The deadline for all California Paralegals to earn their mandatory MCLE (Minimum Continuing Legal Education) credits is December 31, 2014.

Since 2001, California Paralegals have been required to complete 8 hours of MCLE (Minimum Continuing Legal Education). These must consist of at least 4 hours of Legal Ethics and the remaining 4 hours can cover general MCLE topics.

In 2007, the California Legislature clarified the compliance and reporting periods for all Paralegals.

The original Assembly Bill (AB 1761), passed in 1999, read: "All paralegals shall be required to certify completion every three years of four hours of mandatory continuing legal education in legal ethics. All continuing legal education courses shall meet the requirements of Section 6070. Every two years, all paralegals shall be required to certify completion of four hours of mandatory continuing education in either general law or in a specialized area of law." (http://info.sen.ca.gov/pub/99-00/bill/asm/ab_1751-1800/ab_1761_bill_20000914_chaptered.html) The difference between the two year and three compliance periods was described to us as a typo in the final draft of the Bill by a Paralegal activist involved in drafting and passing the legislation.

The revision came in 2006 Assembly Bill 2303 (http://leginfo.ca.gov/pub/05-06/bill/asm/ab_2301-2350/ab_2303_bill_20060928_chaptered.html) which mandated two year compliance periods for both the Legal Ethics and the general MCLE courses. This Bill revised Section 6450 (Paragraph d) of the California Business & professions Code to read (in part), "Every two years, commencing January 1, 2007, any person that is working as a paralegal shall be required to certify completion of four hours of mandatory continuing legal education in legal ethics and four hours of mandatory continuing legal education in either general law or in an area of specialized law."

California Paralegals can earn all eight of their required hours online with Internet For Lawyers' interactive MCLE exercises. Internet For Lawyers' exercises are designed to help Paralegals and Attorneys locate information on the Internet that can be useful to the cases they handle in their practices. For more information on our MCLE exercises and special package prices for multi-hour bundles, see http://www.netforlawyers.com/online_mcle_catalog.htm.