��ͷ��ԭ��

Faculty and Staff in the News – September 2025

Laura Kujawa — Thu, 09 Oct 2025 23:47:34 +0000

Below is a selection of recent news highlights featuring members of ��ͷ��ԭ��’s faculty and staff.

August 27, 2025
Delish
Laurie Beyranevand JD’03, director of the Center for Agriculture and Food Systems, comments on the use of expiration dates in the United States.

August 28, 2025
ABA Journal
Laura Ireland, associate director of the Animal Law and Policy Institute, gives her thoughts on service animals in court.

September 2, 2025
ABA Journal
Delcianna Winders, director of the Animal Law and Policy Institute, was recently highlighted in the ABA Journal for her many successes in the field of animal law.

September 4, 2025
VTDigger
Christopher Worth, visiting assistant professor with the Center for Justice Reform Clinic, comments on the treatment of his client, Davona Williams, who was recently transferred to a facility in Michigan in the midst of immigration proceedings.

September 5, 2025
Tucson Sentinel
Following the President’s move to use the National Guard to address crime in several cities, Stephen Dycus, professor of law emeritus, comments on the legality of deploying Guard troops from one state to another without the consent of the state’s governor.

September 17, 2025
The New York Times
With the EPA’s Endangerment Finding at threat by the Trump administration, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine released a report confirming the original finding and the hazards of climate change. Pat Parenteau, professor of law emeritus and senior fellow for climate policy, weighs in.

September 30, 2025
Fast Company
After the Trump administration ordered a pause for Revolution Wind’s offshore wind farm citing national security claims, construction has now resumed. The administration may opt to appeal, challenging the project again. Mark James, interim director of the Institute for Energy and the Environment, weighs in on the appeal process.

The post Faculty and Staff in the News – September 2025 appeared first on ��ͷ��ԭ��.

Defending Nature Through Environmental Advocacy

Laura Kujawa — Tue, 07 Oct 2025 13:11:44 +0000

Saul Costa hadn’t planned on supporting the Environmental Advocacy Clinic (EAC) at VLGS—he was interested in preserving beaver ponds. That changed after touring a property he was considering purchasing, when his realtor sent him an article about the work the EAC was doing with its nonprofit client Standing Trees to advocate for the protection of Vermont’s Worcester Range. Costa quickly recognized an opportunity to make an even greater environmental impact in Vermont.

Costa is the executive director of the Li-Costa Foundation, which awarded the EAC a $250,000 grant to advocate for protection of Vermont’s scenic Worcester Range and a new direction for management of Vermont public lands. The Foundation prioritizes environmental protection initiatives, novel mental health treatment, and caring for cats.

“I am really interested in getting nature to a point where it’s recognized as a defendable entity, like a nature bill of rights,” Costa said. “I think policy and activism are a big piece of that, but at the end of the day, building case law like this is what’s going to help move the needle and create that snowball effect.”

A Systems Thinking Approach to Nature

Growing up on a 12-acre farm in Vermont, Costa was homeschooled, which provided ample outdoor time for exploring the woods and fields. His father was an entomologist at the University of Vermont and worked to protect hemlock trees from the invasive hemlock woolly adelgid. His father often took Saul and his five siblings with him on trips to help with field trials. “I was just surrounded by care for the forests and that has stuck with me,” Costa said.

Costa spends as much time as he can in nature—hiking, gardening, camping, and backpacking. It’s not only restorative, but it helps him with his work. “I take mindful nature walks and focus on the physical environment around me,” he said. “My head becomes so much clearer, and I’ve leaned into that as a way of enhancing productivity.”

After graduating early from Norwich University in 2014 with a computer science degree, Costa moved to Silicon Valley for a job as a software developer. While working full time, he created an online coding environment to help students learn computer programming and then grew it into a startup, which was acquired in 2020. He now splits his time between Vermont and California.

Costa applies an engineering framework to his environmental advocacy. “One of the things that excites me the most about supporting nature initiatives is the potential for compounding network effects because natural systems are all integrated,” he said. “Worcester Range is a watershed, and protecting that has benefits to Lake Champlain, as well. My vision is that we have initiatives like these coming together and being more impactful than we thought, because they are all connected systems.” In addition to Standing Trees, the EAC works with other environmental and public interest organizations to support their advocacy goals with student-powered legal representation.

Costa credits his late father for instilling a deep appreciation of nature as a source of strength and purpose. “It would be really exciting to talk to him about this project,” he said. “I still feel him in my life and in this work.”

Small Changes, Big Impact

Costa believes there are many ways people can contribute to their communities, both locally and in the broader sense of how we connect with each other as a part of nature. Systemic change is critical, but no action is too small, and even modest actions can add up to meaningful change. Whether it’s working to keep a little insect from attacking a grove of hemlock trees or students participating in a law school clinic challenging a reluctant-to-change system, the actions can have considerable benefits.

“The clinic is a model that I would love to see more schools adopt,” said Costa. “I think it aligns beautifully with the character of Vermont, and it’s not only a way to provide students with a real-world experience—which is incredible—but also an opportunity to make a statement as a school. These are the types of projects that we want to see play out within a legal space.”

“I’m really excited to be a part of ��ͷ��ԭ�� and the incredible work that the Environmental Advocacy Clinic is doing to protect forests in Vermont and New Hampshire.”

The post Defending Nature Through Environmental Advocacy appeared first on ��ͷ��ԭ��.

Meet the Panelists: 2025 Vermont Law Review Symposium

Laura Kujawa — Thu, 02 Oct 2025 16:48:15 +0000

In celebration of its 50th volume, Vermont Law Review proudly presents its annual symposium, “Free Speech on Trial: Resisting Censorship in 2025.”

This dynamic event will feature four panels examining pressing First Amendment issues—executive power and academic freedom in contemporary governance—the Pico v. Island Trees case and book banning in schools across the United States, a comparative panel with African artistic freedom of expression, and the rapidly evolving intersection of artificial intelligence and free speech in democratic societies.

Speaker bios have been organized by panel. To learn more about this event, please click here.

Executive Power and Academic Freedom

Moderator: Siu Tip Lam, ��ͷ��ԭ��

Professor Siu Tip Lam came to ��ͷ��ԭ�� from the Massachusetts Attorney General Office, where she was an assistant attorney general in the Environmental Protection Division for 11 years. During her tenure there, she enforced state environmental laws and litigated throughout the Massachusetts court system, including the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court. Prior to that, she practiced law with the Boston firm of Brown, Rudnick, Freed & Gesmer as a litigation associate. She graduated from Harvard-Radcliffe College with a bachelor’s degree in East Asian Studies and received her JD from Northeastern University Law School. She speaks Mandarin Chinese and Cantonese and came to the United States from Hong Kong as a child.

Ryan Kane JD’13

Ryan is Deputy Solicitor General with the Vermont Attorney General’s Office. Ryan’s work involves representing Vermont in appellate courts including the Vermont Supreme Court and the Second Circuit Court of Appeals and litigating matters with complex constitutional issues. Ryan also assists in representing Vermont in multi-state litigation against the Federal government. Prior to becoming Deputy Solicitor General, Ryan was an Assistant Attorney General in the Environmental Protection Division of the Vermont Attorney General’s Office. Ryan also spent several years in private practice and clerked for the Vermont Superior Court, Environmental Division. Ryan is a 2013 VLGS graduate.

Apratim Vidyarthi

Apratim Vidyarthi is a litigation associate in the New York office of Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher. His practice focuses on appellate and constitutional law, including First Amendment litigation and the media, entertainment, and technology industries. Among his matters, has represents a large technology company in First Amendment litigation against a government data sharing law; and currently represents a reporting organization in a high-profile defamation/free speech lawsuit. Apratim maintains a robust pro bono practice, focusing on First Amendment, Second Amendment, constitutional policing, Executive power, and Equal Protection issues. Apratim has filed amicus briefs at the Supreme Court in Chiles v. Salazar, Free Speech Coalition v. Paxton, Gonzalez v. Trevino, and Hungary v. Simon. Apratim earned his JD cum laude in 2022 from the University of Pennsylvania. Prior to law school, Apratim worked at Deloitte Consulting in their technology consulting group.

