Welcome news from David Whelan of the Great Library – Law Society of Upper Canada:

You can now print and download articles older than 18 months free of charge from the Law Society’s CLE collection, powered by the Great Library.

The service – AccessCLE – has been 100% pay-per-view since its inception in 2007 and contains over 6,000 PDF articles going back to 2004.  The articles represent the individual presentations from CLE/CPD seminars put on by the Law Society.  Our partnership with the Law Society’s CPD team is ongoing and we continue to receive and add metadata to articles from recent presentations.

The 18 month window is a rolling period.  Content within that window is still available but is pay-per-view.  You can search for both free and paid articles with either AccessCLE itself or through our discovery engine, Infolocate.ca.

If you need more information please contact Olcay Atacan at [email protected].  We hope this change will improve your ability to access and use this information.

CLE materials are a fantastic place to start a legal research question.  They often offer practical advice from expert practitioners. Congratulations to the staff at the Great Library who power this project!

Most law firms have an orientation program for articling students.  I am certain that ‘legal research’ is part of the program – if not, my tip is to add it!

An look back at the conference site for last weekend’s Law and Society Association conference showed a Methods Cafe as part of the program.

Scholars experienced in using different research methods each sit in a large ballroom at different tables, which are prominently labeled with the method about which that expert is prepared to talk. The experts then act as a consultant to anyone who shows up to talk with them about the method’s use in a specific project or in general during the standard 105 minutes scheduled for the session. One person, a few in succession, or a few at once might come to the table during the time. Since this is an experimental venture, the topics make no attempt to cover all possible research methods, but reflect the interest of the expert participants.

A methods cafe may be an interesting way to share practice area specific research paths and sources. Consider having a lawyer (or embedded librarian) from a few practice groups discuss go to resources and when they use them.  For an internal program, I would arrange the process to give each (4 or 5 max.) research practitioner the floor for 5-12 minutes to share their best loved source.  I would aso recommend that the presentation approach is a ‘war story’ rather than a presentation with powerpoint visuals or an online demo.  This research method’s cafe would probably be better  described as a resource sharing session.

Today’s Tip: be creative about sharing methods for teaching legal research to articling students.

Today’s Tip is really about finding new sources of information as they appear.   The announcement yesterday in Alberta about the Alberta Open Data Portal is a good reminder that information may become available that is relevant to your legal research. 

A number of jurisdictions in Canada provide open data.  A handy list is available the datalibre.ca blog.

Today’s Tip is a follow up to “”, read a book review.  There are excellent book reviews available in the Canadian Law Library Review, the journal fo the Canadian Association of Law Libraries (available to members of the association as well as through subscription).

Book reviews can also be found in blog posts. For example this post on the ILTA KM Blog:  Book Review–Martin White’s “Enterprise Search”. Hat tip to David Hobbie for the review.

Despite discussions about alternative fee arrangements and the changing times for the business of law, many clients and law firms still deal with compensation for legal work based on the billable hour.  One thing that goes hand in hand with that are billable research hours, and the costs for services used that clients pay in disbursements.

Today’s tip is for the new summer law students and their articling peers: watch the clock.

Efficient gathering of information usually means less time overall spent answering a research question. Fast gathering usually starts with what an expert can tell you about an area of law (yes, a textbook whether it is online, eBook, or print).  If your organization charges clients disbursements for using fee based research tools like LexisNexis Quicklaw and  Westlaw Canada, make sure you know what model and method is used so that you can keep the gathering costs down.

This tip came from Christine Hiller and was shared with the Canadian Association of Law Libraries Conference in Montreal. In the Plenary today, Christine shared that there are eBook license templates and resources available! Check it it at OCUL .

Sometimes the only way to answer a research question is by asking a bunch of people for their opinions.

An example: Canada Post is asking Canadians about the kind of postal service they will need in the future. An important question, especially for those of you who like getting books in the mail. This question is in response to a Conference Board of Canada report on the future of the postal service.  The Conference Board is an excellent place to look to see if someone has already answered your big picture type question.

