preLaw - Winter 2011 - 43
INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY LAW specialties Where to study Intellectual property law Albany Law School Arizona State University College of Law Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law Boston University School of Law Brooklyn Law School California Western School of Law Case Western Reserve University School of Law Catholic University School of Law Chicago-Kent College of Law DePaul University College of Law Drake University Law School Drexel University Earle Mack School of Law Emory University School of Law Fordham Law School Franklin Pierce Law Center George Mason University School of Law Golden Gate University School of Law Hofstra University School of Law Indiana University School of Law Lewis & Clark Law School Marquette University Law School Massachusetts School of Law New York Law School Notre Dame Law School Quinnipiac University School of Law Saint Louis University School of Law Santa Clara University School of Law Seattle University School of Law Southwestern Law School Suffolk University Law School Syracuse University College of Law Texas Wesleyan School of Law The John Marshall Law School-Chicago The University of Toledo College of Law Thomas Jefferson School of Law Tulane Law School University of Akron School of Law University of Arizona James E. Rogers College of Law University of Connecticut School of Law CONTINUED ON THE NEXT PAGE Winter 2011 A pairing of technology and interesting clients After earning her Ph D in biophysi fter Ph.D. biophysical chemistry from Yale University, Karen LeCuyer worked several years as a biochemistry professor at the University of Connecticut Health Center. “But I didn’t want to be a professor anymore, and I wanted to leave the university. I’d thought about patents, and friends helped me find a job in the area,” she said. Law firm Cantor Colburn in Hartford, Conn., let her try a job as a technology consultant and patent agent for two days a week in the summer of 2001. “I decided I liked it, and in November I quit my teaching job. I’ve been here ever since,” she said. Being a law firm employee naturally led her to return to the University of Connecticut as a law student, earning her J.D. in 2008. She had continued work at her firm while going to school part-time. In law school, she took advantage of the Intellectual Property and Entrepreneurship Law Clinic, where she did work on trademarks as well as patents and also dealt with the ins and outs of the Bayh-Dole act, dealing with intellectual property. Now she’s an associate at Cantor Colburn. She specializes in pharmaceutical formulations and biotechnology an and helps clients obtain patents for their new developments. “I love my job because it’s a marriage of technology and interesting clients,” she said. “When clients come to us, it’s usually because they’ve made new discoveries and they’re very excited about it.” She works in patent prosecution, drafting applications for clients’ inventions to submit to the U.S. Patent Office. “Then the case is assigned to an examiner who writes back to tell us why the client can’t have a patent,” she said. “They generally say, ‘Oh no, you can’t have that,’ and then we go back and forth a fair bit, amending and arguing. I usually joke that if you get approval on the first application, there’s probably something wrong with the application.” Her law firm has hired a number of technology advisers like her and encouraged them to go on to law school. “Cantor Colburn has been very progressive in hiring people with a chemistry background who can also write,” she said. “Generally, you can’t teach a lawyer the science, but someone with a science background can learn the law.” 43
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