#1 legal writing Nevada’s law school · Las Vegas

UNLV Boyd Center for AI & Legal Writing

AI is rewriting law.Boyd should set the standard.

With a legal-writing program ranked #1 nationally and responsible AI entering the required curriculum, Boyd can build the independent center the profession trusts to test tools, train leaders, define standards, and widen access to justice.

Experience the Living Brief ↓Join the founding coalition →

The strategic window The transition is inevitable. Leadership is still available.

WORKFLOWIllustrative draft

STATUSReady to analyze

Select Experience the Living Brief—or run the Boyd Standard—to begin.

01Claim calibration

02Authority trace

03Privacy review

04Human ownership

Argument / Draft 01

The record establishes a clear and settled duty.

The Ninth Circuit has that a public agency must provide individualized notice before changing access to essential benefits.

“Notice must be calibrated to the recipient’s circumstances.”

The denial was especially harmful because .

→

THE BOYD STANDARDSee the center’s operating standard in action.

Authority, judgment, privacy, and ownership will be reviewed in sequence.

Unverified authority 1Private details 1Human owner Required

Illustrative interface · Not legal advice · Final judgment remains human

#1Legal WritingRanked #1, 2026–27 U.S. News rankings Fall ’26Required AI courseResponsible AI for every first-year student 1998Young by designA law school built from the ground up NVNevada’s law schoolThe state’s only law school

01 The evidence

Why the window is open now

The market is moving.
The safeguards are not.

Adoption is accelerating, the risks are appearing in court records, and investment is following. The profession needs an independent place to determine what actually works.

0169%

of 1,300+ legal-industry respondents reported using general-purpose AI for work; survey fielded Sept.–Oct. 2025

8am 2026 Legal Industry Report · vendor survey ↗02100+

AI-related sanctions decisions analyzed across more than 60 U.S. jurisdictions, 2023–2026

Lucci, forthcoming Capital University Law Review ↗0317–33%

hallucination rates in a preregistered Mar.–Apr. 2024 evaluation of three legal AI research tools

Stanford RegLab / Journal of Empirical Legal Studies ↗04$3.9B

projected global legal AI market by 2030, up from an estimated $1.4B in 2024

Grand View Research market forecast ↗

Survey results, empirical studies, sanctions research, and commercial forecasts answer different questions. Each figure is labeled and linked to its source.

02 The center in motion

Practice is the laboratory

Real work in.
Public value out.

Legal writing is where research, reasoning, persuasion, judgment, and public power become visible. Boyd can embed with real practitioners, study complete workflows, and turn the evidence into better training, standards, and tools.

FIELD INPUTReal briefs, forms, opinions, contracts, and client communications

Measure.

Independent evidenceStudy human-only, AI-only, and human-plus-AI work across briefs, contracts, opinions, client communications, and public legal documents.

Guide.

Standards that travelTurn evidence into competencies, model policies, verification protocols, procurement guidance, and responsible workflows for the institutions shaping law.

Teach.

Human judgment, amplifiedBuild rigorous, evidence-based education for foundational writing, critical evaluation, AI-assisted practice, and supervision—from the first year through the bench.

Build.

Technology with a purposePartner with engineers, legal technologists, practitioners, and communities to create a portfolio of trustworthy tools that solve real legal-writing problems.

FIELD OUTPUTEvidence the profession can trust. Technology people can use.

Field partnership Bring the consequential workflow—not the polished success story.

Build a real-world study with Boyd ↗

03 Product foundry

A suite—not a single app

Build the technology.
Then prove it deserves trust.

The Center will partner with engineers, legal technologists, courts, legal aid, firms, and users to build focused products for the public, judges, lawyers, rural communities, and the institutions that train and govern them.

Built by Professor Regalia at Write.law

Turn a rough instruction into a better thinking process.

Prompt Pilot strengthens a lawyer’s prompt by asking before assuming, surfacing choices, flagging judgment calls, and keeping the human decision-maker in control.

Built for: Lawyers, students, legal teams
Designed value: More thoughtful instructions. Less reflexive delegation.
Human boundary: The tool improves the process; it does not make the legal judgment.

Prompt PilotWORKING TOOL · DEMO

Choose a mode

YOUR PROMPT

Draft an argument that the agency violated due process.

✦Strengthening the thinking process→

SKEPTIC · PILOT-ENHANCED

Before drafting, identify the strongest counterargument, list any missing facts, and distinguish verified authority from assumptions. Ask me to resolve each judgment call.

