Description

Universities generate an enormous amount of intellectual property, including copyrights, trademarks, patents, Internet domain names and even trade secrets. Until recently, universities often ceded ownership of this property to the faculty member or student by whom it was created or discovered. Increasingly, though, universities have become protective of this property, behaving like private firms, suing to protect trademarked sports logos, patents and name brands. Yet how can private rights accumulation and enforcement further the public interest in higher education? What is to be gained and lost as institutions become more guarded and contentious in their orientation toward intellectual property? In this lecture, law professor Jacob H. Rooksby, J.D., M.Ed., Ph.D., uses a mixture of research methods to grapple with those central questions, exposing and critiquing the industry's unquestioned and growing embrace of intellectual property from the perspective of research in law, higher education and the social sciences. Lunch will be served at 11:30 a.m. The lecture will begin at noon.

The event is free and open to all, but please register. Parking is available for a fee in the West Broad Street, West Main Street and West Cary Street parking decks. If special accommodations are needed, please contact the VCU Libraries Events Office at (804) 828-0593.

Sponsors

This event is presented by VCU Libraries and the VCU Office of Research and Innovation.

About the Speaker

Jacob H. Rooksby, J.D., M.Ed., Ph.D., is the associate dean of administration and an assistant professor of law at Duquesne University School of Law in Pittsburgh. In addition to his administrative role, he teaches courses in torts, intellectual property (IP) subjects, law and higher education, corporate governance and social media and the law. His primary scholarship focus concerns the impact of IP law and policy on higher education. He is counsel to the intellectual property group at Cohen & Grigsby, P.C., and the current president of the Pittsburgh Intellectual Property Law Association. He formerly practiced law with McGuireWoods LLP in Richmond, Va., where he was a member of the firm's IP litigation/patents department and higher education practice team. He also has experience serving as an expert witness in intellectual property litigation.

He holds J.D., M.Ed. (social foundations of education) and Ph.D. (higher education) degrees from the University of Virginia. He earned his undergraduate degree, summa cum laude, in Hispanic studies and government from the College of William & Mary, where he was inducted into Phi Beta Kappa.

Image: Sanger Series: The Branding of the American Mind: How Universities Capture, Manage and Monetize Intellectual Property and Why It Matters, by Jeff Bland