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Examining how small the legal tech world is within the legal IT community as a whole, we can readily acknowledge that the massive need for education is a formidable challenge. The gaps between what an everyday lawyer knows about technology, and what IT knows about the practice of law, are now being properly recognized as a huge divide. For the past 15 years or so, this technology law chasm has been bridged by a precious few organizations, lawyers, IT professionals, experts and vendor consultants who have thrown their bodies on the proverbial railroad tracks to try to keep their less informed colleagues from crashing headlong into the abyss.
Perhaps enough crashing - in the form of fines, sanctions, lost cases and abject humiliation - has now taken place so that many lawyers and law students are now steadily realizing that they must learn about technology, whether they like it or not.
The good news is that there are great organizations out there, both established and newly minted, that are devising new and exciting ways to educate legal and IT professionals. Two such bodies are IT-Lex and The Sedona Conference®.
IT-Lex – Educating Legal Professionals and Students
IT-Lex is a not-for-profit recently founded by lawyers Adam Losey, Ralph Losey, and Samir Mathur. The entity is quite new and aims to bring new blood into the eDiscovery and technology law arena, linking up “technology law scholars, educators, seasoned practitioners, young lawyers, law students, paralegals, technologists, and anyone else with an interest in this constantly-evolving area of law,” according to its website.
Law students are the attorneys of tomorrow, of course, and today’s go-getter law students are hungry for eDiscovery education – or if they’re not, they should be if they want to be successful lawyers one day. Christopher Danzig of Above the Law posted on June 4th: “E-Discovery in Law School: Yes, You Need to Learn This Stuff”. Adam Losey from IT-Lex agrees with this 100%.
An associate at Foley & Lardner, Adam was a teacher prior to becoming a lawyer, and he taught eDiscovery as an adjunct professor at Columbia University. Losey has what he refers to as a “fire in the belly” about eDiscovery education and says, “Lawyers need to get educated on eDiscovery or they will find it hard to compete in the increasingly competitive market for legal services. If litigators don’t get savvy, they’re going to flounder.”
This eDiscovery passion runs in the family- Adam’s father, Ralph Losey is a partner at Jackson Lewis and creator of the e-Discovery Team®, a blog and education resource that has is widely read and respected.
Adam stresses the need for law students to learn about eDiscovery, whether their law school offers courses on it or not. In order to bring law students and other professionals into the eDiscovery conversation, Adam explains that IT-Lex is launching a number of initiatives including a blog, video clips, and events.
IT-Lex is also sponsoring a merit-based writing competition for law students, and will open for submissions in the fall. The top three winning entries will be published in the IT-Lex Journal, receive invitations to join IT-Lex as Members, and will receive $5,000, $1,000, and $500 prizes (respectively). Entrants must be law students in good standing at an ABA accredited law school.
Today's legal job market is blisteringly competitive. eDiscovery knowledge is an edge that will make law students more attractive to firms and corporations; IT-Lex is providing real help in this regard.
The Sedona Conference Resources
The Sedona Conference, a non-profit organization, was founded in 1997 by lawyer Richard G. Braman and is funded by donations from corporations and law firms, membership fees, and fees paid to attend its events. According to Kenneth “Ken” J. Withers, Director of Judicial Education, Sedona has 10 working groups that meet and discuss cutting edge issues in the areas of antitrust, complex litigation and intellectual property rights, including issues relating to law technology and eDiscovery – problems that don’t have easy solutions. He highlights that Sedona encourages cooperation among parties in the fact-finding phase of litigation, which speeds things up and reduces costs at the same time.
The working groups draft commentaries which are then vetted and honed through dialogue fostered at events such as The Sedona Conference Institute (TSCI). TSCI is a 2-day summit bringing together thought leaders from legal and IT to discuss the most current and pressing eDiscovery and legal IT topics of the day. Ideas, opinions and education also come to life through a series of webinars that Sedona provides.
Ken explains that much of Sedona’s efforts in this space are litigation-oriented and designed to produce content that will help judges, lawyers, IT and records management professionals. Sedona’s work is also relevant for internal audits, investigations, information governance and management issues.
Sedona is particularly appreciated by judges because the results are considered practical, non-partisan, balanced and from the trenches. Ken notes that more than 250 cases have cited to The Sedona Principles and conferences. Also, since there is little money available in government budgets for judicial education and so many cases today have elements of technology, Sedona is that much more valuable for judges. Ken says, “Sedona needs to go out to where judges are to try to get on the agenda, and to bring the educational programs directly to them.”
Here are some interesting Sedona initiatives coming up in the near future:
Ken also mentioned an innovative project planned for February 2013 which will train litigators on practical cooperation. Sedona is limiting participation to 50 people for a 1.5 day simulation of best practices to cooperate during the discovery phase of a civil litigation case that will be enacted from beginning to end. Unlike most Sedona events that are held behind closed doors and kept confidential, this session will be videotaped and then will be made available to the general public for educational purposes.
American poet Robert Lowell once said, “If we see light at the end of the tunnel, it is the light of the oncoming train.” For legal and IT professionals that have been caught off guard by technology issues that cost them pain, time and money, the legal technology “train” has been a destructive force. However, fortunately, because of organizations like IT-Lex and The Sedona Conference, and countless other tried and true legal technology leaders who have been leading the way, it’s becoming easier for legal and IT professionals to avoid the oncoming train and see a positive outcome revealing itself. We admittedly still have very far to go, but much more of the legal community is on the right track.
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