Known more for administering the LSAT, the Law School Admission Council is now accepting applications from U.S. law students with ideas on how to aid low-income people's legal needs for its first Justice Innovation Challenge.

While the solution ideas will vary, the ideas must focus on solving legal issues that are both challenging for low-income individuals to navigate and that saddle legal aid providers with considerable work. These include domestic violence, customer debt, evictions, business entity formation, foreclosures, access to government benefits and others.

“There are so many people not getting legal assistance and legal service organizations are overburdened and we have a complex legal system,” said LSAC presidential innovation fellow and Access to Justice Tech Fellows program director Miguel Willis. ”Folks find themselves not able to navigate the legal system when they have a legal issue.”

Applications for the challenge started in April and will close July 19. After whittling the applicants to 10 participants in late July, the teams will be partnered with nonprofit legal services organizations and mentors to refine their ideas and build their solutions.

Although participants aren't expected to have a ready-for-market product by the end of the competition, a judging panel, which is scheduled to include LSAC president Kellye Testy, Legal Services Corp. president James Sandman and others, will critique the solutions based on their inclusivity, innovation, community impact and realistic implementation.

By Aug. 21, a first-place winner will be awarded $15,000, with $10,000 and $5,000 being awarded to the second- and third-place winners respectively for seed funding.

The program is the brainchild of a similar competition, which Willis noted shows how such encouragement early in an idea's formation can lead to a tangible product. During his 2L year at the Seattle University School of Law, Willis participated in Seattle's Social Venture Partners Fast Pitch competition and won a $15,000 prize for an idea that became the Access to Justice Tech Fellows program, which officially launched in 2016.

With that success in mind, Willis said the challenge can help individuals seeking legal advice and budding law students. For instance, students can see firsthand how leveraging legal technology can lead to nontraditional employment paths. 

But ultimately the challenge's main goal is to provide individuals an easier route to justice. “I really want to make this about impact,” Willis said. “We aren't looking for the next blockchain solution that solves every problem, but something community-centered that can help a law school clinic, [a] bar association or nonprofit organization.”

Universities have also looked to law students to help bridge the access-to-justice gap through technology. For example. Cornell Law School has offered a  “Delivering Legal Services Through Technology” course while the Chicago-Kent University launched a masters of law degree program on legal innovation.

Associations integral to lawyer development have likewise stepped up. In the United Kingdom, for instance, the Solicitors Regulation Authority recently launched its first access-to-justice challenge.