I encourage you to give feedback to Canada Post. From the News Release that askes for input:

Canada Post has stayed relevant to generations of Canadians by understanding their changing needs and evolving to serve them. The options put forward by the Conference Board are the starting point for this important conversation with Canadians about what they value, what they expect from us going forward and what needs to change to get there.

As the news release states, you can send them feedback by mail:

THE FUTURE OF CANADA POST
2701 RIVERSIDE DR SUITE N0800
OTTAWA ON K1A 0B1

The news release also offers a visit to canadapost.ca with a suggestion to follow the link to The Future of Canada Post. The feedback form was not yet available on April 30, 2013. Check the site, or,  send them a letter.

Update: Comment on the Future of Canada Post at http://www.canadapost.ca/ext/en/future/?page_id=2&cpage=20&sf12333662=1

Hat Tip to @canadapostcares for tweeting me the link.

A Government of Canada news release reminded me to remind you to watch for new sources of information.

The Governments of Canada and of Alberta Launch New Online Portal for Accessing Oil Sands Environmental Monitoring Data and Information

OTTAWA, Ont. – April 22, 2013 – Canada’s Environment Minister, the Honourable Peter Kent, and Alberta’s Environment and Sustainable Resource Development Minister, the Honourable Diana McQueen, today announced that access to federal and provincial environmental monitoring data on air, water, land and biodiversity in the oil sands is now available through an online data portal (www.JointOilSandsMonitoring.ca). The new portal represents the next stage of progress for the Joint Canada–Alberta Implementation Plan for Oil Sands Monitoring announced in February 2012.

This new portal is a tool for legal research, well kind of new in that it is a collected jumping off point if you are looking for environmental monitoring information.   The new part is the aggregated collection – quite useful if you are searching for this type of information to have a unified starting place. Check it out.

Today’s Tip: Be on the look out for new research sources and tools.

Do you have a new research tool to share? Suggest a Slaw tip about it.

The Federal Courts in Canada have a pretty good website. They also have a very nice docket search tool. Note that this search tool, although it is linked from the Federal Court website, offers a radio button for searching the Federal Court of Appeal docket as well.

Hat Tip to the Courts Administration Service for setting me to rights on that. Thank you especially to the Registry Officer who took the time to locate my email address and send some followup information after providing most of the answer to my question by phone. Above and beyond the call of duty and deserving of thanks. Given private thanks at the time, and now a public acknowledgment as well.

Today’s Tip: If someone goes out of their way to help you, especially when they are a public servant, thank them.

Things get so busy in law that sometimes we get behind.  For instance, Research posts are supposed to appear on Wednesdays here at Slaw Tips.  We all know that notes, tasks, and to do lists help us keep on top of the things we need to do.  The same is true for legal research.

Today’s Tip is to use a detailed  ‘sources consulted’ list.  My personal preference is to put this list in the last section of a research memo.  A Sources Consulted list can take the form of a bibliography (the texts you visited) or it can be more.  I suggest using the sources consulted as your working notes for your research.  Use it as a map for how you are going to approach the question.

• Which texts are you going to use
• When you use the texts, note which sections you visited and if you found something
• Which legislation tool are you going to use, what are your searches
• If you find legislation on your topic, which sections did you check for judicial consideration
• Which cases were useful of those you found
• What did the noteups of those cases reveal as the standard language search terms
• Did you look in the Abridgment, Halsbury’s Laws of Canada, the CED, another digest
• What you found that helped answer your research question

Embedding all of this information in your sources consulted keeps you stay on scope with your research project (that’s right you just read some legal project management language).

These notes can also form some of the text of your research memo or opinion.  You can always cut them out later and save them in a different reference document if you need to.  When these detailed notes stay with your research analysis, they make it really easy to reuse.  They are also fantastic if at the end of the day you do not find an answer.

• Nicholas on Software Tools for Editing
• Jamie on Software Tools for Editing
• Steve Coughlan on ‘I Hope This E-Mail Finds You Well’
• Lyn on Womxn
• Celia Chandler on Gross Negligence

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