About Us

The Chisum Patent Academy was formed in 2009 to provide what CLE programs and patent bar training courses simply can’t offer: premium-quality, advanced patent law educational services in a unique seminar-style setting. Each seminar is limited to ten (10) participants and conducted in roundtable, interactive discussion style. All seminar sessions are jointly taught by Donald Chisum and Janice Mueller, internationally known patent law scholars who have a combined 40 years’ experience in patent law teaching, research, and writing. Chisum Patent Academy seminars not only target key areas of patent law such as patent claim interpretation, nonobviousness, and inequitable conduct, but also provide continually updated coverage of the most critical new patent law developments from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit and the U.S. Supreme Court.

Donald S. Chisum

Donald S. Chisum, co-founder of the Chisum Patent Academy, is the sole author of Chisum on Patents, a multiple volume treatise, which was first published in October 1978. He regularly revises the treatise to account for developments in United States patent law. He is the sole author of the Patent Law Digest. He is also author of the Chisum Patent Law Reference Guides^TM, which are available at www.chisum.com.

Follow Donald on Twitter.

Read more about Donald

Janice M. Mueller

Patent attorney Janice M. Mueller co-founded the Chisum Patent Academy with Donald S. Chisum in 2009. From 2004-2011, Janice was a tenured full Professor at the University of Pittsburgh School of Law, where she taught and wrote in the field of intellectual property law with an emphasis in U.S. and comparative patent law. Janice has also taught at the John Marshall Law School (Chicago), Suffolk University (Boston), the University of Kentucky, the University of Washington, Seattle University, Santa Clara University, and William Mitchell College of Law. A former law clerk to Judge Giles S. Rich of the Federal Circuit, Janice is the author of Patent Law, Seventh Edition (Aspen Treatise Series 2024) and the two-volume, digitally-updated practitioner treatise, Mueller on Patent Law (Fastcase/vLex 2021). Volume I of MOPL focuses on patentability and validity; Volume II of MOPL covers enforcement. For detailed tables of content, click here.

Follow Janice on Twitter.

Read more about Janice

Custom Designed Seminars

The Chisum Patent Academy can custom-design seminars focused on our clients’ particular interests and needs. Potential topics run the gamut from satisfying disclosure requirements for biotechnology patent applications to crafting a winning Federal Circuit appellate brief. We can also provide comprehensive overviews of recent Federal Circuit and Supreme Court developments. Although we offer our public seminars in Seattle, Washington, D.C., and Cincinnati, the Chisum Patent Academy will work with clients throughout the U.S. and abroad to offer on-site programming at any time of year.

CLE Credit

The Chisum Patent Academy will apply for 12 hours of CLE accreditation per seminar in those states where we conduct two-day seminars. Where state bars require, we submit attendees’ names as they are listed on the sign-in sheet. If you are seeking CLE credit for a state other than where that seminar is being held, please apply directly to the appropriate state bar.

More information about CLE Credits

Contact us for more information