PRL 101 slides, August 25

Class slides from PRL 101, August 25.
CC-BY-SA

Transcript

1. The Paralegal Profession creative commons licensed (BY) flickr photo by mlinksva: https://flic.kr/p/dYPVpn
2. Form teams • Introductions • Team Name • Roster
3. In teams: • What is a paralegal? • What do paralegals do? • Why do you want to be a paralegal?
4. PRL Resources? • ABA Standing Committee on Paralegals http://www.americanbar.org/groups/paralegals.html • National Association of Legal Assistants http://www.nala.org/ • National Federation for Paralegal Associations http://www.paralegals.org/
5. What is a paralegal? • ABA? • NFPA?
6. What is a paralegal? • “a person . . . who is employed . . . by a lawyer . . . which work, absent such assistance, the attorney would perform.” -ABA • “a person . . . qualified to perform substantive legal work . . . customarily . . . performed by a lawyer.” -NFPA
7. What do paralegals do? • It depends. What does a lawyer do? • Litigation – Pleadings • Complaint, answer, cross complaint – Discovery documents • Interrogatories, RFP – Motions • Dismiss, exclude evidence – Investigation – Summarizing/organizing evidence: depositions, documents
8. What do paralegals do? • Social Security Disability – Interview clients – Obtain releases from client – Gather medical records – Gather gov’t records – Analyze/summarize file
9. Not a lawyer • License to practice law • Legal advice – Giving an opinion about the substance or procedure of the law, ordinarily in exchange for compensation
10. Employment • In general, paralegals who work for large law firms or in large metropolitan areas earn more than those who work for smaller firms or in less populated regions. • 272,580 paralegal jobs in US in 2014 • Projected employment, 2022: 323,300 (+17% "Faster than Average") • 91,200 additional jobs
11. Information literacy • Where can you find information about the paralegal profession? • How can you evaluate the reliability of information you find?
12. Open browser • go to google.com • search 'paralegal' • Number of results? • Which ones are useful/reliable?
13. flickr photo by Martin Deutsch https://flic.kr/p/5RXwuH shared under a Creative Commons (BY-NC-ND) license
14. results? • Wikipedia? • BLS? • U.S. News? • Craigslist?
15. Employment information? Bureau of Labor Statistics: 23-2011 Paralegals and Legal Assistants http://www.bls.gov/oes/home.htm • Occupation profiles • Legal occupations • Paralegals and Legal assistants
16. Wages • Top 10%: >$77,830 • Middle 50%: $37,550—$62,000 • Bottom 10%: <$30,280 • Median: $48,350
17. Industries with highest employment? • Legal services • Local government • Federal executive branch • State government • Management of companies and enterprises
18. Top-paying industries? • Semiconductor manufacturing • Software publishers • Professional and commercial equipment • Information services • Pharmaceutical and medicine
19. States with most jobs? • California • Florida • New York • Texas • Illinois
20. States with highest pay? • D.C. • Alaska • California • New Jersey • Washington
21. Cities with most jobs? • New York • Chicago • D.C. • Los Angeles • Atlanta • Dallas • Philadelphia • Houston
22. Top-paying cities? • D.C. • San Francisco • San Jose • Anchorage • Los Angeles • Trenton • Seattle
23. Alabama? Searchable database: http://data.bls.gov/oes/ • One occupation for multiple geographical areas • Paralegals & Legal Assistants 232011 • Metropolitan or Nonmetropolitan Area • Use <shift> to select all Alabama areas
24. Alabama employment ? Area Employment Hourly mean wage Annual mean wage Alabama 2,230 $22.04 $45,830 Birmingham-Hoover, AL 910 $25.68 $53,420 Mobile AL 320 $20.14 $41,880 Montgomery AL 260 $22.77 $47,360 Huntsville AL 190 $21.75 $45,240 Tuscaloosa AL 80 $15.35 $31,920
25. Specialty areas • Litigation • Business transactional • Real Estate Transactional • Family Law • Estate Planning • Criminal • Administrative • Bankruptcy
26. Paralegal Associations • Benefits? – Education/CLE – Certification – Networking • National Federation of Paralegal Associations (NFPA) – No Alabama chapter • National Association of Legal Assistants (NALA) – Alabama Association of Paralegals – http://alabamaparalegals.net/
28. What does it take to succeed? • How can you add value to the firm?
29. One final note • What was the last book you read?