Justice for Kids: Keeping Kids Out of the Juvenile Justice System, Edited by Nancy E. Dowd

UF Law Professor Nancy Dowd served as editor of a new book that brings together scholarly works from leading academics and activists on preventing children from becoming caught up in the juvenile justice system.

The book, Justice for Kids: Keeping Kids Out of the Juvenile Justice System was released earlier this month.

“The juvenile justice system does not function well for kids, their families, or the community,” said Dowd, who is also the director of UF Law’s Center on Children and Families. “This book provides concrete, cutting-edge reforms to insure fairness and justice to kids, while insuring that resources are conserved and spent wisely to promote the goal of supporting kids to productive adulthood.”

While some youths in the juvenile justice system quickly move out, never to return, others continue on a path that takes them deeper and deeper into it. Here, the book’s contributors look at ways to intervene at an early stage to prevent kids from going down that path in the first place.

The book also calls for the re-evaluation and restructuring of the juvenile justice system and for greater consideration to race, gender and sexual orientation.

It will take place 10 a.m. in HOL 345.

In The Man Question, author Dowd takes up the challenge of theorizing the construction of manhood and masculinity as an anti-essentialist project that can sit with feminist discourses.

As Dowd argues, men’s treatment by the law varies by race, age, economic position, sexuality, and many other factors. Her work questions how we know and value the lived experiences of men, not in order to deny men’s privilege but to explore the price, structure, and contradictions of that privilege.

As her primary examples, she explores men’s experience of fatherhood and sexual abuse, and boys’ experience in the contexts of education and juvenile justice. How we, as a society, arrive at the contextual and anti-essentialist goals Dowd prescribes presents questions worthy of vigorous discussion and debate.

This workshop brings together leading masculinities scholars to discuss how understanding the diverse characteristics and consequences that attach to manhood help us comprehend the nature of privilege and subordination.

Speakers will explore questions of masculinity across the diverse areas of employment discrimination, criminal law, and international law, and constitutional law. In addition, participants will grapple with theoretical questions of history, identity, vulnerability, and the limitations of equality rights. Refreshments in the morning and lunch will be provided to attendees.

Check out the event flier here and RSVP to Debbie Willis by Nov. 11 to reserve a spot.

Hina Jilani, advocate of the Supreme Court of Pakistan, speaks at the sixth annual Center on Children and Families Weyrauch Distinguished Lecture in Family Law at the University of Florida Levin College of Law. The lecture is tomorrow at noon in the Chesterfield Smith Ceremonial Classroom, HOL 180. It is free and open to the public.

Jilani’s work in the area of children’s rights has included working for legal aid, proposing and drafting reformative legislation, and creating and implementing programs that protect the human rights of disadvantaged groups. She is responsible for establishing the first all-women’s law firm in Pakistan in 1981. According to the Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice and Human Rights, Jilani has been under 24-hour-a-day surveillance by Pakistan since 1996 because of her activism in women, children and human rights movements.

Jilani held the position of special representative of the United Nations secretary general on human rights defenders from 2000 to 2008.

In 2006, Jilani was appointed to the UN’s fact-finding commission on Darfur, Sudan, and in 2009, was appointed to the UN’s fact-finding commission on the Gaza conflict. She is also affiliated with the Carter Center and the UN Conference on Women. In 2008, she was the recipient of the Editor’s Award for Outstanding Achievement by The Lawyer Awards in London.

The Center on Children and Families Weyrauch Distinguished Lecture in Family Law was made possible by an endowment supported by Frank G. Finkbeiner (JD 72) and T.W. Ackert (JD 72).

Walter Weyrauch, who passed away in 2008, was a distinguished professor of law at UF Law. Originally from Germany, Weyrauch joined the UF Law faculty in 1957 as associate professor. He became professor in 1960, was Clarence J. TeSelle Professor 1989-1994, and became Stephen C. O’Connell Chair in 1994 and distinguished professor in 1998. He was named an honorary professor of law at Johann Wolfgang Goethe University, Germany, and was visiting faculty at the University of California, Berkeley; Rutgers University School of Law and University of Frankfurt.

All seven Florida Supreme Court justices to judge Maguire Appellate Advocacy Competition on Friday
The law school community is invited to watch as members of the Florida Moot Court Team, (pictured at right), showcase their oral advocacy skills to all seven members of the Florida Supreme Court on Friday. The 27th annual Maguire Appellate Advocacy Competition, formerly known as the Raymer F. Maguire Moot Court Final Four Competition, will be held at 10 a.m. in UF Law’s Martin H. Levin Advocacy Center Courtroom. The event is free and open to the public — the law school community is encouraged to attend. The exhibition allows moot court team members to receive useful critiques regarding their oral arguments as they prepare for the American Bar Association’s National Appellate Advocacy Competition. This year’s team consists of Wilbert Vancol (3L), Leah Edelman (3L), Katie Tinsley (3L), David Hughes (3L), David Evans (3L) and Monica Haddad (2L). During the exhibition, Vancol and Edelman will present arguments for Petitioner, and Haddad and Evans will argue for Respondent. The Maguire exhibition provides UF Law students a unique opportunity to observe these outstanding law students exhibit their oral advocacy skills. Providing critiques for the oral arguments will be the justices of the Florida Supreme Court: Chief Justice Charles T. Canady, Justice Barbara J. Pariente, Justice R. Fred Lewis, Justice Peggy A. Quince, Justice Ricky Polston, Justice Jorge Labarga (JD 79) and Justice James E.C. Perry. First-year law students interested in being a part of the Florida Moot Court Team are highly encouraged to attend the Maguire Competition to see the team in action. Additionally, the team will hold a question and answer session for all interested 1Ls Wednesday, March 2, at noon. Pizza will be provided at the session, and 1Ls will have the opportunity to ask questions about the Florida Moot Court Team, the try-out process and general appellate advocacy issues. For questions regarding the information session, please contact Jennifer Sharp.

