Law School Dispenses iPads, Touts Downtime Study Opportunity
A California law school’s pilot program to provide iPads to students in a supplemental bar study curriculum proved so popular that all of its entering 1Ls signed up.
The Monterey College of Law in Seaside, a four-year evening law school, has issued a press release saying it is the first U.S. law school to “adopt the iPad as an integral part of the law school curriculum.” The press release quotes law school officials who say the pilot program, developed in conjunction with BAR/BRI, will be a boon to students, many of whom juggle law school, work and family.
According to law dean Mitchel Winick, the iPad “ will provide time-challenged students an easy way to add 30 to 45 minutes of studying each day … during a lunch break, waiting in the car-pool line, or even getting their oil changed. The result will be an additional 3 to 5 hours per week of valuable study time.” He hopes the result will be better performance in law school and improved bar-pass rates.
The next step in the program, Winick says, will be to provide iPads to faculty members who want to integrate the iPad into course materials and classroom presentations.
The press release says 100 percent of 1Ls and 70 percent of upper-level students enrolled in the BAR/BRI program at the end of the first week of law school. The school kicked in part of the iPad cost and BAR/BRI provided a group pricing deal, keeping the total cost of the supplemental bar study course the same, according to Campus Technology.
“We are particularly interested in using iPad-based, multiple-choice practice exams during regular semesters to help students gauge their progress through bar-tested subjects,” Winick told Campus Technology in an e-mail. “We also intend to use the iPads to develop virtual study groups, using programs such as WebEx, Skype, and Moodle to expand the group learning environment beyond the classroom.”
