Entrepreneurial Law Clinic
Promoting Economic Development by Facilitating Entrepreneurship
ELC is an innovative clinic serving entrepreneurs throughout the Pacific Northwest.
We team law and business students with pro bono attorneys and business advisors to provide critical early stage legal and business counseling to the following groups:
ELC is based on a pioneering model developed by Faculty Director Sean O’Connor that is a hybrid of a traditional law clinic and an externship. This model allows more clients and students to interact in ELC than in a traditional clinic. It also taps the strong entrepreneurship-focused legal practitioner community in the Seattle area to deliver experienced, high quality legal services and mentorship to ELC clients and students. ELC models the structure and services of technology and entrepreneurship focused law firms by providing access to lawyers and students specializing in critical fields such as IP, corporate & securities law, and tax.
The Entrepreneurial Law Clinic (ELC) was founded in recognition that:
- Low or no cost legal services to entrepreneurs and non-profits that serve them might demonstrably assist in broad based economic development.
- Low or no cost legal services may be required to fulfill society’s, and the legal profession’s, obligation to provide meaningful access to justice across a broad spectrum of needs.
- Emphasis on leveraging a region’s research institutions can be used as an engine for desirable high tech economic development.
Entrepreneurial Law in the News
- Business Law - A Clinical Perspective - UWLaw
The Entrepreneurial Law Clinic is profiled, along with founder of the clinic Prof. Sean O'Connor. (Fall 2008)
- Sean O'Connor authors law journal article on teaching
Faculty Director Sean O’Connor writes about the teaching innovations he pioneered at UW Law School, including creating ELC, in the
Saint Louis University Law Journal: Teaching IP From an Entrepreneurial Counseling and Transactional Perspective, 52 St. Louis U. L.J. 877 (2008). - How to Build IPR-Focused Entrepreneurial Law and Business Clinics to Assist in Regional Economic Development Around the Globe – International IP Institute
Washington D.C. based International Intellectual Property Institute commissioned UW Associate Professor and ELC Faculty Director Sean O’Connor to prepare this report based both on his experiences creating ELC and original research in the field.
The Report provides not only step by step guidance on how to create such clinics, but also a comprehensive study of the role these clinics can play in access to justice movements and economic development worldwide. - Clinic helps small businesses help themselves - KCBA Bulletin
The King County bar can play a role in ensuring that small businesses survive by sharing their expertise with the UW Entrepreneurial Law Clinic, which works to identify low-income, minority- and immigrant-owned businesses that would benefit from pro bono legal assistance. - Law School Clinic to work with new UW Health Science Research Institute
Under a new NIH grant award, the Entrepreneurial Law Clinic at the UW School of Law will be part of a new team dedicated to working with the UW Institute of Translational Health Sciences.
- UW law students assist small-business owners - Puget Sound Business Journal
The UW law school's Entrepreneurial Law Clinic, started last year with seed money from a trio of foundations, pairs teams of third-year law and MBA students with law professors and volunteer attorneys to give transactional law assistance to small businesses and nonprofit organizations. - Students experience business law up close
- Campaign UW
The University of Washington's new Entrepreneurial Law opportunities for students interested in business law and the Clinic has given students like Daniel Heu-Weller a chance to gain hands-on experience with business clients while still in school.