The John Marshall Law School has merged two of its centers together to create The Center for Intellectual Property, Information & Privacy Law, which will focus on how the legal world grapples with questions concerning privacy and security.
“Expanding our curriculum to include privacy law and information technology allows us to illuminate this bridge and offers us tremendous possibilities for innovation,” said Doris E. Long, director of the new center. “We will continue to lead the way so that students, practitioners, policymakers and academics can master the challenges of new technologies and new digital realities.”
The new Center combines the existing Center for Intellectual Property Law and Center for Information Technology & Privacy Law into a program that builds upon John Marshall’s leadership in the fields and dedication to practice-ready training. The law school has been a consistent leader in intellectual property law since the creation of its IP programs 75 years ago.
“I am so pleased that we are taking this critical step in marrying our two centers into a new center designed to take advantage of the emerging interconnections between intellectual, privacy and cyber security,” Dean John E. Corkery said.
James Lai, counsel for Motorola Mobility and an adjunct professor at John Marshall, praised the school’s initiative to house the overlapping legal issues in a singular program.
“I think that it makes sense to have a technical-based center and if you look at the issues that tech companies face, they are IP, privacy and security,” Lai said. “Even if the subject matters seem different, a lot of the behind-the-scenes work is pretty similar.”
Law students who go on to work for clients in the information or technology worlds will ultimately deal with the same overlapping legal issues, no matter if they concentrated on IP or privacy law, Lai said.
The combined center offers a variety of J.D. certificates, as well as L.L.M. and M.S. degrees and multiple online courses whose credits may be applicable toward a degree.