Explore the working tool at Write.law ↗

Shared product standard

Authority-grounded · Secure · Accessible · Measurable · Human-owned

Concepts shown are illustrative. Prompt Pilot is an existing Write.law tool created by Professor Regalia; other products would be co-designed, tested, and reviewed before deployment.

04 Applied capability

What we will teach—and study

AI fluency is not a bag of prompts.

It is the ability to redesign work without surrendering judgment. The Center will define, teach, and empirically test the skills that distinguish responsible augmentation from careless delegation.

Decide where expertise must enter, where review must occur, and who owns the final work.

TEACH

Map approval gates, escalation points, and nondelegable decisions.

STUDY

Compare quality when review happens early, late, or not at all.

APPLY

A named lawyer inspects the source and reasoning—not merely the prose.

H Human judgment is an active system requirement—not a disclaimer at the end.

05 The first commitments

Start focused. Build the field.

Evidence. Standards. Public purpose.

National evidence

Human + AI Legal Writing Benchmark

Compare complete human-only, AI-only, and human-plus-AI workflows across accuracy, reasoning, clarity, trust, time, learning, and equity.

First artifact → public benchmark report

National capability

AI Legal Writing Competency Standard

Define what lawyers, judges, students, and supervisors must know about task framing, source verification, confidentiality, disclosure, supervision, and human ownership.

First artifact → model standard and academy

Nevada public purpose

Justice Writing Lab

Co-design and measure a high-value public tool—such as a custody-forms guide—with Nevada courts or legal aid, then publish the model for others.

First artifact → deployed, evaluated public pilot

06 The strategic window

The question is no longer whether AI will transform legal writing.

It is whether vendors shape standards by default—or independent institutions help set them with evidence and a public mission.

Why Boyd must lead ↓

07 Why here

The right place. The right moment.

Boyd is unusually well positioned to lead.

A nationally leading legal-writing foundation

Boyd’s legal-writing program is ranked #1 nationally in the 2026–27 U.S. News rankings. The center begins with deep institutional expertise—not a borrowed specialty.

Verify the ranking ↗

Responsible AI is already in the curriculum

Beginning fall 2026, every first-year Boyd student will receive practical instruction in responsible generative and agentic AI use.

Read the announcement ↗

’98

Young enough to build differently

Founded in 1998, Boyd became a national leader without centuries of inherited structure. Innovation is not a departure from its identity; it is the identity.

About Boyd Law ↗

Las Vegas is built for proving bold ideas

A global convening city, a university-industry innovation ecosystem, and an unusually coherent state legal community create the conditions for fast, visible, real-world collaboration.

Explore UNLV innovation ↗

08 From vision to institution

The first 36 months

Move with urgency.
Build for permanence.

The center earns authority through the quality of its evidence, the usefulness of its tools, the strength of its partnerships, and the independence of its voice.

Phase 010–12 months

Earn the right to lead

↳Constitute the center and founding advisory network
↳Launch the benchmark through embedded practice partnerships
↳Ship one Nevada public-interest pilot

Phase 0212–24 months

Prove what works

↳Publish the first report and pilot national competency standards
↳Open the professional and judicial academy
↳Release the first evaluated tool suite

Phase 0324–36 months

Set the field

↳Scale multi-institution studies and product pilots
↳Convene the Las Vegas Forum on AI & Legal Writing
↳Establish a durable national network and open observatory

09 Built to lead

Legal writing × AI

Faculty lead

Professor Joe Regalia

Legal-writing scholar, educator, builder, and advisor to law firms, courts, agencies, nonprofits, corporations, and judges. His work sits precisely where this center will lead: writing, persuasion, technology, professional judgment, and public access.

Faculty profile ↗Contact ↗

An institution, not a personality

The center will pair intellectual leadership with operating depth.

01Executive leadership

Strategy, partnerships, and durable operations

02Research & methods

Empirical design, assessment, and publication

03Product & engineering

Responsible AI, design, security, and delivery

04Practice network

Faculty, judges, firms, bars, legal aid, and communities

10 · The founding coalition

Build early.
Learn first.
Lead responsibly.

We are inviting a small founding cohort to help create evidence, training, tools, and public-interest infrastructure designed for the profession to use.

Founding partners do not buy a conclusion. They gain a front-row seat to the work.

Early field intelligence

Private briefings on aggregate findings, emerging risks, and validated practices where research rules permit.

