January 15, 2025
Ten years ago, Mitchell Hamline School of Law, the leader in blended legal education, became the first ABA-approved law school to offer a J.D. that law students could earn partially online and partially in person. Since then, blended legal education has become increasingly prevalent, with more law schools adopting hybrid models that combine online and in-person learning to offer greater flexibility and accessibility to law students.
Wednesday, Jan. 15, 2025
As we enter our second decade of blended learning, we continue to transform legal education and prepare new lawyers for the future of law. This program explored the key skills and competencies that new lawyers entering today’s legal market need to be successful and how artificial intelligence and other technologies are reshaping the practice of law and the work of lawyers. The program also featured a panel of law professors and lawyers who discussed how legal education must evolve to better prepare future lawyers for the challenges and opportunities ahead. Below are video sessions from the day, along with presenter biographies.
On-demand videos
Session 1: Practice-Ready Law Students in a Changing Legal Profession
Welcome to Mitchell Hamline
Camille M. Davidson, president and dean, Mitchell Hamline School of Law
Introduction of program and speakers
Professor Leanne Fuith ’10, Mitchell Hamline School of Law
Speakers
- Logan Cornett, director of research, legal education and licensure, Institute for the Advancement of the American Legal System (IAALS)
- Zack DeMeola, senior director of strategic initiatives, Law School Admission Council (LSAC)
Session 2: Technology and the Future of the Practice of Law
Speaker
Damien Riehl ’02, vice president and solutions champion, vLex Group
Session 3: Transforming Legal Education
Panel moderated by Professor Leanne Fuith ’10
- Professor Peter Knapp, Mitchell Hamline School of Law
- Professor Mehmet Konar-Steenberg, Mitchell Hamline School of Law
- Professor Michele Pistone, Villanova University Charles Widger School of Law
- Briana Al Taqatqa ’18, associate, Dorsey & Whitney
Q & A with all speakers
Presenter Biographies
Session 1
Logan Cornett is a rigorous methodologist with almost two decades in research, with more than 12 of those years spent at the Institute for the Advancement of the American Legal System (IAALS) studying issues related to access to justice, equity in our legal ecosystems, and developing person-centered legal structures and processes. As director of research, Cornett leads the empirical aspects of IAALS’ work. Through directing IAALS’ legal education and licensure work, she identifies, implements, and evaluates strategies that promote equity and access in law schools, in pathways to licensure, and in the legal workplace. She currently leads IAALS’ Foundations for Practice project—which she has been involved with since its inception in 2014—and co-authored a seminal report, Building a Better Bar, which details research designed to produce an empirically based definition of minimum competence to practice law. She is committed to actively supporting states’ on-the-ground licensure improvement efforts. Cornett earned her master’s degree in research methods and statistics from the University of Denver and bachelor’s degree in psychology from Oregon State University.
Zack DeMeola is senior director of strategic initiatives at the Law School Admission Council (LSAC), where he oversees LSAC’s strategy department, including research, educational content, and initiatives to develop innovative and equitable ways to educate and train future lawyers. He is committed to continuous improvement in legal education and the profession as co-chair of the ABA Resources on Outcomes and Assessments Committee and former member of the ABA Center for Innovation governing council. Previously, DeMeola was IAALS’ director of legal education and the legal profession, where he led the Foundations for Practice project, the most comprehensive study of skills, competencies, and characteristics new lawyers need, and the Unlocking Legal Regulation project, which promotes a regulatory system that better addresses the access to justice crisis. In 2023, the ABA Journal named DeMeola a Legal Rebel for his work creating a holistic way for law students to find where they fit into the profession. He earned his J.D. from William & Mary School of Law, master’s degree from the College of William and Mary, and bachelor’s degree from the University of Pennsylvania.
Session 2
Damien Riehl ’02 is a lawyer and technologist with experience in complex litigation, digital forensics, and software development. A coder since 1985, Riehl clerked for chief judges of state and federal courts, practiced in complex litigation for over a decade, and has led teams of cybersecurity, world-spanning digital forensics investigations, and legal software development. He currently serves as vice president and solutions champion at vLex Group, where he helps lead the design, development, and expansion of various products, integrating AI-backed technologies (e.g., GPT) to improve legal workflows and to power legal data analytics. Riehl is part of the leadership team at SALI Alliance, a legal data standard, where he develops and has greatly expanded the taxonomy of over 18,000 legal tags that matter, helping the legal industry’s development of generative AI, analytics, and interoperability. He is also chair of the Minnesota State Bar Association’s working group on AI and the Unauthorized Practice of Law (UPL). Riehl earned his J.D. from Mitchell Hamline School of Law and his bachelor’s degree from North Dakota State University.
Session 3
Peter Knapp is a professor of law at Mitchell Hamline School of Law and has taught in the blended-learning program since it began in 2015. Knapp served as interim president and dean of Mitchell Hamline from 2019 to 2020 and co-director of Mitchell Hamline’s clinical program from 2015 to 2017. He has held a variety of leadership roles in the Minnesota legal community including on the Minnesota Supreme Court’s Legal Services Planning Committee and Legal Services Coordinating Commission. Prior to teaching, he practiced law at Oppenheimer Wolff & Donnelly in St. Paul.
Mehmet Konar-Steenberg is a professor of law at Mitchell Hamline School of Law and was a key member of the administrative and faculty team that sought Mitchell Hamline’s first variance from the American Bar Association to offer the first J.D. that law students could earn partially online and partially in person. Konar-Steenberg has taught in the blended-learning program since it launched in 2015. Prior to teaching, he practiced law at the Office of the Monitor, Greene Espel, and the Minnesota Attorney General’s Office.
Michele Pistone is a professor of law at Villanova University Charles Widger School of Law, where she established the law school’s in-house clinical program and founded the school’s VIISTA program—an online interdisciplinary program that trains students to become immigrant advocates. Pistone has been a fellow at the IAALS’ Educating Tomorrow’s Lawyers, and she co-authored “Disrupting Law School: How Disruptive Innovation Will Revolutionize the Legal World.”
Briana Al Taqatqa ’18 is one of Mitchell Hamline’s first graduates from the blended-learning program, enrolling with the first blended-learning cohort in January 2015. She is an associate at Dorsey & Whitney in Minneapolis and practices in the law firm’s Labor & Employment group. Before practicing law, she worked for an international education-management company, supporting its efforts both in the United States and in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates.