News
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Kristi Rudelius-Palmer, HRC Co-Director, Participates in Mock U.S. Senate Hearing on Children’s Rights Legislation in Boston
November 20, 2014On Nov. 20, the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child celebrated its 25th anniversary. In honor of this milestone, Kristi Rudelius-Palmer, co-director of the Human Rights Center, and the Law School’s Fulbright Humphrey Fellow Vered Windman, participated in a mock U.S. Senate hearing on children’s rights legislation at the Edward M. Kennedy Institute in Boston, which will officially open in March. The institute has a replica of the U.S. Senate Chambers where the simulation with 30 teachers took place. “We need to have our young people become more civically engaged, active leaders, fostering societies based on principles and practices of equality, non-discrimination, non-violence, and responsibility around the globe,” Rudelius-Palmer said.
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Tim Looby (’82) Appointed Judge in Minnesota's First District
November 12, 2014Tim Looby (’82) has been appointed by Minnesota Governor Mark Dayton to serve as a judge in the state’s First Judicial District. He replaces Judge Thomas McCarthy, who retired. The First Judicial District, with 36 judges, more than 250 staff employees, and an annual caseload topping 150,000, encompasses a seven-county area just south of the Twin Cities. Looby’s investiture ceremony was held Oct. 24.
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Sara Sommarstrom (’05) and George Byron Griffiths (’15) to Be Honored by Minnesota Justice Foundation
October 28, 2014The Minnesota Justice Foundation (MJF) has announced that among the recipients of its Outstanding Service Awards this year will be Law School alumna Sara Sommarstrom (‘05) and third-year law student George Byron “Geordie” Griffiths. The awards will be presented at the MJF Annual Awards Celebration on November 19.
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Three Law School Alumni Honored in University's China 100 Celebration
October 24, 2014In 1914, three students from China—Pan Wen Huen, Pan Wen Ping, and Kwong Yi Kum—enrolled at the University of Minnesota. Today, the University hosts more than 2,200 students and scholars from China each year. China 100 is the University’s yearlong celebration honoring those first Chinese students and the wealth of connections that have come in the century since.
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IMO Study Shows Chicago Charter Schools Underperform their Traditional Counterparts
October 13, 2014A new study by the Institute on Metropolitan Opportunity (IMO) at the University of Minnesota Law School showed that charter schools in Chicago underperform comparable traditional public schools and are more highly segregated by race. The analysis used comprehensive data for Chicago schools in 2012-13 and controlled for the mix of students and other challenges faced by individual schools.
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Prof. David Weissbrodt Wins Elizabeth Hurlock Beckman Award
October 1, 2014David Weissbrodt, founder and co-director of the Human Rights Center, a member of the Law School faculty since 1975 and a local, national, and global leader in human rights advocacy, has been named a 2014 recipient of the Elizabeth Hurlock Beckman Award. The honor recognizes educators who have inspired their former students to “create an organization which has demonstrably conferred a benefit on the community at large.”
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Prof. Heidi Kitrosser's New Book Wins Civil Liberties Prize
September 25, 2014Professor Heidi Kitrosser’s forthcoming book, Reclaiming Accountability: Transparency, Executive Power, and the U.S. Constitution, has been named the recipient of the 2014 IIT Chicago-Kent College of Law/Roy C. Palmer Civil Liberties Prize. The book will be published in January by the University of Chicago Press.
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Wise, Witty, and “Notorious”: Justice Ginsburg in Conversation at the Law School
September 18, 2014If you want to make Ruth Bader Ginsburg smile, wear clothing based on her social media meme. The U.S. Supreme Court justice has inspired “Notorious R.B.G.,” a Tumblr dedicated to all things Ginsburg. In one image on the site, she is pictured wearing a rakish crown in the style of the rapper Notorious B.I.G.
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The Orientation Express: Bringing New Students and Fellows Up to Speed
September 10, 2014The 195 members of the J.D. class of 2017 gathered in Mondale Hall at 8 a.m. on Aug. 26 for the start of their Law School orientation. Over the next three days, they would be welcomed, briefed, tipped off, and clued-in; meet professors, administrators, and other key figures; go to lunch, go to socials, go on a scavenger hunt; and be given not one, but two legal writing assignments, lest they forget what this whirlwind of meeting and greeting was really about.
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Joint-Degree Student Roma Patel (’15) Wins Mayo Clinic Innovation Award
September 3, 2014Roma Patel, who is on track to receive both a J.D. and a Master of Public Health degree from the University of Minnesota in 2015, has won a Mayo Clinic Center for Innovation CoDE Award. She will receive $50,000 in funding, access to Mayo’s enormous resources, and the services of a production team, and over the coming year she will create a video series intended to use the power of storytelling to help patients from diverse backgrounds better understand their illnesses and their health-care options.