He also has a master’s of Science in Engineering and Technology Innovation Management from Carnegie Mellon, and bachelor’s degrees in Nuclear Engineering and Applied Mathematics and a minor in Public Policy from the University of California, Berkeley. Apratim’s scholarship on technology and constitutional law has been published in various leading journals. Among his work, Apratim authored A Sword and a Shield: An Antidiscrimination Analysis of Academic Freedom Protections, 26 U. Pa. J. Const. L. 471 (2024). That work arose from his advocacy against a professor accused of racist acts within the classroom at Penn, and assesses how academic freedom intersects with antidiscrimination law.

Sam Abel-Palmer

Sam Abel-Palmer is the Executive Director of Legal Services Vermont, Vermont’s LSC grantee, a position he has held since 2016. He previously served as Director of Intake for Vermont Legal Aid, as a staff attorney in Vermont Legal Aid’s Disability Law Project, and as a civil rights investigator with the Vermont Human Rights Commission. He is a member of the Vermont Board of Bar Examiners, and of the NLADA Civil Council. In a previous lifetime, he taught theater history and dramatic literature at DePauw University, Dartmouth College, and the University of Vermont.

Michael Hurley

Michael Hurley is Government Affairs Counsel at the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE), where he works on legislative and regulatory issues affecting free speech and academic freedom in higher education. He advocates for laws that expand and protect expressive rights and opposes laws that restrict them. This is Michael’s second tenure at FIRE, where he previously served as a Legislative & Faculty Program Associate. Prior to his time at FIRE, Michael worked as a research analyst for a political consulting firm during the 2020 election cycle.

Michael earned his JD, cum laude, from the University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School and holds a bachelor’s degree in World Politics from The Ohio State University.

Pico v. Island Trees and Book Bans

Moderator: Anna Connolly, ��ͷ��ԭ��

Anna F. Connolly joined the faculty of Vermont Law School in July 2021. Prior to that, she was an attorney at Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton, LLP where her practice focused on international and domestic commercial litigation as well as pro bono matters. She has significant experience in cross-border disputes, securities litigation, antitrust, and representing sovereign governments.

She has won numerous awards for her pro bono work, including civil rights and immigration matters, as well as work on behalf of survivors of domestic violence and sex trafficking. She was named a “Rising Star – The Top Women” by Super Lawyers in 2018. Professor Connolly served as a law clerk to the Honorable Raymond J. Lohier, Jr. of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit and to the Honorable Cathy Seibel of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York.

She received a JD degree from Columbia University School of Law, where she was a James Kent Scholar and an editor of the Columbia Law Review. She received an undergraduate degree, magna cum laude, from Dartmouth College.

Anna serves on the Board of Directors of the ACLU of Vermont and of Gibney, a contemporary dance company and social action incubator in New York City. She is also the faculty representative to the Board of Trustees of ��ͷ��ԭ��.

Rhiannon Hamam

Rhiannon Hamam is a graduate of the University of Texas School of Law. Her first lawyer job was as a public defender in rural south Texas. She also worked as a mitigation specialist on capital habeas cases, and later returned to public defense, this time in Austin. She is currently the Supervising Attorney in the Mithoff Pro Bono Program at the University of Texas School of Law. She is a co-host of the 5-4 podcast. Outside of lawyering, Rhiannon is a community organizer in the movement for Palestinian liberation.

Michael Liroff

Michael Liroff graduated from Fordham Law School in 2014. He worked as an intern under Judge Shira Sheindlin in the Southern District of New York, as an associate at Sullivan & Cromwell LLP, and as advisor and general counsel to the political action committee Mobilize America at its founding. Outside the legal industry, Michael worked as a teacher and as an organizer on Barack Obama’s 2008 Presidential campaign.

