KU to host legal education conference

LAWRENCE — Legal educators from across the country will gather in Lawrence this week to explore access to justice and the lawyer’s role in promoting the rule of law.

The 2017 Midwest Clinical Legal Education Conference, “Justice, Professionalism, and the Lawyer as Public Citizen: Teaching Across Learning Experiences,” will take place Friday and Saturday at the University of Kansas School of Law.

“As experiential legal educators, we play a significant role in transmitting the core values of our profession,” said Jean Phillips, director of KU Law’s clinical programs. “This conference will bring together clinic and field placement program educators who teach about justice, professionalism and our duties as public citizens in an array of learning experiences. Participants will reflect upon issues of race, class, gender and access to justice, and consider how to teach students to embrace our professional responsibility to speak for those who are least heard.”

Plenary sessions taught by expert legal educators will focus on expansion of experiential learning pedagogy, the role of experiential education in the law school curriculum and best practices for teaching the professional skills required of public citizen lawyers. Other sessions will highlight innovative teaching and service models, techniques for addressing race and the role of collaboration in public service lawyering. 

Floyd Bledsoe, a former KU Law Project for Innocence client released from prison after serving 16 years for a murder he did not commit, will provide the keynote address. Quinton Lucas, KU Law lecturer and Kansas City, Missouri, city councilman, will share an update on community policing in Kansas City.

Clinical legal educators provide hands-on learning opportunities by teaching and advising law students engaged in practical experiences such as field placements and live-client experiences.

Visit the KU Law website for a complete schedule and list of presenters. Support for this program is provided, in part, by the Association of American Law Schools Section on Clinical Legal Education; CLEA, the Clinical Legal Education Association; and by Clio legal software.