A few weeks back there was a post from someone asking about
justification for CALI membership. I replied to the person privately,
but last week at AALL, no less than 10 people mentioned that post so
I thought I would send my response to the list to clear up any confusion.
There are TONS of reasons to continue your membership with CALI!
The CALI Library of Materials is our most visible and tangible product,
but behind it is a our continuous ongoing research and development in
the area of computer-integrated legal education. CALI is non-profit
consortium and not a commercial publisher. We seek to innovate
without regard to commercial viability of a particular product or
approach. We are supported entirely by law schools in our efforts and
our members benefit from our efforts.
Did you know that the original work on interactive videodiscs that are
now distributed through the CLE Group and from Harvard Law School
were CALI projects? Did you know that the first electronic casebooks
were produced by CALI? We are currently pushing the envelope on
computer-based examinations and web-based delivery of legal education.
Besides the Library of Materials, which has grown to over 110 lessons
in over 20 legal subject areas, we also deliver:
- The Conference for Law School Computing: This year over 300
faculty, librarians and staff attended to learn about the projects,
services and new ideas in computer-integrated learning.
- The CALI-IOLIS (kal-lee-eye-OH-liss) Authoring System: CALI
has partnered with the Law Courseware Consortium in the United
Kingdom to bring a Windows-based lesson-authoring system to
CALI members. The software is very easy to use and free to all
faculty, staff and students at CALI member schools. There are
dozens of faculty currently working on CALI-IOLIS projects this
summer and we expect to see an explosion of new lessons in the
future.
- The Donald Trautman CALI Lesson Writing Competition: CALI
has just concluded the first year of this one-of-a-kind competition.
The Trautman Competition (named after a co-founder of CALI and
a Harvard Law professor) is modelled on legal writing
competitions commonly sponsored by bar associations. There are
divisions for both faculty and students and cash prizes are awarded
to the winners who develop the most innovative, effective and
high-quality materials. The next 1996-1997 Trautman Competition
will be announced in the near future.
- The CALI Excellence for the Future Awards: When Lawyers
Cooperative Publishing discontinued their AmJur awards last year
(except in California where Bancroft-Whitney continues to
adminster the program), we picked up the ball and improved on it.
The CALI Awards program is available to all U.S. law schools
and is awarded to the student receiving the highest grade in a
course. There are no restrictions on class size or subject taught.
The awards program is administered using software developed by
CALI that greatly reduces the likelihood of errors and greatly
simplifies the data collection process for law school registrars.
- CALI-EXAM: CALI has partnered with the Institute for Law
School Teaching at Gonzaga University School of Law to distribute
their collection of multiple-choice exam questions electronically.
The cornerstone of this project is software developed by CALI that
will allow the creation (and later the delivery) of law school final
exams on the computer.
- The CALI Law Student CD-ROM: CALI recognized that the great
majority of law students desire to use our materials on their home
computers. To make access to our materials more convenient, we
developed a CD-ROM that contains the entire CALI Library of
Materials. This CD-ROM can be purchased only by students from
CALI member schools at cost. The CD-ROM also contains
demonstration software from over 20 law practice automation
firms. We wanted to expose students to the tools that they will use
when they enter practice.
- Partnerships to Benefit Law Schools: CALI has partnered with the
CLE Group and arranged for discounts to the Interactive
Courtroom video-enabled CD-ROM teaching products for CALI-
member law schools. CALI has also arranged for discount prices
with Envires Corporation for their Shadow Law product on EPA
regulations and documents.
Currently, our most exciting work is in the area of WWW-based
delivery of our lessons. We are already testing a web-based
instructional delivery system and should have a production system by
this fall. The system under development will allow CALI-IOLIS lessons
to be automatically delivered over the World-Wide-Web so faculty can
both author and deliver their materials either via stand-alone computers
or via Internet-connected computers either at your law school or from
the student's home.
I have been Executive Director of CALI for a little less than two years
and I can't believe how quickly things are moving in the area of
computer-integrated learning. I view CALI as an extension of our
membership, a remote department, doing the research and development
that no, single law school could afford to do by itself. It is only through
the membership dues that we can continue to operate and I believe that
we deliver tremendous value in the products, services and research that
we perform on behalf of our law school members.
John Mayer
Executive Director
312-906-5307 - voice
312-906-5338 - fax
jmayer@kentlaw.edu - internet
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John Mayer, Executive Director 312-906-5307-voice
CALI-Center for Computer Assisted Legal Instruction 312-906-5338-fax
565 West Adams jmayer@kentlaw.edu
Chicago IL 60661
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