Priority pilot consideration

Bring a real workflow for structured problem-framing, defined measurement, and a deidentified executive readout.

A national room

Priority invitations to founding roundtables and the planned Las Vegas Forum on AI & Legal Writing.

Capability and thought leadership

Early access, as available, to selected tools and training, plus opportunities for evidence-based case studies, workshops, and public convenings.

THE INDEPENDENCE COMPACT

Founding partners help frame questions, contribute real workflows, and test solutions. Boyd controls research methods, safety thresholds, publication, and conclusions.

Publish what we find · Protect people and data · Test before scaling · Represent the field

Explore a founding partnership ↗Bring a practice challenge ↗

Founding benefactors · Practice partners · Technology partners · Courts, bars, and public institutions

Illustrative product portfolio

Built by Professor Regalia at Write.law

Prompt Pilot

Turn a rough instruction into a better thinking process.

Prompt Pilot strengthens a lawyer’s prompt by asking before assuming, surfacing choices, flagging judgment calls, and keeping the human decision-maker in control.

Built for: Lawyers, students, legal teams
Human boundary: The tool improves the process; it does not make the legal judgment.

Proposed Nevada public-service pilot

Family Forms Guide

Help a parent complete custody forms without pretending to be their lawyer.

A guided, plain-language app could turn complex custody forms into an understandable sequence, check completeness, explain unfamiliar terms, and route high-risk questions to legal aid or court staff.

Built for: Self-represented families, legal aid, courts
Human boundary: Jurisdiction-aware information, no legal advice, visible human handoff.

Prototype direction · demonstrated above

Authority Trace

Make every material claim traceable before it leaves the building.

A writing workspace could connect propositions to authority and the record, surface unsupported confidence, remove unnecessary private details, and require named human approval.

Built for: Firms, courts, agencies, law schools
Human boundary: No green check without source inspection and accountable human review.

Proposed judicial writing studio

Opinion Clarity Lab

Test whether an opinion works for every reader it serves.

A judge-controlled lab could evaluate structure, record traceability, citation integrity, public comprehension, and plain-language explanations—without displacing judicial reasoning.

Built for: Judges, clerks, courts, the public
Human boundary: No automated adjudication. Judicial judgment remains nondelegable.

Applied AI legal-writing capabilities

Design the human-in-the-loop

Decide where expertise must enter, where review must occur, and who owns the final work.

Teach: Map approval gates, escalation points, and nondelegable decisions.
Study: Compare quality when review happens early, late, or not at all.
Apply: A named lawyer inspects the source and reasoning—not merely the prose.

Improve the process before automating it

A faster broken workflow is still broken. Decompose the work, remove friction, then choose the right technology.

Teach: Map the task from source material to final reader and identify failure points.
Study: Measure which redesigned steps improve quality, time, cost, and learning.
Apply: A firm rebuilds its research-to-draft handoff before adding an AI layer.

Frame the task and its boundaries

Good prompting begins before the prompt: audience, objective, source universe, unknowns, and constraints.

Teach: Turn an assignment into a precise decision and communication problem.
Study: Test how framing changes accuracy, usefulness, and overconfidence.
Apply: The system asks clarifying questions instead of inventing missing facts.

Verify claims, authority, and the record

Fluent output earns no presumption of truth. Material propositions need a source trail.

Teach: Use claim-to-source checks, counterauthority review, and record pin cites.
Study: Measure false support, omitted authority, and verification burden by workflow.
Apply: A citation is opened, read in context, and matched to the proposition.

Protect confidentiality and privilege

Tool choice is a professional-responsibility decision, not merely a feature comparison.

Teach: Classify data, understand vendor terms, minimize inputs, and design safe boundaries.
Study: Evaluate whether real practice protocols prevent leakage and overcollection.
Apply: Client details unnecessary to the task never enter the system.

Measure what actually becomes better

Speed alone is not success. Better work includes accuracy, clarity, trust, learning, access, and equity.

Teach: Define a baseline, a success measure, and a stop condition before a pilot.
Study: Compare human-only, AI-only, and human-plus-AI workflows in context.
Apply: A pilot reports what failed as clearly as what improved.

Know when not to automate

Responsible expertise includes recognizing tasks where the cost of delegation exceeds the benefit.

Teach: Identify high-stakes ambiguity, vulnerable users, and irreducibly human judgment.
Study: Document failure modes and the conditions that require human service.
Apply: The workflow stops and routes the person to qualified help.