Full Circle: Assistant Clinical Professor Honored by National Bar Association

“My students keep telling me they love it. They all want to come back,” says Chicago-Kent College of Law Assistant Clinical Professor Michelle J. Miller when asked about the students feedback on their clinic experience.

Miller completed her first year leading the Intellectual Property, Entertainment, and Entrepreneurship Law Clinic at Chicago-Kent College of Law this summer, and she’s already receiving national accolades for her work.

Miller was one of six women nominated for the Exceptional Academia Award from the National Bar Association’s Women Lawyers Division. All six nominees were honored at the annual Gertrude E. Rush Annual Breakfast. 

This year’s theme was “Pioneers and Powerhouses: A Century of Women Legal Leadership,” and the nominees were chosen for their roles in shaping legal education and advancing equity. 

Miller, in particular, was honored for her work establishing the clinic over the last year. She was surprised to receive notice of a nomination for her work after just one year at Chicago-Kent.

“I believe I’m still in a state of shock,” she says. “When I got the email, I just paused, thinking, ‘How did you all find me?’”

Miller joined the clinical faculty in fall 2024 with the intention of starting a clinic that focuses on what the legal world refers to as “soft IP”—any branch of intellectual property law that doesn’t involve patents—such as trademarks, copyrights, and trade secrets. 

Once she got started, Miller found her students doing much more. They work on a variety of intellectual property, business and entertainment law issues, “We help people to start businesses and scale businesses,” Miller says. “We also help actors, actresses, television producers, R&B singers, hip hop singers, executive producers. A lot of times they are contacting me because there’s an intellectual property issue that they’re concerned about in a deal.” 

Miller rebranded the clinic to its current name, and her students have helped clients navigate a plethora of legal issues. The students get extensive experience in trademark law matters, especially for entrepreneurs and entertainers who want to protect their brands. Students have also had exposure to international business, international trademark, and AI issues.

“The students in the clinic have had opportunities to work for some major celebrities, which has been really great for them,” says Miller. “They have had the opportunity to get exposure to television program contracts, television deals, and IP issues in deals for music artists, actors and actresses.”

Chicago-Kent’s law clinic model may be unique to the world of legal education. Many law schools clinics only offer pro bono services, but as a fee-generating law firm, the C-K Law Group isn’t limited in terms of the clients it can serve or what legal services it can offer.

“If I was at a different law school, with a traditional pro bono type of IP clinic, I would not be able to work for A-listers,” says Miller. “Some law schools will do an IP clinic that focuses on trademark or they may have an IP clinic that combines trademark and entrepreneurship, but it’s not going to deal with anything entertainment related.”

Kent’s IP clinic is unique in that it handles soft-IP, business, and entertainment issues all in one clinical program.

Miller’s students have worked on issues for major celebrities and business bigwigs. When sharing her experiences with her students, Miller tells them interesting stories to help them learn about the unique experiences that could happen in the life of an attorney that practices soft-IP law. For example, Miller told her students that she never thought being a trademark attorney would result in her receiving an invitation to former Vice President Kamala Harris’ DC home in 2023 for a hip hop celebration as an industry leader. Miller tells the students that she did not take pictures with the numerous entertainers she saw at the VP’s home and usually do not take picture with them.

“This could be a potential client,” Miller explained to her students. “I need to make sure that I’m carrying myself in such a way that if there is an opportunity that they will feel comfortable working with me as an attorney.”
Miller also hit the ground running by pitching a partnership with Illinois Tech’s Ed Kaplan Institute for Innovation and Tech Entrepreneurship while at her faculty orientation.

Kaplan runs the Startup Accelerator Program, which helps Illinois Tech students take their budding businesses from idea to market. Chicago-Kent’s pro bono Patent Hub supports the students’ efforts to obtain patents for their inventions, but Miller saw an opportunity to provide the students with even more legal support.

“I can help the clinic students train on how to do their first legal consultation to help entrepreneurs know the different areas of intellectual property and then find out what their brand assets are,” says Miller.

Miller’s law students performed exhaustive legal research to discover if a name or other brand asset was available for federal trademark registration, which resulted in information that helped a few of the student-led startups to rebrand.

At the end of the semester, students in the accelerator program had the opportunity to pitch their businesses to compete for seed money. A couple of Miller’s Chicago-Kent students went to the university’s Mies Campus for the first time to meet their clients.

“I’m hoping it’s an opportunity for the clinic to maintain this partnership,” says Miller. “My goal is that this will be an ongoing project every spring semester.”

Miller also jumped at the chance to collaborate with the Center for Sports Innovation on matters of name, image, and likeness issues.

“Publicity rights are not just for the top-tier athletes or influencers,” says Miller. “There are opportunities for every-day individuals, including athletes at Illinois Tech.”

Miller is now representing Chicago-Kent as a member of the core faculty of the Center for Sports Innovation, advising on areas of intellectual property law.

As a Bronzeville native, collaborating with Illinois Tech is a bit of a homecoming for Miller.

“In my teenage years, I passed by Illinois Tech sometimes,” she says. “I had teachers at that time period who told me they didn’t think that I would get into college, and if I did, I probably would not be able to finish.”

Now, as a first-generation college graduate, law professor, and practicing attorney, she’s back in the neighborhood to give back.

“It’s interesting looking at all that I have been blessed to accomplish—and to be able to come full circle and have a relationship with an institution that’s right in the community where I grew up,” she says. “I just feel like life has come full circle for me in a great way.”