25, 250,000, 2,500,000 AND 10,000,000

We don’t talk enough about our accomplishments here at CALI. I believe it is because we are too busy working on the “next thing” and barely pause long enough to get the word out about how other things are going. Technology in legal education is constantly changing, though it does often cycle back around to ideas we’ve had in the past (*cough*, ebooks, distance learning, *cough*).

We’re going to try to change this.

Every week, someone on the CALI staff will write a short blog post for the CALI Spotlight talking about something CALI did or is working on. There are so many interesting conversations between and among the staff and we attend conferences and workshops all the time where we have amazing, fascinating experiences and ideas. We are going to try to capture some of that and share that with you.

Now, what about the numbers?

25 is the number of years that CALI has been holding the Conference for Law School Computing. Realize for a moment how wonderful an accomplishment that is! For 25 years, we have been hosting a meeting of law school Teknoids, librarians, faculty, ed-tech folks, vendors and various folk with the purpose of sharing ideas, projects, code and camaraderie. The majority of recent conference sessions are available on Youtube too!

250,000 is the number of CALI Excellence for the Future Awards that we will have processed for 120 different law schools.  Actually, we will pass that number sometime next year. We started the CALI Excellence for the Future Award program to recognize accomplishments by students in all law school courses (the old “book” awards only recognized a limited number of courses)  and to help law schools make that recognition. It’s a perfect project for a consortium of law schools.

2,500,000 is the number of times someone ran an A2J Author Guided Interview(r) in the past 7 years. Most of these were people need to solve a legal problem and a friendly and competent legal aid attorney created an A2J Author Guided Interview(r) that walks them through filling out a court form. I am especially proud of this accomplishment and we are hard at work on the next generation of A2J Author.

A2J Author has educational value as well.  Over a dozen law schools have used A2J Author in a course taught to law students. The students learned a 21st century practice skill, the legal aid community got some help automating a court form and self-representing litigants get help.  It’s WIN-WIN-WIN.

10,000,000 is the number of times a law student ran a CALI lesson in the past 11 years.

10 MILLION!

That number is staggering and reminds us of the tremendous responsibility that we at CALI take very seriously. Faculty are assigning and students and learning from the CALI lessons that we helped produce.

Now, here’s the thing.

CALI did not deliver all those presentations over 25 years of conferences.

CALI did not get the highest grade or make the determination who was the top student in the class. We didn’t even type in the names of the students or the courses they took.

CALI did not design, develop and write the A2J Author Guided Interviews that were used over 2.5 million times.

CALI did not author the 900+ lessons that were used over 10 MILLION times by law students.

You did that.

You faculty, staff and students at law schools that support CALI. We did do our part –  writing software, organizing caterers and hotels, applying for grants, training users, responding to emails and phone calls, developing processes and systems that are available and reliable. It’s obvious to say it, but important for us to remember – we would not exist without you.

Thank you!

John Mayer
Executive Director, CALI
jmayer@cali.org
@johnpmayer

updated 3/11/15 to add links and correct some terrible typing and grammar – mea culpa!

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Drone Law

6129855697_a9337b0bcf_mDrones – unmanned aerial vehicles – are in the news more and more. Have you ever wondered about the law that regulates them? CALI can help you out!

Yes, CALI has a lesson on the new area of Drone Law.  This lesson – Drones: Unmanned Aircraft Systems – covers both the miliary and civilian aspects of drone law.  It is part of our Aviation law series and is written by Professor Wendy Davis of the University of Massachusetts School of Law at Dartmouth.

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Board of Directors News

This month the CALI membership elected three new board members to its Board of Directors.   The new members are:

  • Warren Binford,  Willamette University College of Law
  • David I.C. Thompson, University of Denver Sturm College of Law
  • Roger V. Skalbeck, Georgetown University College of Law

They have each been elected to a three year term.

