Ride the Lightning

Cybersecurity and Future of Law Practice Blog
by Sharon D. Nelson Esq., President of Sensei Enterprises, Inc.

Digital Detectives: Catalyst's Free E-Discovery Practicum for Law Schools

November 16, 2015

In the most recent edition of our Digital Detectives podcast, we enjoyed our conversation with Bill Hamilton, the executive director of the E-Discovery Project at the University of Florida's Levin College of Law.

Only about 30 law schools nationwide offer e-discovery courses. To address the gap, e-discovery provider Catalyst developed a free practicum that aims to give law students the necessary experience to enter the workforce with adequate practical knowledge about e-discovery. Topics we discussed include:

  • What a practicum is (we had to look it up)
  • The students' use of e-discovery software
  • Instructional videos, structured exercises, and quizzes with feedback
  • Catalyst’s interest in education and its cloud-based platform
  • Testing to strengthen retrieval capacity rather than as an assessment tool
  • Applying the case law to concrete situations
  • The grading process: low stakes testing and evaluation
  • The need for law schools to provide more practical e-discovery training

The practicum got rave reviews from the students – no surprise there – the teaching of practical skills is still somewhat rare in many law schools. Good conversation – thank you Bill!

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