First, I don't think that there's an objective way to measure effective
legal research skills because the amount of research that lawyers perform, and the way in which they do so will depend upon the availability of resources.
Not exact matches
Second, my approach would improve
legal scholarship
because the only people producing scholarship would be those who are highly
skilled in doing
research (and who therefore understand the difference between
research and advocacy) and the scholarship would be evaluated in the same way as scholarship in other academic fields.
Unfortunately, most students come to law school overconfident in their
research skills because they are fairly adept at the simple task of gathering information.30 So they often fail to appreciate that
legal research is significantly more sophisticated and complex than the more - general
research they have conducted in the past.
LAWCLERK ™ works with graduates who haven't taken the bar yet
because they are valuable in terms of
legal research, writing, and briefing
skills which are all sought after in this marketplace.
Because the cornerstone of an appeal is the appellate brief, an attorney must have superior
legal research and writing
skills.
Because of the amount of information available today, the number of access choices, and the limited subject knowledge of a new lawyer, it likely will take several years to develop adequate
legal research skills.
The article is meant as a guide for lawyers,
because putting Holland's strategies to work in court requires some decent
legal research skills along with the ability to assemble a coherent
legal argument and defend it in court.
But essentially, we teach them LRW and then they rarely have to use those
skills because they are given casebooks that contain all the cases and statutes that the profs want them to see, there is no incentive to conduct
legal research unless they are writing a paper.
Perhaps it is
because they consider it beneath them, or they are embarrassed to admit to the their lack of expertise in this fundamental and essential
skill, but many is the time I have seen
legal research foisted off on a poor
legal assistant.
History or English degrees also develop useful
research skills for
legal practice: «Traditionally, a history degree is seen as being in sync with law
because of the
research skills you develop,» says Samantha Hope, graduate recruitment manager at Shoosmiths, «but we don't have a preference of degree subject.»