A Message from
Dean Jenn

Dear DePaul Law Alumni Community:

Orientation for the entering class of 2020 (174 strong) has begun COVID-style, including one day of in-person classes, an online service day and a Zoom student organization fair!

To prepare for the fall semester, the senior admin team has been working tirelessly for the past few months to put together a course schedule that balances safety with providing the best educational experience for our students. The faculty attended workshops and trainings throughout the summer to ensure that that they would be providing excellent online education, as most of the upper-class courses had converted to online offerings. Last week, we adjusted the online offerings even more when the university decided to limit in-person offerings in light of rising positive COVID-19 cases in Illinois and other states.

Next week, when all classes begin, each of the 1L sections will come in once per week for two of their classes and take their remaining classes online. Except for a small number of experiential learning courses, upper-class courses are online. At the same time, we are ensuring that our students have a "home" at DePaul Law, keeping our library, as well as other spaces on the Loop campus, open during the week. Everyone on campus needs to wear a mask and stay safely distant. My responsibility to all our students is to keep them moving forward towards becoming lawyers—the pandemic may slow us down a bit, but it will not stop us! The world will need our students more than ever when they graduate.

In addition to all the logistical dancing that we are doing, we are also moving forward to advance the excellence of the law school and its Vincentian values in a variety of ways, including:

• adding two clinics, a Family Law Field Clinic and a Croak Community Legal Clinic in Criminal Justice (adding to the Civil Justice Clinic);
• hiring a new Jaharis Fellow, Theodosia Stavroulaki, who is an expert in health care, antitrust and artificial intelligence law, and law and inequality;
• planning a "Community Conversation" on racial justice, including policing, health disparities and voting; and
• reviewing our degree programs to ensure that social and racial justice are integrated into our JD, LLM and MJ programs.

We will continue to keep our eyes on our North Stars—our students, our values, our sustainability and our excellence. I look forward to the year ahead and to keeping connected with our community in every way we can!

All my best,
Dean Jenn

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College of Law
Diversity Council

The College of Law is proud to announce the establishment of the Alumni Diversity Council. The newly created council offers critical support, guidance and oversight on the College of Law's anti-racism, diversity and inclusion efforts. The all-alumni group provides direct feedback to the law school's administration and supports DePaul Law as thought leaders, advocates and connectors.

To learn more about the role of the board and see a list of members, please click here.

Write a Note of Support to a DePaul Law Bar Taker

The ongoing COVD-19 pandemic has brought unprecedented changes and uncertainty to long-standing events and activities. This is especially true of bar examinations, as our 2020 graduates and additional DePaul Law bar takers having been preparing for the exam in an altered reality. In Illinois, the traditional late July examination has now been twice delayed. The exam has been moved to October 5-6 and will be occurring remotely for the first time in Illinois history.

Beyond the usual stresses that preparation for the bar exam brings, the pandemic has amplified this stress as bar takers worry about their health, family/friends, their financial situations and future employment. More than ever, well wishes and notes of support from our alumni community would mean a great deal to these recent alumni in their quest to become licensed, practicing attorneys.

To show your support, please click here to write a brief note.

*We ask that notes of support do not include comments on how to study for the exam. This will be a very different bar exam, and many of the bar takers have been studying on a modified schedule since June. Thank you in advance!

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Volunteer Opportunity: ABA Negotiation Competition

The College of Law is seeking alumni volunteers to serve as coaches for one or two student teams in the ABA Negotiation Competition. The topic for this year's problem will be sports law, and the competition will be held remotely. The problem will be distributed in early October, and the first round of competitions will take place beginning in early November. Teams register for the competition in September. Each coach would work with a team of two students and one alternate.

Coaching sessions would be held virtually. More information about the competition can be found here. Problems from previous years can be found here. If you are interested or would like more information, please contact Professor of Law Emily Cauble. Thank you for considering volunteering your time to help our students prepare for this competition!

Student Spotlight: Kizuwanda Wyatt, SBA President 2020-21

Kizuwanda Wyatt took a non-traditional path to law school, entering DePaul Law after a two decades-long career in the hospitality industry. The previous president of the Black Law Student Association (BLSA), she has begun her term as president of DePaul's Student Bar Association (SBA) for academic year 2020-21.

Dr. Ana Vazquez-Rivera, director of diversity, inclusion and student life, says of Wyatt, "The descriptors that come to mind are resourceful, collaborator, advocate. As president of BLSA, she initiated relationships with Advancement to launch a crowdsourcing platform for professional development and networking opportunities, as well as collaborated with various groups in and out of the law school to develop creative programming."

Read the full spotlight here.

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Jaharis Health
Law Institute CCB
Healthcare Compliance
Virtual Conference

The 2020 Healthcare Compliance Conference will address the key requirements for an effective compliance program and some of the challenges compliance professionals face when conducting education and training, responding to compliance violations, auditing and monitoring, implementing HIPAA protections, and communicating and reporting.

The conference will specifically address telehealth, preparedness and the use of new technology for the delivery of healthcare in the current environment. Speakers will address the changes required in response to the recent pandemic, compliance in the current landscape and how to transition to the anticipated new norm.

Thursday, Aug. 27, 2020
9 a.m. – 3 p.m.
Live Web Conference

The conference agenda, CLE credits and registration information can be found here.

2020 Schiller DuCanto & Fleck Family Law Center Virtual Symposium: The Current State of Elder Law

On Monday, Oct. 12, join us for the 2020 Schiller DuCanto & Fleck Family Law Center Virtual Symposium: The Current State of Elder Law.

Through various panel discussions with experts in the field, panelists and attendees will explore the intersection of family law and elder law, emergency guardianships, advance directives, public benefits, caregivers, choices in end of life matters, protecting your loved ones from financial exploitation and LGBT seniors. Panelists will address the current landscape, the changes required in response to the recent pandemic and how to transition to the anticipated new norm. There will also be an elder law case law update you don't want to miss!

The agenda, speakers and registration can be viewed here.

The cost to attend this full-day symposium is $99 per person, with a reduced rate of $49 for non-profit and government employees (free for students).

DePaul University College of Law is an accredited CLE Provider. This program has been approved for up to seven (7) general Continuing Legal Education (CLE) credits.

Pending approval, this program will include 1 hour of diversity and inclusion CLE credit.

Upcoming Virtual Alumni Programming