Levin College of Law

Center on Children & Families

The Center on Children and Families is an interdisciplinary center committed to filling the need for high quality advocacy by creating programs and resources that bring an interdisciplinary, evidence-based and child-centered approach to issues of children’s law and policy.

Welcome to the Center on Children & Families

Stacey Steinberg
Director

Mission

The mission of the Center on Children and Families is to promote the highest quality of advocacy, teaching and scholarship in the areas of child & family law and policy. We believe that children, as the least powerful of our citizens, are most in need of high quality advocacy. They must depend on adults – parents, teachers, doctors and lawyers – to vindicate their rights to protection from abuse and to overcome barriers to education and health care. Children cannot lobby for legislation or retain high-powered lawyers and costly experts. While great strides have been made in educating family lawyers, we believe that too few professionals have the breadth of training necessary to advocate effectively for children and their families.
Our Center is committed to filling the need for high quality advocacy, teaching and scholarship by creating programs and resources that bring an interdisciplinary, evidence-based and child-centered approach to issues of children’s law and policy. Through its Gator TeamChild Juvenile Law Clinic, Conferences, Publications, and Student Fellowships, the Center on Children and Families is training a new generation of advocates for a new era.

Goals

  • Promote quality scholarship on issues of importance to children and their families.
  • Train a new generation of advocates for children and their families.
  • Educate children about their rights and responsibilities in a free society, and
  • Promote interdisciplinary and child-centered methods for studying systems serving children and their families.

Advisory Board

 

Bob Merlin

Robert J. Merlin, P.A.

 

Katy DeBriere

Florida Health Justice Project

 

Jessica Zissimopulos

Board Certified in Juvenile Law and Member of the Florida Juvenile Rules Committee

 

Judge Meshon T. Rawls

Alachua County Court Judge

 

Amanda Harrell

Senior Attorney, 8th Judicial Circuit Guardian ad Litem Program