News & Updates

Colorado Supreme Court Chief Justice Nancy Rice is implementing a new resource for self-represented litigants—the Colorado Equal Access Center. The Center supplements the Colorado Judicial Department’s ongoing efforts to respond to a substantial justice gap in Colorado courts (and in states around the country).

In the wake of the November elections, the California Supreme Court adopted amendments to the code of judicial ethics that address judicial campaigns. The new rules require appellate judges, who stand for retention every twelve years, to recuse themselves from hearing cases involving parties who have made campaign contributions of at least $5000.

In July 2016, the Conference of Chief Justices and the Conference of State Court Administrators recognized the important needs of litigants in our state courts and responded by adopting a set of 13 Recommendations focused on ensuring our courts are affordable, efficient, and fair for all.

Advanced Advocacy: Legislative Policy, the latest Educating Tomorrow's Lawyers course portfolio, incorporates theory and practice of the legislative processes, advocacy in the legislative context, and judicial interpretation of statutory law. This is an upper level simulation course with an emphasis on research, drafting, and presentation for a genuine legislative immersion experience.

Professor David Thomson wrote a guest post for CBA-CLE Legal Connection discussing the Carnegie Report, his own experience as a young lawyer, and why he created this course.

Divorce proceedings are getting a digital makeover in the United Kingdom as Her Majesty's Courts & Tribunals Service (HMCTS) prepares to move all divorce applications online.

As state legislatures around the country kick off their 2013 sessions, lawmakers in at least four states—Kansas, Minnesota, Pennsylvania, and Tennessee—are poised to make changes to the process for selecting their states’ judges.

Chief Justice Paul De Muniz announced that he will retire from the supreme court in January 2013. De Muniz’s announcement came well in advance so that prospective candidates for his seat could prepare for the 2012 election.

Last night, Educating Tomorrow’s Lawyers Director Alli Gerkman was honored at the 12th Annual Raising the Bar Dinner hosted by the Colorado Women’s Bar Association Foundation. Each year, the CWBA Foundation honors women lawyers “who have made a difference in our communities and have ‘raised the bar’ for all of us.” With over 400 people in attendance, Alli was honored along with four other women attorneys for their work to raise the bar through reform or innovation “that has significant systemic impact.”

In a recent blog post, Lance Soskin argued that "litigation is a multi-billion dollar industry that favors the wealthy," leaves everyone else significantly disadvantaged, and that the answer lies in the better use of alternative dispute resolution. I take a different approach. While mediation and arbitration certainly have their place, we cannot and should not abandon the system itself. What we need is a justice system that is more accessible, efficient, and accountable.

The American Bar Association's Standards Review Committee will hold a public forum in Chicago on November 11 to allow for comments on proposed changes to the standards. Among the requirements that have drawn concerns are "student learning outcomes," or "requirements that law schools lay out what they want students to learn and design ways to assess whether they are meeting those goals."

Judicial performance evaluation (JPE) took center stage in the Fall/Winter 2017 issue of Voir Dire, the American Board of Trial Advocates’ magazine. The cover story, written by IAALS’ own Rebecca Love Kourlis and Natalie Knowlton, discussed JPE programs in place today around the country and how trial attorneys, in particular, fit into those processes. As one part of the larger O’Connor Judicial Selection Plan, JPE programs assess judges based on objective performance criteria, including surveys of those who work with or appear before the judge being evaluated. Kourlis and Knowlton note that trial attorneys have a unique and critical role to play in these surveys.

Malia Reddick, Director of the Quality Judges Initiative at IAALS, was recently interviewed about the Minnesota Bar's judicial selection policy, which may or may not be retained this summer. Reddick says that Minnesota’s system is good, and could be even better by strengthening it against against the intrusion of politics, special interests, and money. A system that emphasizes a judge’s qualifications, rather than how much money a judge can raise to get elected or their personal positions on hot-button issues, creates a more stable, open, and impartial judiciary.

The Metropolitan Corporate Counsel recently highlighted Rebuilding Justice:" A provocative and important portrait of the American judicial system, Rebuilding Justice is a call to action for all citizens – lawyers and non-lawyers alike, stressing the need to support and protect this crucial cornerstone of our democracy."

The ABA Center for Innovation launched a new project in April that will provide legal aid organizations with free technology that will hopefully make them more efficient and able to help more clients. The project, called "Legal Tech for a Change,” will allow the Center for Innovation to serve as a broker between legal aid organization grantees and established legal technology companies. The Center will also vet potential technology solutions.

Colorado Magistrate Judge Simon Mole recently penned a blog post in which he comments on IAALS’ study and analysis of data from Colorado pilot programs that instituted proactive case processing in family law cases. Magistrate Judge Mole suggests that the study deserves more than just academic interest, especially “at a time when the ATJ community looks to simplify civil procedure for self-represented litigants.”

Professor Benjamin Spencer of Washington and Lee School of Law wrote a guest post in the Washington Post, arguing that bringing the Carnegie model to law school is far preferable to the deregulation of the profession.

For years, law school graduates have struggled to find full-time employment, facing a highly saturated, fiercely competitive job market. There continues to be a gap between what law schools teach and what legal employers expect from new graduates—and not enough traditional law firm positions to hire them all. 

A group of twenty teenagers in the United Kingdom who have been affected by separation or divorce are banding together to create a service that will help teens cope with divorce. The website will provide mentoring and support to children between the ages of twelve and sixteen who are experiencing difficulty due to changing family dynamics. And, the support and mentoring services will be provided to the teens by other young people.

The commission on judicial qualifications admonished a judge for an “injudicious” flyer used in her 2010 campaign. According to the commission, the flyer “likely gave the impression…that the judge’s rulings could be influenced by campaign contributions.”