African Artistic Freedom and Censorship

Moderator: Emily Gould

Emily Gould brings many decades of practice as an attorney and ADR professional to her current consultancy work on two continents. A former criminal prosecutor and agency general counsel, in the United States, she is the founder of a multi-racial leadership development company, that consults to law firms, legal systems and international NGO’s on the topic of trauma-informed leadership. In Rwanda, she supports a local Peace Center as co-director of , a U.S. non-profit, and also serves as a law reform consultant to the Rwandan Justice Sector on the topic of trauma-informed restorative justice.

In her legal career, Gould served as an Assistant District Attorney for Middlesex County, MA, director of the Medicaid Fraud Control Unit in the Vermont Office of the Attorney General, and general counsel to the Vermont Agency of Agriculture. She has served as an assistant panel member of the Vermont Board of Professional Responsibility, and is a past section chair of the Association for Conflict Resolution and Dispute Resolution Section of the Vermont Bar Association.

At Vermont Law School, she was faculty for Global Restorative Justice, an online offering that focused on the country of Rwanda and how it employed restorative justice to recover from the genocide of 1994. Professor Gould has also been a lecturer in law and associate research scholar at Columbia Law School (CLS) in the field of lawyer leadership development. She was among those at CLS who created and delivered a flagship course in Columbia Law School’s Leadership Initiative, Lawyer Leadership: Leading Self, Leading Others, Leading Change, a 5-credit experiential course offered for the first time in 2018. She also taught law reform and policy development in Africa, including Rwanda, at Columbia Law School.

In Rwanda, with funding from the E.U., she was the international consultant for the Rwandan ADR Policy (adopted in 2022) that is the first national policy in the world that explicitly calls for a trauma-informed approach to justice and that centers community-based restorative justice for both civil and criminal matters. There, she has also served as a consultant to the Rwandan Supreme Court Advisory Committee on Mediation and as a consultant to the Kigali International Arbitration Center. With other Rwandan consultants, she has been a frequent trainer on mediation in Rwanda, both for the Judiciary and members of the Rwandan Bar Association. At the request of the Rwanda Law Reform Commission, she was one of the drafters of a draft Comprehensive ADR Law.

Sam Brakarsh

Sam Brakarsh is a theatre maker, policy advocate, and facilitator whose work bridges law, health, and the arts. He currently chairs the Pan-African Network on Artistic Freedom Summit and has served as the Africa Regional Representative for Artists at Risk Connection (ARC) and PEN America, and coordinated the AMANI: Creative Defense Network. Sam has led initiatives to reform censorship legislation in Sub-Saharan Africa, established networks of artist residencies, and coordinated emergency responses for artists prosecuted for their work. Additionally, he co-founded the Chikukwa Research Trust and Culture Centre in Zimbabwe and serves on the board of Savanna Arts Trust. As well as a published writer and actor, Sam is a Theatre of the Oppressed (TO) practitioner, in which he has created TO networks and led programs across the globe to change laws through participatory dialogue. Sam is recognised as a Dalai Lama Global Fellow and holds degrees from Yale and Oxford University.

Adaobi Egboka

Adaobi Egboka is the director, Africa Initiatives at the Cyrus R. Vance Center for International Justice, a non-profit program of the New York City Bar Association that promotes global justice by engaging lawyers across borders to support civil society and ethical, legal practice. She directs the Vance Center’s programmatic activities in Africa, working on projects across all four of its practice areas with a focus on key rule of law and human rights issues, and leads organization-wide efforts to promote and strengthen pro bono practice in selected African countries through special initiatives and strategic partnerships. She is a human rights lawyer with over 18 years of experience in access to justice, good governance, and the rule of law issues.

Lisa Sidambe

Lisa Sidambe is a regional researcher at Freemuse. She monitors and documents artistic freedom trends and developments, covering 46 African countries. As a consultant human rights researcher and development practitioner, she has worked on various projects related to artistic freedom, decent work, governance for culture, and international cultural cooperation. Lisa is the founder of Canvas of My Identity, an initiative that employs mixed media visual art to engage post-conflict narrations of contested spaces, contested discourses and contested identities. A Mandela Rhodes Scholar, Canon Collins Scholar, Beit Scholar and Sir John Monash Medallist, Lisa holds a summa cum laude honours in Philosophy and International Studies from Monash University, a master’s in Conflict, Development and Security from the University of Leeds, and is currently a doctoral candidate at the University of Johannesburg. She has also studied advanced human rights, public law, cultural project management, global governance and cultural diplomacy.

