Improving Legal Research Instruction: Texas Tech's Certificate of Excellence in Legal Research Program

As law schools send their graduates off to practice law and their first and second year students to summer programs, many are all too often ill-equipped to perform legal research effectively. Academic law librarians can beat their chests claiming they can do nothing about this because they do not have enough input in the typical legal research and writing program and cannot persuade law school administrators to make successful completion of an advanced legal research course a requirement for graduation, or they can develop programs to supplement their school's current curriculum.

Guest blogger, Arturo Torres, Associate Dean, Law Library and Computing, and Professor of Law at Texas Tech School of Law, describes one such program in the following post. Note how comprehensive, systematic and convenient it is for Texas Tech students. Law school librarians may want to adopt some version of this program at their home institutions. There's no time like right now for improving legal research instruction in the legal academy. [JH]

Texas Tech's Certificate of Excellence in Legal Research Program

The Law Library at the Texas Tech University School of Law offers an extracurricular non-credit certificate program in legal research. By completing this program, students earn a credential that can be listed on their resume as proof of the research skills they offer prospective employers.

To earn the Certificate of Excellence in Legal Research, students must complete 30 clock hours of instruction and assessment. Each student must complete 20 hours of required courses and 10 hours of electives. Each class consists of two or three hours of lecture and demonstration and one hour of skills assessment. To earn credit for each class, the student must satisfactorily complete the one-hour skill assessment. Click on image (left) to view representative sample of a semester course schedule.

Students may begin the program as early as the second semester of their first year of law school and complete the required number of hours anytime before graduation. Classes in print research, electronic research, and various other general research topics are offered every semester and during the summer session. Students register online based on their needs and availability.

The program has been in existence for about two years and we are proud to report that as of spring 2008 eight students have received their certificates. Many students are currently in the pipeline and working toward certification.

Based on our experiences over the last two years, we will be revamping the program in summer 2008. We will be reviewing the course offerings, including required courses, rigor of skill assessment, and general program administration streamlining. The program is further described here.

-- Arturo Torres, Associate Dean, Law Library and Computing, and Professor of Law, Texas Tech School of Law