Last month the law library announced that law students now have access to the Legal Technology Assessment (LTA) and accompanying training modules from Procertas. The LTA and its training modules teach students to efficiently use important features in Word, Excel, and PDF. Students who successfully complete the LTA become qualified as “Certified Operators of Basic Office Technology.”
When Bob Ambrogi visited the law school for Future of Law in November, he spoke about a lawyer’s duty of technology competence and specifically mentioned the Legal Tech Assessment which was created by Casey Flaherty. Flaherty, former in-house counsel to Kia Motors, created the LTA to test attorneys’ competence and efficiency in using Word, Excel, and PDF. Most attorneys Flaherty tested performed poorly on the LTA.
While many law students understand the basics of Word, Excel, and PDF, the LTA ensures that they are proficient in using features commonly needed in preparing legal documents, including applying styles, redacting information, and removing metadata. Online training modules are provided for each discrete skill that is tested, but students who feel confident in the skill can skip the module and take the assessment.
Students should have received an email from Procertas detailing how to register for the LTA. If you can’t find the email, please contact Shawn Nevers (neverss@law.byu.edu) in the library. We hope all students will take the opportunity (either now or in the summer) to improve their basic technology skills through the LTA. The Library is evaluating several other opportunities for students to improve their technology skills and we invite you to keep an eye out for more offerings in the Fall.