The impact of Hurricane Andrew (which struck at the start of my second year, devastating my hometown of Goulds) on the Everglades migrant labor camp inspired me to pursue a summer clerkship at Farmworkers Legal Services of North Carolina (FLSNC). I found the work to be wonderfully compelling and satisfying, offering a work-life balance that supported my new status as a single parent of a young son.

After graduation, despite opportunities in Mexico and Colombia, I returned to North Carolina to work as a staff attorney with FLSNC, and later with the Immigrant’s Legal Assistance Project of the N.C. Justice Center. I engaged in policy advocacy and handled individual cases and class action litigation on behalf of immigrant workers and limited English proficient students in employment, civil rights, benefits and immigration cases. The work was stressful and at times infuriating, but I knew I was making the kind of difference I always wanted to make. I returned to international work in 2002 when I traveled to Colombia with Witness for Peace, a human rights group working in Latin America.

Our purpose was to witness the impact of U.S. drug policy (which is causing terrible environmental and human rights tragedies); to meet and speak with numerous governmental officials, human and environmental rights activists, religious leaders, farmers, and indigenous representatives; and then to come home and talk about it.

Upon my return from this revelatory, humbling and at times terrifying experience, I gave numerous presentations and appeared in several local newspapers to discuss what I learned and saw. Overall, I have had a wonderful career as a lawyer in the public sector. It has allowed me to do meaningful work and have a fantastic family life with my husband and three children.

Students and other members of the UF community are invited to take part by the Center for International Business Education and Research (CIBER), the UF College of Journalism and Mass Communication, and the Center for Governmental Responsibility in the Levin College of Law. The conversation will explore recent EU antitrust cases involving U.S.-based companies Microsoft and Apple. These cases involve competition issues concerning Windows MediaPlayer and iTunes software.

The expert panel will discuss the background and ramifications of recent rulings and the effect they will have on international business and entertainment in the 21st century. Attendees will be able to take part in a Q&A session as well, since these cases raise pertinent issues for anyone who usesthe Internet and computer technology to send, share, download and view audio and video files. The program will be recorded for broadcast on WUFT-TV.

The expert panel will include Dr. Andrew Chin, a professor of antitrust, intellectual property, and patent law at the University of North Carolina School of Law and counsel to Intellectual Property Solutions, P.L.L.C., who also prepares and prosecutes patent applications in computer and Internet technology; Dr. Mark A. Jamison, director of the Public Utility Research Center and director of Telecommunications studies at UF’s Warrington College of Business, who served as the special academic advisor to the chair of the Florida Governor’s Internet Task Force; Dr. Jesper Strömbäck, professor in media and communication from Mid-Sweden University and research director at the Demokratiinstitutet Centre for Political Communication Research, who will provide not only a journalistic point of view, but a European one, as well.

The panel will be chaired by Dr. Clifford A. Jones of the Center for Governmental Responsibility, a specialist in European Union competition law, and a visiting Fulbright scholar at the Max Planck Institute for Intellectual Property, Competition, and Tax Law in Munich. Law students will join them on the panel.

The Extension Service is now working closely with the Conservation Clinic, housed in the law college’s Center for Governmental Responsibility, to promote smart growth and sustainability solutions throughout the state.

Levin College of Law Dean Robert Jerry said smart growth and sustainability are key issues in Florida, and have long been a focus of the college’s environmental and land use law program as well as a number of units in UF’s Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences.

“An interdisciplinary approach is vital to successfully managing these areas,and this partnership with the Extension Service will greatly amplify available intellectual and physical resources,” Jerry said. “Conservation Clinic projects also leverage taxpayer dollars by utilizing the time and talents of law students under faculty guidance. The students benefit, too, by gaining hands-on, real world experience.”

“With Florida’s population expected to double in 50 years, growth management will continue be one of the most urgent, difficult and potentially contentious issues facing the state,” said Larry Arrington, dean for extension.

“The statewide Extension Service, which is part of UF’s Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences, has faced increased pressure to play a greater role in Florida environmental and land use issues, and our new partnership with the Levin College of Law allows us to better respond to these needs,” Arrington said. “Agricultural producers in the state have emphasized the need for science-based solutions to issues surrounding growth, and county government officials are also requesting more support on growth issues.”

The Conservation Clinic provides environmental and land use law services to Florida communities and non-government organizations and university programs such as the Extension Service and Florida Sea Grant College Program, said Tom Ankersen, director of the clinic. Among other projects, the clinic has consulted with local government on ordinances and comprehensive plan policies, state statutes and conservation easements.

“Demand for clinic legal services has been growing, and much of this has come through requests generated by our expanding relationship with UF’s Extension Service, which has offices in every county,” Ankersen said. “The Conservation Clinic already has an ongoing relationship with the Florida Sea Grant program to support its coastal and marine education programs.”

In the next 50 years, more than 11 million new homes – along with millions of square feet of commercial space and thousands of miles of new roadways – will be needed to accommodate the influx of residents, according to Pierce Jones, director of the Extension Service’s Program for Resource Efficient Communities.

“In order to achieve the kind of resource-efficient growth we need, our community planning efforts require cross disciplinary collaboration with building professionals, local governments, water management districts and other agencies,” Jones said. The Program for Resource Efficient Communities works with these and other collaborators to promote the adoption of best design, construction and management practices in new residential community developments that measurably reduce energy and water consumption and environmental degradation, he said.

The Conservation Clinic recently helped draft the language for Gainesville’s Green Building Program, which is being used as a model by Sarasota and other Florida communities. The incentivebased program incorporates a variety of energy efficient construction and landscape criteria that builders must follow in order to build homes that are certified by the Florida Green Building Coalition.

Another Extension educational effort benefiting from the clinic’s legal services is the Florida Yards and Neighborhoods program, which encourages builders and developers to protect natural resources by incorporating environmentally friendly landscaping into their new construction.

Jones said the Conservation Clinic provided model language for various covenants, conditions and restrictions to help homeowner’s associations do their part to protect and conserve Florida’s water resources using science-based information generated by UF. Jim Cato, IFAS senior associate dean, director of UF’s School of Natural Resources and Environment and director of the Florida Sea Grant College Program, said the Conservation Clinic is a critical partner in both programs.

“The clinic has been working with Sea Grant’s boating and waterways management program for a number of years, and recently began assisting the Program for Resource Efficient Communities, which is also affiliated with the UF school,” he said.