In this episode, I sit down with Professor Kipp Coddington from the University of Wyoming College of Law to discuss how legal education is adapting to the age of AI and what skills tomorrow's lawyers will need to succeed. Kipp teaches an innovative course on AI and Internet Law that combines substantive legal issues with hands-on technology training. Students are expected to use AI throughout the course, experiment with tools such as Gemini Notebook, complete programming exercises, and analyze the legal, policy, and technical challenges emerging from AI adoption. His view is straightforward: lawyers do not need to become software engineers, but they do need to understand and embrace the technologies that are increasingly shaping legal practice. A major theme of our conversation is the debate taking place across legal education about how much AI students should be allowed to use. Kipp argues that law schools are trying to strike a balance between exposing students to transformative technology and preserving the critical thinking, reasoning, and judgment that legal education has always sought to develop. In his view, the goal is not to outsource thinking to machines but to teach students how to use AI responsibly while continuing to strengthen their own "wet neural network" through rigorous analysis and problem solving. What stood out most from the discussion was Kipp's experience teaching students in an AI-enabled environment. Despite concerns that generative AI might make student work more generic or less original, he observed the opposite. In a class assignment where students used AI tools to develop presentations on emerging legal issues, students brought a unique perspective, resulting in a surprisingly diverse range of topics and insights. Rather than producing forty versions of the same answer, students explored issues ranging from healthcare data and privacy to international AI regulation and business risk. Their own judgment, creativity, interests, and experiences shaped the output. That observation led to one of the most important takeaways of the episode: even in an AI-powered world, junior lawyers and law students continue to create value through their perspective. A student or first-year lawyer may not have decades of legal expertise, but they can bring fresh thinking, creativity, problem-solving ability, and a unique lens to legal challenges. AI can accelerate execution, but it does not replace the human judgment that helps lawyers identify risks, generate insights, and develop novel solutions. We also explored what skills law schools should be emphasizing in this environment. Kipp believes the most important traits are not technical. Instead, he highlighted humility, effective listening, empathy, intellectual curiosity, sound judgment, and the ability to operate in legal gray areas. Lawyers are fundamentally risk managers and counselors. They rarely provide simple yes-or-no answers. Their role is to help clients understand risk, evaluate alternatives, and chart a path forward. Those skills become even more important in a world where AI can generate answers but cannot fully replace professional judgment. The conversation also touched on how AI is changing teaching and assessment. Traditional take-home assignments and research papers present new challenges because of the ease with which AI can generate written work. Kipp discussed emerging approaches such as oral defenses, in-person examinations, and more interactive evaluation methods designed to ensure students truly understand the material. While these challenges are real, he remains confident that legal education can adapt and continue to identify and develop talent. Perhaps most striking was Kipp's optimism about the future. While acknowledging that some traditional legal business models may come under pressure, he sees a lot of opportunity for lawyers who embrace technology. He pointed to growing demand for professionals who understand both law and technology, including opportunities within AI companies themselves. Just as the internet created entirely new career paths for lawyers, he believes AI will create new roles, new industries, and new ways for legally trained professionals to add value. If you're a law student, young lawyer, legal educator, or anyone interested in the future of the profession, this conversation offers a thoughtful and optimistic perspective on how legal education can evolve while staying rooted in the timeless fundamentals of legal practice. https://www.linkedin.com/in/kipp-coddington/
