CoCounsel Case Study
CityUHK School of Law prepares tomorrow’s lawyers with CoCounsel
Learn how CityUHK School of Law integrates CoCounsel into PCLL training to strengthen practical skills, support faculty, and prepare graduates for modern legal practice.
City University of Hong Kong School of Law is one of only three institutions in Hong Kong authorized to deliver the Postgraduate Certificate in Laws (PCLL), the mandatory professional qualification to become a solicitor or barrister. Under the leadership of PCLL Programme Director and practicing barrister Ubaid Rehman, the school is committed to producing technically proficient, practice-ready lawyers equipped for a profession transformed by technology.
“What convinced us to adopt CoCounsel was its breadth of functionality and the way it encouraged us to think creatively about how AI could be used in legal training”
Mr Ubaid Rehman
Director of the PCLL Programme, School of Law, Hong Kong’s City University (CityUHK)
The challenge: Preparing practice-ready, and tech-savvy lawyers
City University of Hong Kong’s School of Law faced a challenge shared by legal educators worldwide: how to bridge the gap between knowing the law and applying it in real practice. Ubaid Rehman, PCLL Programme Director, recognised that “Even with close supervision in small-group teaching, there are limits to how much practice and experimentation can fit into a class schedule,” says Rehman. Students needed more opportunities to draft, strategize, and experiment independently to be truly practice-ready.
At the same time, the legal profession is changing faster than ever. Technology is reshaping everything from legal research, drafting to client communication and case management. The school’s vision, therefore, extended beyond producing just academically strong lawyers. It also aims to develop tech-savvy professionals who could “become AI and digitally literate. They do not need to be coders or data scientists, but they do need to understand how technology is transforming the profession”, Rehman shares.
The challenge was clear: how could CityUHK School of Law provide students with more practical learning while simultaneously preparing them for a tech-driven profession, without compromising PCLL’s rigorous standards?
The solution: Integrating CoCounsel into legal training
After careful evaluation, CityUHK School of Law became the first law school in the Asia Pacific region to adopt CoCounsel, Thomson Reuters’ AI-powered legal assistant. CoCounsel stood out for its versatility and similarity with real legal workflows — covering research, drafting, document comparison, and litigation preparation — capabilities that matter in PCLL training.
The School took a deliberate, phased approach to integrating CoCounsel into its legal training framework. Rather than overhauling the entire curriculum at once, they strategically piloted the tool within small-group learning and selected litigation-related subjects, mirroring the daily work of junior lawyers. The first use cases include group exercises that involve drafting, document comparison, and litigation strategy.
“For instance, students could use CoCounsel to explore how witness statements might be structured or to generate questions for cross-examination. The tool provided structured starting points from which students could then exercise their own professional judgment and creativity,” Rehman shares.
Throughout this integration, the pedagogical principle remained clear: AI as a complement to traditional legal training, not a replacement. "Our motivation was not to replace traditional feedback, but to complement it,” Rehman emphasises.
Support from Thomson Reuters
The Thomson Reuters team’s support proved instrumental in this early adoption phase. Their hands-on approach, including in-person training sessions for faculty members less comfortable with technology, demonstrated a commitment that went beyond providing software licenses. “On several occasions, when some colleagues who were less comfortable with technology needed extra guidance, the Thomson Reuters team arranged to meet with them individually,” Rehman recalls, highlighting the personalised support that facilitated faculty buy-in.
The Results: Building confidence for a technology-driven future
Though still in its early stages, the integration of CoCounsel is already delivering clear value for CityUHK School of Law.
For faculty
Faculty members who tested CoCounsel found it practical and effective. CoCounsel proved valuable not only in teaching but also in lesson preparation, generating sample exercises, creating fact patterns, and suggesting new ways to assess skills. Several requested access for their own classes, particularly in subjects requiring drafting, and litigation-related work. This keeps coursework varied, dynamic, and engaging.
For students
With CoCounsel, graduates are gaining early, practical exposure, building an informed understanding of AI's role. This ensures they enter the profession "conversant with these tools and aware of how they shape modern legal work" from day one.
For the institution
CityUHK now leads legal education innovation in the region, gaining early, practical experience with AI integration, an essential step as technology’s role in law continues to grow.
Looking Ahead
CityUHK School of Law plans to expand the use of CoCounsel across additional courses, including Law and Technology and Commercial Writing and Drafting. For institutions considering a similar path, Ubaid Rehman advises: “Start experimenting. Encourage your faculty to try the tools, even in small ways, and provide spaces for discussion about what works and what doesn’t.”
For CityUHK School of Law, this experimentation is already paying dividends, positioning the institution and its graduates for success in an evolving legal landscape.
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