UA School Of Law Receives $500,000 Technology Gift

FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. — A University of Arkansas School of Law graduate will provide a gift of more than $500,000 to purchase electronic infrastructure that will bring innovations to the way the school educates future lawyers and serves the legal community.

The gift from Ron LeMay, a 1972 graduate of the law school who is now president and chief operating officer for Sprint Corp., will fund a video conferencing system, a multi-media retrieval system, a structured wiring system and data equipment.

"We are excited and delighted by the new possibilities that this very generous gift will provide to the law school," said Robert B. Moberly, dean of the school. "We will be able to employ a wide range of innovative technology in our classrooms, library, courtroom and conference rooms."

UA Chancellor John A. White said, "We are grateful for Mr. LeMay’s gift and for the technological support it will provide to the School of Law. Information and telecommunications technologies are transforming the way students are educated. It is essential that our School of Law be at the forefront in the use of these technologies to educate its students.

"Mr. LeMay’s gift augments the steps necessary to achieve and sustain excellence - to compete with other leading American research universities in attracting talented faculty and students and supporting the academic programs that allow them to thrive," White added. "It will go a long way toward enhancing academic programs in the School of Law and will fuel our vision of emerging as the nationally competitive, student-centered research university Arkansas needs and deserves."

Representatives of the law school have been talking with LeMay and other Sprint representatives for more than a year about the best way to provide a state-of-the-art electronic infrastructure to the law school.

Work is already under way by representatives of Sprint, the law school, UA University IT Services and the UA physical plant to install new fiber optic wiring and the data equipment, video conferencing system and multi-media retrieval system.

"It is essential that future graduates of the UA School of Law be provided the opportunity for advanced learning through the ever-expanding technology of the Internet. I am very glad that I can help provide this state-of-the-art technology so that Arkansas law students and faculty have the best possible opportunities," LeMay said.

When the installation is complete, the school will be able to explore new opportunities for bringing faculty experts from other locations to Fayetteville law classrooms without the cost of travel. In turn, law school officials believe the technology will allow the school to export the expertise of its faculty to other law schools and to provide legal education to lawyers throughout Arkansas and elsewhere.

Glen-Peter Ahlers, the school’s library director and head of technology, said, "This infrastructure will enable us to experiment with technology any way our creative juices flow. The way to look at the gift is as if Ron LeMay and Sprint waved a magic wand over the Leflar Law Center and miraculously brought everything up to date."

Chauncey Brummer, a faculty member who uses technology such as PowerPoint during his lectures now, believes the gift will open the door to many opportunities for improving the education students receive about current issues in the law.

"This will enable us to gain immediate access to Lexus, Westlaw and Loislaw sites for the class," he said. "It also will provide for the potential use of teleconferencing with legal experts, judges and lawyers."

Through the technology, he said, the class might be able to talk with a justice sitting in his chambers about a recent court decision the class was studying. "Students would be able to find out exactly what motivated the court in its decision," he said.

Tim Tarvin, a supervising attorney in the school’s legal clinic, said the gift is a big step toward integrating technology into legal education and service.

"This is going to give us an opportunity to do things that didn’t seem possible just a few years ago," he said. "From a clinical perspective, the gift helps us prepare to become distance education providers. That will permit us to more easily collaborate with other law schools, and with other disciplines within the University. It also will enable us to teach and to reach students in an entirely new way and disseminate information to the bench, the bar, government entities, business and the public in ways that are becoming increasingly accessible."

He added, "The implications for the profession are equally great because the same technology that allows us to export education and information can be used to export legal services, particularly to those who have traditionally been denied access to justice."

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