Additionally, two members of our Board of Directors have been named to Jurist’s 25 Most Influential People in Legal Education.  They are William Henderson, Indiana University Mauer School of Law – Bloomington and Paul Caron, Pepperdine University School of Law.

Welcome and congratuations to all!

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CALI Infographics

With the 25th anniversary of CALIcon approaching and the expanding offerings of CALI, I decided to make some infographics that make it a little easier to digest what it is we do and how long we’ve been doing it.   Spoiler alert: A lot and for a long time!

These will be traveling with us as CALI staff members attend different conferences, but in case you don’t get to see them in person, here they are!

A Timeline of CALI's Activities

A Timeline of CALI’s Activities

CALI by the Numbers

CALI by the Numbers

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Come see CALI at AALS!

2932769640_de0390516f_mLegal education is at a cross roads… and CALI can show you the way!   Stop by our booth (#202-206 in the exhibit hall) and see what all we have to offer!

Assessment and Experiential Learning are two of the hottest topics in legal education right now thanks to some changes to the ABA accreditation requirements.  Did you know that CALI already has assessment and experiential learning tools in place and ready for you to use?  It’s true!

Our CALI Lessons and the underlying CALI Author software can be used for either formative or summative assessment by you and your students.  We have over 900 lesson in 40+ legal subjects.  LessonLink allows you to  view student performance on CALI lessons down to a question by question basis.  If our existing library doesn’t work for you, you can always edit and/or write a new lesson and then publish it on our site for free with our AutoPublish feature.

As for experiential learning, how does hands on work with legal aid organizations and using technology to create guided interviews for self represented litigants sound?  CALI is currently working with several law professors on a pilot program incorporating A2J Author into new or exisiting law school courses and clinics.   A2J Author is a document assembly software program that allows non-programmers to create step by step interviews that allow self-represented individuals to fill out forms that can be submitted to courts.

But wait!  There’s more!  But you’ll have to stop by the booth to see.  The entire CALI staff will be available to take suggestions and answer your questions.   See you there!

Photo Credit: Daniele Pesaresi via Compfight cc

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A2J Author Course Project announces faculty fellow selections

About-Welcome to A2JCALI is pleased to announce the selection of the faculty fellows participating in the A2J Author Course Project, a joint initiative with IIT Chicago-Kent College of Law and Idaho Legal Aid Services to support law school courses teaching A2J Author®. Robert C. Blitt and Valorie K. Vojdik (University of Tennessee College of Law), Alyson Carrel (Northwestern University School of Law), Jennifer A. Gundlach (The Maurice A. Dean School of Law at Hofstra University), Carrie Anne Hagan (Indiana University Robert H. McKinney School of Law), Michele R. Pistone (Villanova University School of Law), Michael J. Robak (University of Missouri-Kansas City School of Law), and Rebecca S. Trammell (Stetson University College of Law) will offer courses teaching students to create Guided Interviews, interactive graphical interfaces that help self-represented individuals navigate a legal process.

Those courses will be taught across varying course models, exemplifying the versatility of A2J Author as a powerful tool to lower barriers to justice. The courses also span a wide range of legal topics, from mediation to human rights. Faculty fellows will offer courses in Fall 2015 and Spring 2016 and will meet with project planners and other fellows throughout the project. Faculty fellows will also contribute their course materials and author a case study for use by future teachers of A2J Author.

The A2J Author Course Project builds on the success of the first round of the project, then called the A2J Clinical Course Project. Based on the Justice & Technology Practicum, a course taught by Professor Ronald W. Staudt of IIT Chicago-Kent College of Law, the A2J Clinical Course Project brought together faculty from six law schools and sought both to facilitate the creation of interactive tools to assist self-represented individuals and also teach law students technical skills vital to practicing law in the 21st century. The rebranding of the project for this next round reflects the substantial interest in A2J Author courses by both clinical and non-clinical faculty across the country.

CALI thanks all those who submitted superb proposals for this round – a record number. Congratulations to the faculty fellows and best wishes for your work ahead.