Faculty scholarship & activities
Last week, Professor Mark Fenster discussed conspiracy theories in a radio interview; Professor Gugliuzza was a panelist in a recent Washington, D.C., panel looking at court decisions; Professor Amy Mashburn talked about a class action lawsuit; Professor McMahon was published in Tax Notes; Dean Emeritus Jon Mills was appointed to an ABA task force and the results of a CGR study are referenced in an article on Florida Main Street programs.
Faculty scholarship & activities »

UF Law’s Center on Children & Families co-hosts presentations on collaborative and therapeutic family law
Barry Law Review and UF Law Center on Children and Families will host “Collaborative and Therapeutic Family Law: Theory and Practice” Friday, March 11, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. in Orlando. Area and state experts will offer their expertise. To register, contact Debbie Willis willisd@law.ufl.edu or 352-273-0613 by Feb. 22 and fill out this form.

Submit art for Sixth Annual UF Law Student/Faculty Art Show by March 14
Mark your calendars for the upcoming UF Law Student/Faculty Art Show Wednesday, March 16, in the Legal Information Center at 7 p.m. The Art Law Society will have a silent auction for selected works and all proceeds will benefit Shands Arts in Medicine program. There also will be wine, food and live music. If you are interested in submitting your artwork, send the following information to f.c.tripp@gmail.com by March 14 at 5 p.m.: title, artist’s name, date created, dimensions of the work/length of video, medium (i.e., oil on canvas, photography, etc) and whether you would like to donate the work for the silent auction.

CSRRR hosts Harvard Professor Charles Ogletree Thursday, March 24
The Center for the Study of Race and Race Relations presents its spring lecture with Charles J. Ogletree, Jesse Climenko Professor of Law and director of the Charles Hamilton, Houston Institute for Race and Justice, Harvard University. The lecture takes place at noon, March 24, in Chesterfield Smith Ceremonial Classroom (HOL 180) with a reception and book signing at 1 p.m. Ogletree will discuss his book, The Presumption of Guilt: The Arrest of Henry Louis Gates, Jr. and Race, Class and Crime in America (Palgrave Macmillan 2010). This event is free and open to the public. For more information, visit http://www.law.ufl.edu/centers/csrrr/events.shtml.

‘Coffee with the Dean’ resumes Wednesday
Dean Robert Jerry will resume a program he has hosted for several years called “Coffee with the Dean” Wednesday, Feb. 23, at 9 a.m. Up to 15 students can sign up, first-come, first-served, to meet him in the Faculty Dining Room for coffee and doughnuts. He will have three sessions this semester and each will last about an hour. If you have concerns, questions, a compliment about a member of the faculty or staff, or topics you would like to discuss with the dean, please sign-up by sending an e-mail to Ellen Robinson at robinsone@law.ufl.edu. In addition, the John Marshall Bar Association will host another Town Hall meeting Wednesday, March 30, at noon in the Chesterfield Smith Ceremonial Classroom (HOL 180).

Law student to publish work in e-book, assume editorship of the Global Journal of Peer Review
After graduation, Eric N. Grosch (3L) will publish Clinical-Performance Peer-Review: The Triumph of Fallacy, a work unique in its scientific, logical, legal and philosophical treatment of its medical topic. It contains: (1) proof that clinical-performance peer-review, as practiced, cannot generate reliable findings and that it is counterproductive of its claimed purpose, to maintain and improve quality of clinical care. (2) Evidence that, for clinical-performance peer-review, courts disregard proper legal principles and logic to which they adhere in other cases. (3) Evidence that state legislatures and Congress have produced misguided laws, establishing clinical-performance peer-review-based on no evidence of its efficacy in maintaining or improving quality of clinical care or of its accuracy in identifying good or errant physicians or in distinguishing them. (4) Solutions to enable decision-makers to avoid pitfalls and to found the healthcare-system on principles that fulfill its clinical mission. (5) Defense tactics against bad-faith peer-review.

Princeton Review seeks input from law students
The Princeton Review has once again named the University of Florida Levin College of Law one of the best law schools in the nation. Distinguished schools will be profiled in the 2012 edition of Best Law Schools. In order to help them represent UF Law accurately, please fill out the following survey to author a new “Students Say” profile and update our ratings.