Muleta Kapatiso

Muleta Kapatiso is an activist, lawyer and development practitioner. His experience spans from governance and human rights project advisory, research and implementation, civil and criminal dispute resolution, legislative and policy reform, strategic partnerships and advocacy, artistic freedoms, election monitoring and observation, child rights, rapid response and social movement building. He supports various organisations and practices law an Attorney with a Lusaka based Law firm.

Muleta is the founder of GRASA, an organisation promoting economic, cultural and social rights. He holds an LLB and master of Laws in Constitutional and Administrative Laws (LLM) and Postgraduate qualification for practicing law in the Zambian Courts.

AI and the First Amendment

Moderator: Benjamin Varadi, ��ͷ��ԭ��

Benjamin C. Varadi joined the ��ͷ��ԭ�� community in 2021. His current research explores the intersections of emerging industry regulation and triple-bottom-line considerations, with a particular focus on cannabis and other vice industries. He teaches business, ethics, and agricultural law courses.

He was previously a partner at a New Orleans law firm, a research fellow at the Tulane Center for Intellectual Property Law and Culture, managing attorney of the Common Ground Relief Legal Clinic, and a lecturer at the Loyola University New Orleans College of Law Technology and Legal Innovation Clinic. His contributions as a practitioner have been recognized with the New Orleans City Business “Leadership in Law” Award, and he has twice been selected as a SuperLawyers “Rising Star.”

Esha Bhandari

Esha Bhandari is deputy director of the ACLU Speech, Privacy, and Technology Project, where she works on litigation and advocacy to protect freedom of expression and privacy rights in the digital age. She also focuses on the impact of big data and artificial intelligence on civil liberties. She has litigated cases including Sandvig v. Barr, a First Amendment challenge to the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act on behalf of online discrimination researchers, Alasaad v. Wolf, a constitutional challenge to suspicionless electronic device searches at the U.S. border, and Guan v. Mayorkas, in which she represents journalists questioned about their work by border officers. She argued before the U.S. Supreme Court in United States v. Hansen, a case that significantly narrowed a federal law that, on its face, criminalized First Amendment-protected speech about immigration. Esha is an adjunct professor of Clinical Law at New York University School of Law, where she co-teaches the Technology, Law, and Policy Clinic.

She contributed a chapter to the treatise Feminist Cyberlaw on the legal landscape for digital journalism and research. She was formerly a member of the National Artificial Intelligence Advisory Committee, Law Enforcement Subcommittee, a body tasked with advising the President on issues in artificial intelligence.

Josephine Wolff

Josephine Wolff is a professor of cybersecurity policy at The Fletcher School at Tufts University. Her research interests include liability for cybersecurity incidents, cyber-insurance, government responses to cyberattacks, and the economics of information security. She is the author of two books: “You’ll See This Message When It Is Too Late: The Legal and Economic Aftermath of Cybersecurity Breaches” (MIT Press, 2018) and “Cyberinsurance Policy: Rethinking Risk in an Age of Ransomware, Computer Fraud, Data Breaches, and Cyberattacks” (MIT Press, 2022). Her writing on cybersecurity has also appeared in the Financial Times, the Wall Street Journal, Slate, The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Atlantic, and Wired. Prior to joining Fletcher, she was an assistant professor of public policy and computing security at the Rochester Institute of Technology and a fellow at the New America Cybersecurity Initiative and Harvard’s Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society.

John Coleman

John Coleman joined FIRE after a distinguished career in the public sector. For over six years John served as counsel for the U.S. House Judiciary Committee, assisting the Committee on legal and constitutional policy issues, including those involving First Amendment freedoms. He also worked in the legal departments of two federal agencies before joining state government as a senior policy advisor in the South Dakota Office of the Governor. John earned his bachelor’s degree in English from the University of Mary Washington and his JD from American University Washington College of Law.