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CALI Lessons = Assessment

6059832534_04e9456b65_mAre CALI Lessons as useful to Faculty as they are students?  You bet your sweet assessment they are!

CALI Lessons have a reputation as being “just a study aid” for law students.  While that is indeed a function that they serve, they can also be a powerful assessment tool for faculty.

What is assessment?  Very simply, it’s seeing how a particular student or your class is doing.  It can take two forms – formative or summative.  Formative assessment monitors student learning throughout the progression of a course.  They can take the shape of quizes, rough draft of seminar papers or other low or no point value exercises.   Summative assessment evaluates student learning.   A mid-term, a final exam or final paper are all examples of summative assessment.

Traditional legal education has been very good at summative assessment, in that we do it. (Whether or not the current essay model actually acurrately assesses learning is a whole other conversation.)  Formative assessment, on the other hand, has been lacking.   Well, that’s going to change.

ABA Standard 314 (and it’s interpretations) state:

Standard 314. ASSESSMENT OF STUDENT LEARNING
A law school shall utilize both formative and summative assessment methods in its curriculum to measure and improve student learning and provide meaningful feedback to students.
Interpretation 314-1
Formative assessment methods are measurements at different points during a particular course or at different points over the span of a student’s education that provide meaningful feedback to improve student learning. Summative assessment methods are measurements at the culmination of a particular course or at the culmination of any part of a student’s legal education that measure the degree of student learning.
Interpretation 314-2
A law school need not apply multiple assessment methods in any particular course. Assessment methods are likely to be different from school to school. Law schools are not required by Standard 314 to use any particular assessment method.

Yes, formative assessments are coming your way!  Luckily for CALI member schools, they have an assessment tool available right now – CALI Lessons and the CALI Author Software that powers them.  Students that use CALI Lessons are able to self-assess either via the explanations that come with every answer in a CALI Lesson or  the detailed lesson scoring information that is provided to them after every lesson run.  Faculty who use LessonLink or AutoPublish can access that same data about their students.  So don’t worry about piles of paper to grade or review…CALI Lessons have the faculty covered in a tidy online report.

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Don’t Hide from the Future – Teach It!

6129795259_61f095b88f_zEarlier today I caught a tweet from Law Librarian and Professor Shaun Jamison about his Future of Law course. Specifically, it was about a CALI resource he’s been using – one I tend to forget about but is so valuable and useful today.  Yes, CALI has a set of resources – powerpoints, recorded lectures and exercises – created by some of the leaders in the legal practice world and absolutely free for you to use and adapt in your classes.  We call them the Topics in Digital Law Practice.

This set of resources orginially started out life as a MOOC held in the Spring of 2012.  The topics ranged from document automation to virtual law practice to the technology that’s used in the courts.  The speakers graciously donated their time and work materials to CALI and we have published them on the web with a Create Commons CC BY-SA  license.  That means that you can reuse, remix and republish them and all you have to do in return is credit CALI’s Topics in Digital Law Practice as your source and link back to the site if you are publishing it on the web.

The topics and speakers were as follows:

Friday, February 10, 2012 2pm-3pm EST
The Virtual Law Office
Stephanie Kimbro
Attorney and Technology Consultant
www.virtuallawpractice.org
Twitter @stephkimbro

Document Automation
Marc Lauritsen
Attorney and Document Automation Expert
http://www.capstonepractice.com/marc.htm
Twitter @marclauritsen

Technology in the Courts
Jim McMillian
Principle Court Technology Consultant
National Center for the State Courts (http://www.ncsc.org)

Unbundling Legal Service Delivery
Richard Granat
President of SmartLegalForms, Inc. and DirectLaw, Inc.
http://www.elawyeringredux.com/promo/about/
Twitter @rgranat

Free Legal Research Tools
Sarah Glassmeyer
Director of Community Development / Law Librarian
CALI
http://sarahglassmeyer.com/
Twitter @sglassmeyer

Contract Standardization
Kingsley Martin
President, kiiac.com, www.contractstandards.com/

Online Legal Forms in Legal Aid
Ronald W. Staudt
Professor of Law
Chicago-Kent College of Law
http://www.kentlaw.edu/faculty/rstaudt/

Unauthorized Practice of Law in the 21st Century
William Hornsby
Staff Counsel at American Bar Association

Social Media for Lawyers
Ernest Svenson
Attorney at Law
www.ernietheattorney.net
Twitter @ernieattorney

Happy Remixing!

