incorporates technology today, and how it doesn't. To understand the technology landscape, look to law firm technology managers, leaders within ILTA and industry technology surveys for progress benchmarks.