Goodbye Westlaw Printers
In a big change, Westlaw has decided to remove all dedicated law school printers from every law school this year. Lewis & Clark Law School printers will be leaving campus on June 28. Here’s what you need to know about printing from WestlawNext (and other leading legal research systems) on our campus.
Why the Change
Westlaw has provided three reasons for ending years of free printers, paper and toner for law schools:
- Legal practitioners’ workflows no longer rely on printing legal research
- Reduce carbon footprint and the company’s environmental footprint
- Decreased demand because of increased use of downloads, mobile devices, and WestlawNext folders
How Printing Will Work
Even without Westlaw’s “Standalone” printers, you can still print from WestlawNext. Come Monday, July 1st your default print settings in Westlaw and WestlawNext will be changed to your attached printer (the default printer for your computer). For faculty and staff that will likely be your hall or department printer.
If you are a student on our network, your attached printer is typically going to be the student printer in the Wood Hall Computer Lab. Of course, that does mean that Westlaw printing will come out of your annual printer quota. Read on for ways to avoid reaching your page limit.
Alternatives to Westlaw Printing
There are a variety of alternatives to printing to a Westlaw printer. Here are a few:
- Folders
Save yourself from printing as much as possible by using WestlawNext’s folders. You can create as many as you choose, and they allow you to organize and save documents for as long as you need them. Lexis Advance and Bloomberg Law also have similar folder systems that provide interesting sharing options.
- Download
Need offline access to your Westlaw documents? Instead of printing choose the download action. Save them in your choice of formats, including PDF or Word, and keep on your computer, USB drive, cloud service like Dropbox, or mobile device.
- Print via Lexis
Lexis has said that they have no plans to remove the free dedicated Lexis printers. So go ahead and dust off that Lexis login and give it Lexis Advance a try. You may even find it works better for you than WestlawNext.
Questions
Feel free to contact our Westlaw Account Manager if you have any questions about printing or saving documents on WestlawNext. And of course you are always invited to ask our reference librarians for printing, downloading and search tips using Westlaw, Lexis or Bloomberg.