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CALI Welcomes the Legal Scholarship Blog to Classcaster!

1035843808_a0a5be5179CALI is pleased to welcome the Legal Scholarship Blog to ourClasscaster network of blogs, websites and podcasts.  From their announcement:

On Monday November 3, 2014, the Legal Scholarship Blog will be moving – but never fear, we will keep the same url and subscribers to the blog’s RSS feeds and email alerts will continue to receive LSB updates as usual…

We made the decision to move because the blog has been hacked several times and we have been looking to find a more secure home. Our search took us to CALI, the Center for Computer-Assisted Legal Instruction, and its Classcaster blogging platform. CALI, as many of you know, is a non-profit consortium of mostly US law schools that conducts applied research and development in the area of computer-mediated legal education. Classcaster is CALI’s legal education podcasting and blogging network and seemed like an obvious place for the LSB. When we asked about moving the LSB over to Classcaster the CALI team responded enthusiastically and has been extraordinarily helpful in accomplishing the movement of our blog and its 7 years of archived content.

As the old advertising slogan goes, “if you lived here, you’d be home now!”  If you have wanted to try blogging or are already a blogger and wish to have an advertisement-free blog with personalized support, try CALI’s Classcaster.  It is a FREE benefit of membership in CALI.

And it’s not just for blogging…Classcaster can be used as a personal website, podcast host, course webpage and so much more!  Classcaster is made from WordPress, an open source web platform.  It can be manipulated into just about any shape or tool imaginable – and no programming skills are required.   Questions?  Please contact Elmer Masters at emasters AT CALI.org

Photo Credit: Mykl Roventine via Compfight cc

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A2J Author® software is a finalist for the 2014 International Innovating Justice Award

logo_innovatingjusticeA2J Author® software—developed by IIT Chicago-Kent College of Law and CALI®, the Center for Computer-Assisted Legal Instruction—has advanced to the final round of the international Hague Institute for the Internationalisation of Law (HiiL) 2014 Innovating Justice Awards. A2J Author finished in the top three among 14 other global innovations in the “Successful Innovations” category, which recognizes initiatives that are already making a difference.

The next phase of the awards process involves finalists attending the Innovating Justice Forum November 25 and 26 in The Hague to present their projects. CALI executive director John Mayer will represent the A2J Author team at the forum. The awards will be announced November 26.

“The advancement of A2J for the HiiL Innovating Justice award is terrific news for the software and its creators, CALI and IIT Chicago-Kent,” said Professor Ronald W. Staudt, director of IIT Chicago-Kent’s Center for Access to Justice and Technology (CAJT). “A2J Author has been used millions of times by self-represented people to seek justice. It is easily the most successful innovation I have been part of in the more than 36 years I have been working on issues related to law, technology and access to justice.

“This nomination will showcase that success and help law students, lawyers and courts worldwide learn about the benefits of A2J Author. CAJT program coordinator Jessica Bolack Frank did a great job in preparing the entry, and John Mayer will be fabulous presenting the A2J Author story at The Hague,” said Professor Staudt.

A2J Author is the first court form automation software designed to be pro se user friendly. This allows nontechnical law students, legal aid attorneys, and courthouses to build customer-friendly interfaces that help self-represented litigants complete necessary forms. These A2J Guided Interviews® ask questions in plain language and process the information provided by the user to be assembled into a savable and printable document.

