Tuesday, August 2nd went by in a hurry. Terry Huckleberry, Assistant to the Dean, called to tell me that I needed to review the Annual Report which goes to the Provost, Sharon Gaber. It’s interesting and always rewarding to be reminded just how much the members of the School of Law Community accomplish over the course of a year. The report includes the accomplishments of everyone, students, faculty and staff. Let me share a few of my colleague’s accomplishments with you. This list is not all-inclusive, that would take a lot more space and time than befits a blog.
Professor Dustin Buehler gave a talk on Baseball’s Moral Hazard: Law, Economics and the Designated Hitter Rule, at the American Law and Economics Association’s 20thAnnual Meeting, Woodrow Wilson School of Public & International Affairs, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ, May 2010. He also gave a talk, Casey at the Bat B and in the Field? An Economic Analysis of Baseball’s Designated Hitter Rule, 22nd Annual Cooperstown Symposium on Baseball and American Culture, National Baseball Hall of Fame, Cooperstown, NY, June 2010 (presented with Steve P. Calandrillo).
Professor Uché Ewelukwa received an award for SEALS best paper for presentation for her Homeless Children and the Law in America 1700 to 1900: An International Human Rights Critique. She was also appointed Vice-Chair of the Intellectual Property Rights Committee of the ABA Section of International Law.
Professor Brian Gallini published Police Science in the Interrogation Room: The Use of Pseudo-Psychological Interrogation Methods to Obtain Seventy Years of Inadmissible Confessions, 61 Hastings L.J. 529 (2010).
Professor D’lorah Hughes spoke in The Status of Poverty and The Need for Legal Aid. Her talk received an Arkansas Bar Association 2010 Best of CLE recognition.
Professor Don Judges published with Stephen Cribari, Speaking of Silence: A Reply to Making Defendants Speak in 94 Minn. L. Rev. 800 (2010).
Professor Chris Kelley received a Fulbright Scholar Award to Moldova for Spring 2011.
Professor Ann Killenbeck published The Devil Is in the Lack of Details, in 85 Ind. L.J. 1261 (Fall 2010).
Professor Mark Killenbeck lectured on The Power to Tax? Richard Ellis and the Bank of the United States, at the Annual Meeting, Society for Historians of the Early American Republic, Rochester, New York, July 2010
Professor Karen Koch published an article entitled, What Did I Just Do? Using Student-Created Concept Maps or Flow Charts to Add A Reflective Visual Component to Legal Research Assignments, in 18 Perspectives: Teaching Legal Research and Writing 119 (Winter-Spring 2010).
Professor Rob Leflar’s publication, Unnatural Deaths, Criminal Sanctions, and Medical Quality Improvement in Japan (updated version), appeared in 29 Zeitschrift für Japanisches Recht / J. Japanese L. 5-52 (2010) (update of article published earlier in Yale J. Health Pol’y L. & Ethics).
Professor and Dean Emeritus Bob Moberly spoke on Court Mediation Systems and Mediator Ethics, to the University of Hong Kong Faculty of Law, Hong Kong, April 2010.
Professor Laurent Sacharoff spoke on Miranda’s Hidden Right, at a Faculty Colloquy, given at University of Tulsa College of Law, Tulsa, Oklahoma, in November 2010.
Professor Susan Schneider received the Distinguished Service Award from the American Agricultural Law Association. The Distinguished Service Award is given to a member of the AALA who demonstrates a sustained excellence in contributing to the development of agricultural law, the professional development of agricultural law practitioners, a better understanding of the law by rural citizens; and other noteworthy service reflecting the commonly understood ideals and purposes of the AALA.
Professor Ned Snow published an article entitled, Judges Playing Jury: Constitutional Conflicts in Deciding Fair Use on Summary Judgment, in 44 UC Davis Law Review 483 (2010).
Professor Tim Tarvin spoke on Tax Exempt Status: The Pitfalls and Perils of the Tax Exempt Application Process, at the 9th Annual Transactional Clinical Conference, SkySong, ASU-Scottsdale Center for Innovation, Tempe, Arizona, April 2010.
Professor Elizabeth Young was elected Chair-Elect of the International and Immigration Section of the Arkansas Bar Association.
My colleague, Steve Sheppard wandered in about the time I’d finished reviewing the report. He shared the good news that his legal dictionary, a project he’s poured himself into for the past few years was out in print—that is the abridged edition has been released. The Bouvier Law Dictionary is intended to provide an alternative to Black’s Law Dictionary. It “is derived from the famous 1853 law dictionary of John Bouvier, the dictionary used by John Marshall, Daniel Webster, and Abraham Lincoln.” I asked Steve what distinguishes his dictionary and he explained that it is written to be accessible to both the novice and the expert. In addition, the terms are given a great deal of context in the definitions, with lots of illustrations, which means, of course the entries tend to be longer than other dictionaries. He said the entries are also organized with related words or terms, again to provide context for their meanings.
Looking through the abridged edition, one of the things I found most interesting is that Steve chose to begin the entries for a particular alphabet with a quote about words. One of them was from Mark Twain and I’d never read it before I saw it in the dictionary. Twain wrote, “The difference between the almost right word and the right word is really a large matter–it’s the difference between the lightning bug and the lightning.”
After Steve left, I wandered off to find something to eat and ran into Professor Richard Lee. We met many years ago when we were stranded together in the Dallas airport. It’s a long story, but the end result was that we have remained friends over the years. We decided to grab a couple of peaches. We were in luck. There were still a few left. Richard came back with me to see my new (old) office and hung out with Steve and me before he had to go to a meeting.
Just as he was leaving Rick Seymour, the incoming chair of the ABA Labor and Employment Law Section called to ask me to serve on the selection committee of the ABA’s Legal Opportunity Scholarship Fund. Though it sounded like a lot of work, all at one time, I hadn’t really been carrying my weight on the Council for the last few years due to the deanship, so I agreed to serve for a limited term. Sometimes you have to put your money where your mouth is. If I believe in access to law school for less advantaged students, then it is incumbent upon me to act in a way that furthers that interest. Here’s a bit about the scholars, taken from the ABA website.
Snapshot of ABA Scholars:
In 2009-10, nearly 1,000 applicants competed for 20 scholarships. The applicant pool consisted of 40% African Americans; 26% Hispanics; 12% Asians; 3% Native American; 12% other and no response 8%; 32% male and 68% female.
More than 50 law schools from across the country are represented among the Scholarship recipients.
Former ABA Scholars have practiced at some of the most prestigious firms and organizations across the country.
All of the Scholars have committed themselves to public service either prior to, during, or after law school. From volunteering with at-risk youth to participating in their firm’s pro bono projects, these Scholars are serving the needs of those within their community.
I ended the day reading my fellow panelists papers for a program on social media and the workplace that will be given at the ABA meeting in Toronto. Once I’d completed the papers, I outlined the flow of the panel, and drafted (with excellent suggestions from Adam Kent, my Research Assistant) potential questions for the panelists, in case the question and answer session needed a jump start. Dinner came from Damgoode Pies, their Greek pizza and a small side salad.
Nancecy 