Technology is one of the greatest blessings in humankind. Technology has made everything so easy and effective. Technology has also played a vital role in the field of legal education. Most of the law firms, courtrooms and corporate are embracing technology through CLM tools, compliance tools, e-case, e-filling trademarks and patents, word processing, legal research, etc. And also, the social media is totally flooded with the debate over technology replacing lawyers.
Technology is very helpful for legal education, all over the globe students are being trained to use different applications like SCC online, Manupatra and WestLaw, etc. How to use these applications? These applications include case laws, statute, explanation to every law-related things which are very helpful to students and lawyers as well. Cyber forensics is one such aspect that helps in finding the evidence and for this also students are trained globally.
Lawyers are adopting technology because it helps to improve the efficiency, it is not possible to hold all the information in the brain or to read the bulky books all the time in order to get the solution that’s why technologies are there to help lawyers in order to get the relevant facts and norms to the point with no wastage of time by using different online portals. Even the courts also accept all the facts which are there in Manupatra, SCC and other portals, the Supreme Court also gives all their judgments and important information on their official website.
In the United States, the computer assisting in legal education and research was noted in 1960 but it didn’t get much impact then but by 1980 it began to have a major impact. The internet has also started impacting globally since 1993 and embraced by legal firms and most of the law faculties. The most common use of technology is telephones, scanner, computers, photocopy, and fax machines. Microsoft word has one of the important roles.
Those days are gone now where typewriters and stenographs were used. Inputting data, checking for correctness, storing data and accessing previously filed data with the aid of computers seem to be the norm but this was not so previously. Adding to these two technological landmarks that have greatly impacted law are computer-assisted regal research and computer-assisted legal instructions.
Computer-Assisted Legal Instruction (CAI) was developed by various professors notable among which is Professor Charles D. Kelso of the Indian School of Law in 1960. CAI comprised of many legal topics and also helps students. It was designed to be an individual tutorial to ensure active learning and encourage an adequate understanding of the topic by the user. Things took a more formal shape when the University of Minnesota Law School and Harvard Law School established the Centre for Computer-Assisted Legal Instruction (CCALI) now known as CALI which now consists of most of the US law Schools. It provides different types of exercises like memory drills, simulations which try to recreate real-life scenarios and gives and also which gives tutorial as well.
But legal technology is not getting much importance in most of the law schools. There is an apathetic approach to advance relevant technology learning and so graduates find it difficult to adapt to the already technology-savvy work environment. It is the duty of the law schools to train their students to work on this and give them special training of using these technologies like how to get the adequate content from different portals because it is very difficult to find it also as it full with many case laws, provisions and judgment so sometimes it’s very difficult to find things accurately that’s why the student should get trained as to how to search the exact things and also to give training in cyber forensic which is again very much important in criminal law. There are many law schools in India who don’t have the subscription for all these online portals. Legal education is a hidden wealth. Law is the cement of the society which fertilizes a barren land and makes the lives of people worth living in society.
“The views of the authors are personal“
Frequently Asked Questions
What are the different tools used most commonly in the field of legal education?
Most of the law firms, courtrooms and corporate are embracing technology through CLM tools, compliance tools, e-case, e-filling trademarks and patents, word processing, legal research, etc.
What is cyber forensic?
The cyber forensic basic meaning is the art of applying computer science in the legal process.
What is Computer-Assisted Legal Instruction?
Computer-Assisted Legal Instruction (CAI) was developed by various professors notable among which is Professor Charles D. Kelso of the Indian School of Law in 1960. CAI comprised of many legal topics and also help students. It was designed to be an individual tutorial to ensure active learning and encourage an adequate understanding of the topic by the user.