Ilan Kogan

Ilan Kogan is an associate in Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz’s Litigation Department. Ilan received his JD from Yale Law School, where he served as an Editor of the Yale Law Journal. He completed his MBA at Harvard Business School, where he enrolled under the 2+2 program and graduated as a Baker Scholar. He also holds an MSc in Statistics from the University of Toronto and a BBA from the Schulich School of Business at York University. Prior to joining Wachtell, Ilan worked at the United Nations Executive Office of the Secretary General, Facebook’s Oversight Board, and McKinsey & Company. He has extensive experience with artificial-intelligence technology and policy, including as an expert witness at the Canadian House of Commons.

The post Meet the Panelists: 2025 Vermont Law Review Symposium appeared first on ��ͷ��ԭ��.

VLGS Reflects on Hosting the 2025 New England Legal Writing Conference

Laura Kujawa — Wed, 24 Sep 2025 19:27:00 +0000

On Friday, September 12, the Legal Writing Department at ��ͷ��ԭ�� (VLGS) hosted the New England Legal Writing Conference. This year’s theme was Legal Writing: 2035.

Participants were asked to imagine the promise—and peril—of the future of legal writing in the next ten years. Would today’s core principles still be primary, or would new ideas become more relevant? More than 50 professors from across the country traveled to South Royalton to join this exploration of ideas. Sessions covered a diverse range of topics—from the role cultural humility should play in legal writing instruction to the ethical use of generative AI and ways to encourage self-reflection in the classroom.

Attendees enthusiastically praised the conference and VLGS. They described the conference as “thought-provoking” and “enriching.” One attendee wrote: “The sessions challenged me to see our work from new perspectives, and I left with a renewed sense of purpose about where the discipline is headed. It was a memorable day of learning and connection.”

Selected presenters are now at work turning their presentations into essays for publication in . A special edition of this journal dedicated to the New England Legal Writing Conference will be edited by VLGS’s legal writing faculty and published in 2026.

On behalf of the VLGS community, thank you to our attendees, sponsors, and everyone who contributed to making the conference a success!

appeared first on ��ͷ��ԭ��.

Bridging Divides: Law and Policy Students Explore Restorative Justice and Healing in Northern Ireland

Laura Kujawa — Wed, 17 Sep 2025 13:59:59 +0000

In June, a team of twenty ��ͷ��ԭ�� (VLGS) students and faculty members traveled to Northern Ireland as part of a unique ten-day field study course, Global Healing in Action and Policy. Presented by the Center for Justice Reform, this class was designed with the goal of providing students with an immersive experience learning how other countries have moved through politicized violence and divisiveness toward peace.

Place-based learning and field study opportunities run deep at VLGS. We believe that experiential education empowers students to advance their classroom experiences, enhancing cultural competence and diversifying the learning experience through exposure to different landscapes and perspectives.

Tensions have existed for centuries in the area called “Northern Ireland,” which borders the Republic of Ireland but is currently part of the United Kingdom.

Between the 1960s and 1998, “The Troubles,” known also as the Northern Ireland Conflict, occurred between Catholic nationalists (who sought a united, independent Ireland), and Protestant unionists (who wished to remain part of the United Kingdom).

Over the course of this violent period colored by differences in political, socioeconomic, religious, cultural, and geographic identity, 3,500 lives were lost. Some 30,000 more were injured. In 1998, a settlement was reached with the Good Friday Agreement (GFA), which included both the British and Irish governments, as well as eight Northern Irish political parties.

With this context in mind, the field study course focused on both policies, including the GFA, and restorative practices, such as community dialogues, that have helped Northern Ireland move toward peace. Students were asked to reflect on presentations from policymakers and practitioners, and immerse themselves in the region’s rich memory and culture.

The student cohort bridged multiple degree programs and departments, both residential and online, creating a singular opportunity for connection among the VLGS community. Individuals pursuing the online Master of Arts in Restorative Justice (MARJ), Graduate Certificate in Restorative Justice (GCRJ), residential joint JD/MARJ, residential JD and Online Hybrid JD (OHJD), and Master of Public Policy (MPP) took part in the trip.

The group began in Dublin, Ireland, proceeding across the border to visit Belfast, Ballycastle, and Londonderry (Derry), finally heading back to Dublin to fly home.