A2J Author is the most widely used document automation tool by pro se litigants to address their legal needs. There are more than 1,000 A2J Guided Interviews that are live on the LawHelp Interactive national server. These 1,000 Guided Interviews have helped almost 2.5 million people in less than 10 years.

It is the only free tool available to legal aid attorneys and court staff to automate court forms for people without lawyers. Other software tools and services on the market charge authors to create their automated forms or charge end users to access them. A2J Author is completely free for any nonprofit organization to use for noncommercial purposes.

A2J Author is jointly owned by IIT Chicago-Kent College of Law and the Center for Computer-Assisted Legal Instruction (CALI®). It is managed by IIT Chicago-Kent’s Center for Access to Justice and Technology.

The Center for Access to Justice and Technology was established at IIT Chicago-Kent to make justice more accessible to the public by promoting the use of the Internet in the teaching, practice, and public access to the law. The Center conducts research, builds software tools, teaches classes, and supports faculty, staff, and student projects on access to justice and technology.

CALI®, the Center for Computer-Assisted Legal Instruction, is a nonprofit consortium of law schools whose mission includes promoting “access to justice through the use of computer technology.”

A2J Author® software—developed by IIT Chicago-Kent College of Law and CALI®, the Center for Computer-Assisted Legal Instruction—has advanced to the final round of the international Hague Institute for the Internationalisation of Law (HiiL) 2014 Innovating Justice Awards. A2J Author finished in the top three among 14 other global innovations in the “Successful Innovations” category, which recognizes initiatives that are already making a difference.

The next phase of the awards process involves finalists attending the Innovating Justice Forum November 25 and 26 in The Hague to present their projects. CALI executive director John Mayer will represent the A2J Author team at the forum. The awards will be announced November 26.

“The advancement of A2J for the HiiL Innovating Justice award is terrific news for the software and its creators, CALI and IIT Chicago-Kent,” said Professor Ronald W. Staudt, director of IIT Chicago-Kent’s Center for Access to Justice and Technology (CAJT). “A2J Author has been used millions of times by self-represented people to seek justice. It is easily the most successful innovation I have been part of in the more than 36 years I have been working on issues related to law, technology and access to justice.

“This nomination will showcase that success and help law students, lawyers and courts worldwide learn about the benefits of A2J Author. CAJT program coordinator Jessica Bolack Frank did a great job in preparing the entry, and John Mayer will be fabulous presenting the A2J Author story at The Hague,” said Professor Staudt.

– See more at: http://www.kentlaw.iit.edu/news/2014/a2j-author-software-2014-innovating-justice-award-finalist#sthash.WBMeyel5.41ULgGWn.dpuf

A2J Author® software—developed by IIT Chicago-Kent College of Law and CALI®, the Center for Computer-Assisted Legal Instruction—has advanced to the final round of the international Hague Institute for the Internationalisation of Law (HiiL) 2014 Innovating Justice Awards. A2J Author finished in the top three among 14 other global innovations in the “Successful Innovations” category, which recognizes initiatives that are already making a difference.

The next phase of the awards process involves finalists attending the Innovating Justice Forum November 25 and 26 in The Hague to present their projects. CALI executive director John Mayer will represent the A2J Author team at the forum. The awards will be announced November 26.

“The advancement of A2J for the HiiL Innovating Justice award is terrific news for the software and its creators, CALI and IIT Chicago-Kent,” said Professor Ronald W. Staudt, director of IIT Chicago-Kent’s Center for Access to Justice and Technology (CAJT). “A2J Author has been used millions of times by self-represented people to seek justice. It is easily the most successful innovation I have been part of in the more than 36 years I have been working on issues related to law, technology and access to justice.

“This nomination will showcase that success and help law students, lawyers and courts worldwide learn about the benefits of A2J Author. CAJT program coordinator Jessica Bolack Frank did a great job in preparing the entry, and John Mayer will be fabulous presenting the A2J Author story at The Hague,” said Professor Staudt.

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