On the Radar

Slashing Out-of-state Law School Tuition

Pace University Law School, a private institution in New York, has announced a new tuition program that lets out-of-state students attend the school at the tuition rate of their home-state public law school, according to the Wall Street Journal.

Pace’s annual law school tuition is $45,376. A Wisconsinite attending Pace now would pay U.W. Law School’s tuition rate, which was $21,372 per year for 2014-15. Students must remain in the top 50 percent of the class to keep the discount.

The proposal recognizes increased competition in the face of declining applications and enrollment numbers.

Quotable

“I was young, and I didn’t know what I didn’t know.”

– Former Wisconsin Appeals Court Judge Charles Dykman, on his time as a young lawyer. Judge Dykman was elected to the bench in 1978, at age 40, where he stayed for more than three decades. He is among numerous 50-year members who will be profiled in InsideTrack through May.

The State Bar’s annual 50-year member luncheon celebration is May 12 at the Delafield Hotel.

Tech Tip

As the Boy Scouts Say, Be Prepared

Spring is here – and so is increased risk of flooding and other natural disasters.

The single most important step to protect your law practice against such disasters is to have an offsite digital backup of your files.

For attorneys without enterprise-level offsite backup, you could back up your files daily to external hard drives and lug them home (or to another secure location). Such procedures, however, are time consuming and often abandoned or followed irregularly.

It is much easier to back up to the cloud. Because attorneys should have local backup, a great way to automate the entire process is to use a service that schedules local backup and backup to its own cloud servers.

Examples of such services are Crashplan, Carbonite, and Backblaze. Check them out. If disaster strikes, you’ll be up and running in no time.

Source: Tison Rhine, practice management advisor of Practice411^™, the State Bar of Wisconsin Law Office Management Assistance Program

Did You Know...

A to Z: 55 App Guides for Lawyers

Our friends at the U.W. Law School Library have compiled online guides to both Android and iPad applications that can assist lawyers in their everyday work. From legal research and practice management apps to trial, litigation, and transaction document apps, from legal news apps to productivity and security apps, this database of guides probably has what you’re looking for.

Law librarians update the guides regularly as they identify new apps. And here’s the kicker: the Android and iPad guides are just two of the 55 app guides for just about every aspect of law and legal practice. Check out the guides, at: law.wisc.libguides.com.

Out There

Watch Out, Those Sizzling Fajitas are Hot

You’ve heard it – the restaurant waiter who kindly warns you about the hot plate; however, a waiter apparently didn’t alert a customer dining at an Applebee’s in New Jersey. While bowing his head to pray, grease from Hiram Jimenez’s sizzling plate of fajitas burned his eyes and skin, he alleged in a lawsuit against Applebee’s.

Jimenez argued that restaurants must be safe and free of harmful conditions, and the waiter failed to warn him that the fajitas he ordered posed a burn risk. The trial judge said there was no duty to warn because it’s “self-evident” that a sizzling plate of fajitas poses a risk of danger. The appeals court affirmed.

Moral of the story: Order the enchiladas.

Source: CourierPostOnline.com

From the Archives

50 Years Ago: The Start of Judicare

In 1965, attorney Donald O’Melia, Rhinelander, took the reins as president of the State Bar of Wisconsin. During his tenure, O’Melia helped establish Wisconsin Judicare, which opened in 1966 to serve low-income people in 26 northern Wisconsin counties. It continues to operate today with funding from the federal Legal Services Corporation.

O’Melia and then-State Bar Executive Director Phillip Habermann, who coined the term “Judicare,” convinced Washington officials of the need to pay private bar attorneys, with federal funds, to provide free legal services to low-income individuals.

This month, the State Bar of Wisconsin holds elections for State Bar officers and other leadership positions. The O’Melia story is a reminder of the State Bar’s important role in improving our legal system. Don’t forget to cast your vote by April 24!