Healing in Progress: Policy and Practice

Dr. Hedley Abernethy, a renowned restorative justice leader in Northern Ireland who has spent significant time in the United States, helped VLGS organize its speaker series.

To engage with policy, the group met with David Ford, former Minister of Justice, and Richard Good, advisor to Minister of Justice, who both held office in Northern Ireland during the Good Friday Agreement negotiations.

Students also spoke with Lesley Carroll of the Independent Commission for Reconciliation and Information Recovery, an organization continuing investigations into crimes committed during the Troubles and working through acts of acknowledgment and reparation; the Police Service of Northern Ireland; Dr. Kieran McEvoy, chair of the Senator George J. Mitchell Institute for Global Peace, Security, and Justice at Queens University; and Dr. Duncan Morrow, an expert in Northern Ireland’s conflict at Ulster University.

“There were so many layers to the trip. On both a personal level and an educational level—it was life changing,” student Latisha Rossi JD’27 shared. “I came home and told my husband there is no going back—there is only before Northern Ireland or after. I feel like I have a purpose.”

To gain understanding of the practices used, students met with restorative justice organizations: Alternatives Restorative Justice, which works primarily with Protestant communities, and Community Restorative Justice Ireland, which works primarily with Catholic communities. Students also engaged with two organizations that used storytelling and advocacy by victims of political violence, including the Belfast-based WAVE Trauma Center and the Londonderry (Derry) based Theatre of Witness. Additionally, students spent time with members of the Turnaround Project, which specializes in community building, as well as 174 Trust/Circles of Change, a community dialogue program. The group also spent a portion of the trip at Corrymeela, Northern Ireland’s oldest peace and reconciliation center, learning firsthand about its work.

Other highlights included a meeting with Reverend Shona Bell, who spoke about the concept of civic courage; Tony Macaulay, a memoirist and fiction writer who specializes in the Troubles; and Jon McCourt, a former IRA member and Bloody Sunday survivor who is now a peacebuilder.

Students took “Black Taxi Tours” to view Belfast’s murals and peace walls, and walking tours of Londonderry (Derry). They also received a tour of Giant’s Causeway, a UNESCO World Heritage site.

“Through seeing the devastating impacts of politicized violence, students came to understand both Northern Ireland and divisiveness in other countries with fresh eyes,” said Center for Justice Reform director and course professor Dr. Quixada Moore-Vissing.

“Together, we found hope in the perseverance toward peace that everyday people in Northern Ireland kept pushing for, and the resiliency of the human spirit to see that nonviolence was the only way forward.”

The post Bridging Divides: Law and Policy Students Explore Restorative Justice and Healing in Northern Ireland appeared first on ��ͷ��ԭ��.

Meet the Speakers: 2025 New England Legal Writing Conference

Laura Kujawa — Wed, 10 Sep 2025 19:22:42 +0000

��ͷ��ԭ�� (VLGS) is proud to host professors from near and far for the the 2025 New England Legal Writing Conference. This year’s theme is “Legal Writing: 2035.”

Participants will be asked to imagine the promise—and peril—of the future of legal writing. What will legal writing look like ten years from now? How should legal writing professors pivot to address rapidly evolving developments in technology and society? Which core principles of legal writing should we preserve–and which should we abandon?

Thank you to our moderators, VLGS professors Greg Johnson, Catherine Fregosi, Michael Kovac, Anna Connolly, Tenielle Fordyce-Ruff, and Jessica Durkis-Stokes.

To view the full conference schedule, please click here.

Dean Beth McCormack, ��ͷ��ԭ��

9:15 – 9:30 a.m. Dean’s Welcome | Yates Common Room

Beth McCormack has been dean of Vermont Law School since January of 2021, becoming the first woman to hold that position in the school’s history. From January 2021 – June 2022, she also served as the interim president.

While interim president and dean, McCormack led the school through the COVID-19 pandemic and the adoption of its strategic plan. As part of that strategic plan, McCormack led the development and implementation of the school’s part-time Online Hybrid JD program.

