Barco Law Library: Legal Research Classes
Each semester the Barco law librarians teach several for-credit courses in the law school. These classes teach a variety of beginning and advanced skills in legal research.
Spring 2009
5069 Effective Research Strategies for the Practitioner - 1 Credit
This course will take a very pragmatic approach to research. Students will learn the most effective and efficient methods for locating legal and other information typically sought by practicing attorneys, including fact research, business research, marketing and client development tools as well as legal research. The emphasis will be on locating information as quickly and cheaply as possible using whatever print, Internet, database or Lexis/Westlaw resource is most applicable to the information. Several guest lecturers including local practitioners and law firm librarians will be providing real-world research examples and solutions. The course is graded and evaluation is based on three research projects, there is no exam. The course will be taught in two class sessions per week during the first five weeks of the spring semester.
5958 Legal Research Fellows Practicum - 1 Credit
PREREQUISITES: 1ST YEAR LEGAL WRITING AND ANALYSIS AND AN UPPER LEVEL LEGAL RESEARCH CLASS (FOUNDATIONS OF LEGAL RESEARCH OR EFFECTIVE RESEARCH STRATEGIES FOR THE PRACTITIONER)
Participants in this course will sharpen and refine basic research skills learned during prior legal research courses. With supervision from the faculty services librarian and other Barco Law Librarian librarian-instructors, students will learn to develop legal research strategies, to conduct efficient and comprehensive legal research and to effectively communicate the results to faculty members. Fellows may draft memos, generate spreadsheets or develop bibliographies as finishedwork products for assignments.
The Research Fellow will encounter a diversity of research requests just as an associate would receive a variety of assignments in a law firm setting. Fellows will have an opportunity to directly interact with faculty members.
Students will be required to attend mandatory sixty minute(60) classes held approximately every 2-3 weeks throughout the the semester during the designated class time. During the classes, librarian instructors will discuss essential print and electronic legal research tools, and advise students on how to best utilize Lexis, Westlaw and other legal research databases for their research projects. Students will also discuss their research assignments and work together to generate solutions for difficult research projects.
This one (1) credit course is graded. The course grade is based on student attendance and participation, legal research proficiency, as demonstrated in project assignments, and a ten page paper, which is due at the end of the course.
Students must complete forty (40) hours of research during the semester and attend one (1) hour classes scheduled every 2-3 weeks during the designated class time. Students must work their research hours at the Barco Law Library to receive credit for the class. Enrollment is limited to 5 students per semester.
5863 Information Privacy Law Seminar - 3 Credits
Economic interests, the Internet and national security concerns have resulted in personal information becoming a commodity to be gathered, packaged, marketed, or used for investigative purposes often without regard for, or even the participation of the information subject. New mechanisms for both gathering and disseminating personal information, and new technologies that can both reduce and increase informational privacy have been developed ahead of the ability of the law to effectively regulate these activities. This three credit seminar will explore a number of the law and policy issues in the gathering and use of personal information and the protection of privacy. We will explore these issues in a number of contexts, including privacy and public records, privacy of health and genetic information, database development, privacy and law enforcement, anonymity, workplace privacy, and international privacy law. We will look at privacy-related legislation such as the USA PATRIOT Act, HIPPA, and the CAN-SPAM Act, and the technology of privacy including RFID and other chip technologies, data mining, and the Human Genome project. Students will complete and present an extensive research paper and complete other assignments on the use and misuse of personal information. Papers written for this course may be used to satisfy the upper-level writing requirement. Enrollment is limited to 12 students. Prof. Pike.
5956 Research in Intellectual Property Law and Practice - 1 Credit
The goal of this one-credit course is to provide an overview of the tools and methodologies needed to conduct effective research in Intellectual Property legal issues and practice challenges. Note that the description is not limited to legal research as IP research often requires practical, nonlegal research to identify existing intellectual property, its owners, licensees, and assignees, similar concepts and property such as “prior art” in Patent Law.
The course will meet each week of the semester for one 50 minute class session. Additional time will be used in library lab sessions and work on research projects. While this course is not (yet) approved as part of the IP certificate program, it is intended to complement our IP courses and be of particular benefit to our IP certificate students.
Course evaluation: Students will use a series of hypothetical cases and conduct research on questions relating to the three main areas of the course, copyright, patent and trademark. Specific questions may overlap between different areas of the course and may involve international IP issues and resources. Students will complete three short written “memo-style” papers to identify research issues and resources to address the particular questions. The papers will be evaluated on the quality and accuracy of the research issues and resources identified.>/p>