Students in the Intellectual Property and Entrepreneurship Clinic (“IPEC”) will explore intellectual property needs with clients and will assist them in building various aspects of an IP portfolio. Students must enroll in one of two specialty tracks: the Trademark & Copyright Specialization (5students) or the Patent Specialization (5 students). Students who are enrolled in the Patent Specialization will perform patentability searches and draft patentability opinions relating to the scope of protection a client might be able to receive if it filed a patent application. In appropriate situations, the student may then be asked to prepare and file provisional and non-provisional utility patent applications and design patent applications.

The clinic participates in the United States Patent and Trademark Office’s Law School Clinic Certification Program, giving students limited recognition to practice before the office for purposes of filing and prosecuting patent applications while they are in the clinic, working under the supervision of a registered patent attorney. PLEASE NOTE: To qualify for the USPTO’s Law School Clinic Certification Program for Patents, a student must show they have the scientific and technical training required of patent agents and patent attorneys. This generally means that a student must have an undergraduate degree in engineering or the hard sciences. In some instances, a student who has taken a substantial number of science and/or engineering courses, but who did not obtain a degree in one of those disciplines, may qualify for the Patent Clinic. Students should be prepared to produce college transcripts documenting their degrees; in some cases, course descriptions may also be requested. Further information may be found in the USPTO’s General Requirements Bulletin (pages 3 through 9), available at https://www.uspto.gov/sites/default/files/documents/OED_GRB.pdf. New in 2024 is the option for students with a degree in industrial design, product design, architecture, applied arts, graphic design, fine/studio arts, or art teacher education to represent clients before the USPTO in design patent matters. Students with questions about whether they may satisfy these requirements should contact Professor Patricia Campbell, the director of IPEC.

The clinic includes a classroom component, consisting of weekly two-hour meetings at the Law School. During these meetings, students receive instruction on practical topics such as how to conduct a trademark clearance search, how to prepare a patent application, and how to draft a nondisclosure agreement. Students may occasionally be asked to brief classmates on their projects and discuss strategy and work plans, as well as ethical challenges they are facing in their client representations. Students must also be available for additional meetings with existing and prospective clients that may be scheduled throughout the week. Note that these meetings will occur during regular business hours, not during the evening or on weekends.

This clinic will be offered in fall 2024 and spring 2025 as a one-semester clinic for five credits. All students enrolled in fall clinic will be required to attend in-person clinic orientation on Friday, August 23, 2024 and those enrolled in spring clinic will be required to attend in-person clinic orientation on Friday, January 10, 2025, in addition to any clinic-specific orientation that the professor may schedule.

P: Intellectual Property Law Survey (may be waived with written permission from the instructor, where the student has taken multiple relevant IP courses but has not taken the IP Survey),

P: Must qualify for the USPTO’s patent bar exam (see above)