University of Chicago Law School Bans Laptops in Core Classes to Combat AI, Reshapes Curriculum

The University of Chicago Law School formed an AI committee in early 2023, shortly after OpenAI released ChatGPT at the end of 2022, and began releasing policies and guidance on AI use. Since then, the school has added an AI module to its first-year legal research and writing program, introduced upper-level courses on AI and the law, founded an AI Lab to teach students how to develop AI tools to improve access to justice, and negotiated licenses with leading AI companies so that students, faculty, and staff have access to the resources used by practicing lawyers.

Over the past year, the Law School undertook extensive consultation to shape its approach. This included conversations with alumni, law firm leaders, business leaders, legal technology executives, and law firm associates, as well as internal stakeholders including faculty, staff, and students. The school also surveyed emerging academic and professional literature on how AI is changing legal practice and student learning. Throughout this process, feedback was consistent: students must learn to think critically, strategically, and independently without relying on AI, yet AI tools are already widely available and graduates will be expected to use them in practice.

Based on this feedback, the Law School has adopted a three-part strategic vision. First, the school will develop "AI-resilient pedagogy and assessment"—modes of classroom interaction and performance evaluation that reward effortful engagement with material and discourage offloading work to AI tools. Importantly, this does not mean preventing all student use of AI; the school supports uses such as asking AI to clarify background concepts while reading before class or generating practice problems for study. Second, the school will elevate "essential human" skills likely to remain central to legal practice, including oral advocacy, strategic judgment, critical thinking, and client relationship management, even as AI assists with these tasks. Third, the school will teach responsible, effective, and ethical use of AI, equipping students with analytical skills and theoretical knowledge to adapt as technologies change, rather than simply teaching how to use today's tools.

Implementation begins with a pilot during the 2026–2027 academic year. For required first-year core courses—Civil Procedure, Torts, Elements of the Law, Contracts, Property, Criminal Law, Constitutional Law, Statutory Interpretation, and Transactional Lawyering—the school will prohibit electronic devices in the classroom, with exceptions for designated note-takers, specific authorized tech activities, and disability accommodations. Examinations will be in-class without access to the internet, electronic files, or apps. The school will continue emphasizing the Socratic Method in these courses. The school views this approach as consistent with emerging scholarly consensus that active, in-person engagement is conducive to learning and that reliance on devices to take notes tends to inhibit reflection and reasoning.

The school is taking a different approach to first-year Legal Research and Writing, recognizing that many students will spend their first-year summers in professional environments where AI tools for research and writing are standard. The new structure, also piloting in 2026–2027, treats writing without AI as the foundation and layers writing with AI onto it. Throughout the year, students will write without AI while using AI for research, revision, iterating on drafts, and oral argument preparation. Students and instructors will review both the writing and the use of AI together, allowing students to develop independent writing skills while also learning to supervise and critique AI output.

For upper-level and elective courses, the approach shifts to guidance and experimentation. Device policies, no-device defaults, and in-class, no-access exams remain as default rules rather than strict requirements. The school will encourage instructors to experiment with pedagogy, including formative assessment methods such as midterms, group projects, oral presentations, and peer feedback. The school will also support experimentation with AI-enabled teaching methods such as custom chatbots as study aids and AI-generated practice problems. Additionally, the school has already added courses explicitly focused on the use of AI and plans to continue growing these upper-level offerings, allowing students to choose which and how many AI-focused classes to take.

The University of Chicago Law School's announcement reflects a fundamental reckoning in higher education about how to preserve learning rigor in an era when AI tools are ubiquitous. The decision to ban devices from first-year core courses is not a rejection of AI, but rather a deliberate sequencing choice: the school argues that students must first develop independent critical thinking and legal reasoning before they can meaningfully supervise or critique AI output. This distinction is important. The school explicitly rejected what it calls "AI-provided shortcuts that help them produce easy answers but stunt intellectual growth," and the consultation process confirmed consistent feedback from legal employers that graduates must be able to think critically without relying on AI as a crutch.

The school's three-part vision—AI-resilient pedagogy, elevation of human skills that distinguish excellent lawyers (oral advocacy, strategic judgment, relationship management), and responsible AI use—acknowledges that the legal profession itself will change. Rather than attempting to ban AI or ignore its risks, the school is designing assessment and teaching methods that force students to engage with material effortfully. Notably, the policy applies specifically to first-year core courses, which the school identifies as a "crucial, formative period" where foundational skills are established. Upper-level and elective courses will treat these restrictions as defaults rather than requirements, creating room for experimentation with AI-enabled teaching methods such as custom chatbots and AI-generated practice problems. This tiered approach suggests the school believes students are better equipped to integrate AI tools into their learning once they have built core competencies independently.

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