Study

728 Technology and Legal Problem-Solving

Modern lawyers are asked to make sense of increasingly large messes. Discovery requests may yield millions of pages instead of thousands. Government and corporate decisions may rely on black-box algorithms that can only be inferred from their data exhaust. Evidence to support changes in law or policy may lie hidden in newly digitized public records. Clients with complex, urgent, inchoate stories need to be triaged and processed. This course aims to equip law students with the foundational technical skills to make sense of any mess. Via real-world problems rooted in legal practice, students will learn the basics of collecting, searching, and analyzing data, along with how to build simple scripts and automations. Although students will encounter, generate, and write code, this is not a course in computer science or an introduction to programming.

Course Areas of Practice
  • Intellectual Property, Science, and Technology Law
Evaluation Methods
  • Practical exercises
  • Class participation
Degree Requirements
JD elective
IntlLLM NVE Cert
IntlLLM-SJD-EXC elective
IntlLLM Business Cert
IntllLLM IP Cert
Course Type
  • Seminar
Learning Outcomes
  • Other professional skills needed for competent and ethical participation as a member of the legal profession

Sample Syllabi

Fall 2025

2025
Course Number Course Credits Evaluation Method Instructor

728.01 2
  • Practical exercises
  • Class participation
 Keith Porcaro

Modern lawyers are asked to make sense of increasingly large messes. Discovery requests may yield millions of pages instead of thousands. Government and corporate decisions may rely on black-box algorithms that can only be inferred from their data exhaust. Evidence to support changes in law or policy may lie hidden in newly digitized public records. Clients with complex, urgent, inchoate stories need to be triaged and processed. This course aims to equip law students with the foundational technical skills to make sense of any mess. Via real-world problems rooted in legal practice, students will learn the basics of collecting, searching, and analyzing data, along with how to build simple scripts and automations. Although students will encounter, generate, and write code, this is not a course in computer science or an introduction to programming.

Grading Basis: Credit/No Credit

Syllabus: 728-01-Fall2025-syllabus.pdf48.32 KB

Degree Requirements
Pre/Co-requisites
None

In this section

*Please note that this information is for planning purposes only, and should not be relied upon for the schedule for a given semester. Faculty leaves and sabbaticals, as well as other curriculum considerations, will sometimes affect when a course may be offered.