Ready for Tomorrow: 3L John Tavares designs AI prompt guide for non-lawyers seeking legal help 

This is a headshot of John Tavares, wearing a white shirt against a white background.

3L John Tavares spent his final semester at UC Law SF building an AI tool for people navigating the legal system without a lawyer. He enters practice already fluent in technology that many attorneys are still catching up to understand.

 

  • 3L John Tavares built an AI tool for self-represented litigants during UC Law SF’s AI-Enabled Lawyers Bootcamp. 
  • He gained hands-on experience applying AI to core legal tasks, from research to drafting. 
  • He is starting his legal career with a clear understanding of both the potential and limits of AI in legal practice.  

 

As artificial intelligence reshapes legal practice, UC Law San Francisco is training students through a hands-on AI-Enabled Lawyers Bootcamp that moves them beyond theory and into real-world application before they graduate. Students gain direct experience using AI for core lawyering tasks—research, drafting, discovery, and document analysis—while engaging with ethical issues around privilege, conflicts, and professional responsibility. In a capstone project, they build their own AI tools, often with little or no coding experience.  

Offered for the first time this spring, AI Bootcamp is part of UC Law SF’s technology law and lawyering center, LexLab, led by Director Drew Amerson. The eight-session course was conceived by Director of Applied Innovation Tal Niv and taught by Adjunct Professors Luis Villa and Zoe Dolan ’05—practicing attorneys with deep experience integrating technology into legal work. 

Below, 3L John Tavares discusses how he built an AI-powered tool for non-lawyers and what he learned about how to use the technology more effectively and responsibly. 

Why’d you decide to enroll in the AI Bootcamp? 

I believe AI has enormous potential to transform the legal field, and I wanted to get ahead of it by understanding how to use these tools effectively as an attorney. I was especially interested in how AI can be applied in real legal workflows, as well as how to mitigate risks when using AI in client-facing contexts. 

What were your biggest takeaways? 

One valuable takeaway was seeing how quickly AI capabilities are evolving, sometimes even from one class to the next. I also learned how critical prompting and context are; the quality, accuracy, and reliability of outputs depend heavily on how you structure inputs. Another impactful lesson was understanding how self-represented litigants are using AI, including both the opportunities it creates and the challenges they still face.

Describe your capstone project. 

My capstone project is a tool called PromptCounsel, which helps users turn simple legal questions into more effective, context-rich AI prompts. It asks targeted follow-up questions to surface key facts that non-lawyers might overlook, then generates both a structured issue summary and an optimized prompt. The goal is to help users get more accurate legal guidance from AI and better prepare them if they seek help from an attorney. 

How will this experience shape your work as a new attorney? 

This experience has already improved my efficiency and competence in real-world work, and it will continue to be a major advantage as I begin practicing. Working throughout law school, I’ve seen firsthand how AI can enhance productivity when used effectively. I plan to use AI tools to support both my legal work and my real estate business, particularly in streamlining analysis and client intake. More broadly, the program taught me how to think critically about using AI responsibly and effectively in legal practice. 

What do you think about UC Law SF’s tech law curriculum? 

I appreciate that UC Law is at the forefront of preparing students to understand and responsibly use AI—something many practicing attorneys are still catching up on. Professors Dolan and Villa were highly engaged, knowledgeable, and brought practical, real-world perspectives to the course. 

I also want to highlight Professor Drew Amerson, whose leadership has been truly impactful in my experience. Through his Building a Legal Startup course, I created my first AI product, and with his encouragement, and the help of AI tools, I’ve gone from having no real programming experience (outside of the background on my old MySpace page) to building full websites and applications. His mentorship played a major role in my decision to continue developing projects like PromptCounsel and in shaping how I approach innovation in the legal field. 

The Ready for Tomorrow series highlights UC Law SF students as they share how the College’s innovative, hands-on programs prepare them for a profession being rapidly reshaped by AI and emerging technologies.