McCormack joined the Vermont Law School faculty in 2011. She received her AB from the University of Chicago and her JD, cum laude, from Boston University School of Law.

Linda S. Anderson, Stetson University College of Law

Legal Writing Reimagined: AI, NextGen Bar, and the New Writing Process—What Every Professor Needs to Know
9:30 – 10:15 a.m. Opening Plenary Address | Yates Common Room

Linda S. Anderson is a professor of law and faculty director of the Flex JD program at Stetson University College of Law, where she has taught legal research and writing for 19 of her 25 years in legal education. A former undergraduate academic dean, she brings a lifelong commitment to effective teaching across K–12, college, and graduate settings. As a legal writing professor and curriculum strategist, she helps law schools and faculty align their courses with the NextGen Bar Exam and evolving professional demands—without overhauling everything. She creates AI-enhanced feedback tools, plug-and-play assignments, and course kits that support faculty voice and student readiness. She is the author of a book on writing Florida bar essays and shares practical teaching strategies through her blog, , which serves as a resource hub for faculty navigating legal education reform and AI integration.

Nicole Belbin, Western New England School of Law

The Future of Legal Writing is Now: Everything, Everywhere, All at Once
10:25 – 10:50 a.m. Plenary Discussion Group | Yates Common Room

Nicole Belbin is an associate professor of law and associate dean for Library and Information Resources at Western New England University School of Law, where she teaches Lawyering Skills, Advanced Legal Research in the Age of AI, and Legal Research Theory & Practice.

Nicole received her BS in Criminal Justice from Western New England University and her MSLIS from Drexel University in 2011. She graduated magna cum laude from Western New England University School of Law in 2020. Before college, Nicole served in the United States Marine Corps, where she met her husband. They have three adult children.

Since being admitted to practice in Massachusetts, Nicole has dedicated her spare time to public interest lawyering, mainly assisting veterans with their VA claims. She is passionate about veterans’ law, access to justice, and the role libraries play in student success.

Beth Cohen, Western New England School of Law

The Future of Legal Writing is Now: Everything, Everywhere, All at Once
10:25 – 10:50 a.m. Plenary Discussion Group | Yates Common Room

Professor Beth Cohen teaches at WNE School of Law in Springfield, Massachusetts. She is the director of the Legal Research and Writing Program and currently teaches Lawyering Skills and Mindfulness in Law Practice. She has also taught the Externship Seminar and Professional Responsibility. Professor Cohen served on the Supreme Judicial Court Standing Advisory Committee on Professionalism, the Supreme Judicial Court Alternative Paths Subcommittee on Bar ��ͷ��ԭ��, the board of directors of Community Legal Aid, and the board of directors of Scribes, The American Society of Legal Writers. She currently serves as co-chair of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court Committee on Lawyer Well-Being’s Legal Education Sub-Committee and is on the board of directors of Lawyers Concerned for Lawyers Massachusetts. Professor Cohen co-founded the popular civic education Mini-Law School Program and co-directs the program with Professor Nicole Belbin. She served as associate dean for Academic Affairs from 2009-2020 and interim dean of the School of Law in 2022–2023.

Jessica Mahon Scoles, Western New England School of Law

The Future of Legal Writing is Now: Everything, Everywhere, All at Once
10:25 – 10:50 a.m. Plenary Discussion Group | Yates Common Room

Jessica Mahon Scoles is an associate professor of law and the director the Tindler Center for Inclusive Advocacy at Western New England University Law School. She teaches Lawyering Skills and Appellate Advocacy, and is the coach of the National Moot Court team.

Before joining the WNE faculty in 2022, Professor Mahon Scoles taught legal research and writing as a visiting assistant professor at Boston College Law School and as an adjunct professor at New England Law. Her teaching draws on more than a decade of experience representing clients in high stakes business litigation in California and Massachusetts.

Professor Mahon Scoles’s recent scholarship includes Can I Bring Myself to Court?: Teaching Presentation Style in the Trial Advocacy Classroom, 49 Vermont L. Rev. 1 (2024), and collaborating on the textbook Legal Argumentation, which CALI published in May of this year.