On Friday, April 8th, we hosted our 2016 Symposium, Reimagining Family Defense. More than 100 people attended the half-day event to engage in a discussion of how family defense can become more available throughout the U.S.
The plenary panel featured contributions from Professor Kara Finck of the University of Pennsylvania Law School; Diane Redleaf, Founder and Executive Director of the Chicago based Family Defense Center; and Lauren Shapiro, Director of the Brooklyn Family Defense Project.
Marty Guggenheim, Director of NYU Law School’s Family Defense Clinic, moderated the plenary session, which focused heavily on the need to increase legal representation for parents in child welfare cases. Professor Guggenheim was presented with the CUNY Law Review Scholarship for Social Justice Award.
Making parental voices more prominent in child welfare cases was a focus of the symposium. Members of Rise Magazine, a publication written by and for parents involved in the child welfare system, were invited to share their thoughts on how attorneys and judges can make parents’ family court experiences more empowering.
Making parental voices in child welfare cases more prominent was the focus of CUNY Law Review’s recent symposium.
“We are the professionals, but [parents] are the experts,” Angela Burton, a former CUNY Law professor and now with the New York State Office of Indigent Legal Services, said in her opening remarks.
More than 100 people attended the half-day symposium on Friday to engage in discussions of how family defense can become more available throughout the U.S.
CUNY Law Review members invited representatives from Rise Magazine, a publication written by and for parents dealing with the child welfare system to ensure that parents’ voices were included.
The plenary panel featured contributions from family law professors from NYU and University of Pennsylvania, along with legal defenders from Brooklyn Defender Services and the Family Defense Project (based in Chicago).
“All of the presenters today start from one basic premise—families matter. Every family matters,” Burton added.
Register here.
Please join us at our exciting upcoming spring Symposium, Reimagining Family Defense, which will discuss multidisciplinary family defense models and strategies to support families involved in the child welfare system in an effort to gather support for innovative structural and policy changes to child welfare.
The symposium is not limited to the legal community in New York City, for it aims to engage all who are invested in this issue. We strongly welcome the participation of directly-affected community members and practitioners across interrelated disciplines, such as social workers, parent advocates, community organizers, and educators. Additionally, we welcome practitioners working on this issue outside of New York City.
Further details to come!
On March 30, 2012, a packed auditorium of human rights advocates, lawyers, students, and others gathered at the CUNY Graduate Center for the CUNY Law Review Symposium, “Looking Forward: Rhonda Copelon’s Legacy in Action and the Future of International Women’s Human Rights Law.” The symposium brought together leading scholars and activists from around the world to honor Rhonda Copelon and to share and learn about current extensions of her groundbreaking work.
The day-long event looked at how Copelon’s work helped to define and shape the field of international women’s human rights and described how her vision continues to influence and inspire advocates and practitioners. The panels focused on areas of work where Copelon made a significant impact: sexual rights developments under international law, reproductive rights at home and abroad, rape as a form of torture, and domestic implementation of international human rights law. Panelists and speakers discussed how Copelon influenced them personally and professionally and reflected on how her vision, tenacity, and commitment to gender justice help to shape their responses to the challenges they face today. As the speakers described their approach to building human rights protections for gender rights, they invoked Copelon’s lesson that the role of advocates is not to argue what the law is, but rather what the law should be.
Watch the full day of panels on YouTube, or as a free download from iTunes U. Continue reading
