Law School E-Discovery Syllabus
E-Discovery Educators Network
The semester at the University of Florida Levin College of Law begins on Monday. The start of the semester is always exciting. I have attached the syllabus for the course, which provides a general overview. The specific readings and assignments are on Canvas, the learning management system we use. I will post the Canvas modules as we progress through the semester. One of my goals in the syllabus is to introduce myself and assure my mostly liberal arts students that the course will not require advanced STEM skills. I was a philosophy major! And a hearty thank you to Craig Ball for his quote.
Craig Ball
The semester at the University of Florida Levin College of Law begins on Monday. The start of the semester is always exciting. I have attached the syllabus for the course, which provides a general overview. The specific readings and assignments are on Canvas, the learning management system we use. I will post the Canvas modules as we progress through the semester. One of my goals in the syllabus is to introduce myself and assure my mostly liberal arts students that the course will not require advanced STEM skills. I was a philosophy major! And a hearty thank you to Craig Ball for his quote.
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Kelly Twigger
E-Discovery Educators Network
I’ve found that lawyers use AI for a variety of valid, constructive, and essential purposes to assist them in their professional responsibilities, such as testing arguments, refining pleadings and briefs, mock role-playing, and the like. Lawyers typically don’t “delegate” duties to LLMs. Even hallucination cases arise because of various dumb mistakes, miscommunications, and misunderstandings in a stressful environment.
Student use of LLMs to complete assessments is a different challenge. In the past, I’ve offered 3-hour take-home, open-book final examinations and multiple-choice examinations. But I’ve now shifted to in-person proctored examinations. I provide the students with paper copies of the relevant rules and statutes so that I’m not testing for memorization. The problem with a pure honor system that allows unrestricted take-home exams is that it threatens the integrity of the law school’s overall assessment process. Yes, cheating with an LLM damages the student whose character and competence are compromised, as the Professor elegantly explains. But it also threatens fairness. Law school is currently a very competitive environment. Many/most law firms and judges utilize grade point averages when making hiring decisions. There are two solutions other than proctored closed-book examinations. Allow take-home open-book assignments, but build the assessment so that it also tests the students' ability to use an LLM. The other approach is to abandon competitive ranking and letter grading and let the students create portfolios that demonstrate their skills, creativity, and ingenuity. However, the law firm hiring model currently runs counter to this healthy option.
The real challenge in law school now is not encouraging students to resist the temptation of using powerful LLMs in a high-stakes, competitive environment where ultimately tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars are at stake, but to create courses that teach students how to use LLMs to enhance their practice when they leave law school.