Ongoing Actions in Our Community
- Institutional Equity Committee
This College of Law Committee includes staff, students, and faculty in a role that will (a) consider proposals to implement likely revisions to ABA Standard 303(c) requiring schools to provide bias training and education to law students, cross-cultural competency, and racism), (b) identify institutional mechanisms for implementing our faculty resolution reflecting our community's commitment to anti-racism, (c) serve as a resource for other committees and entities in order to incorporate considerations of equity into WUCL programs and initiatives, and (d) serve as a focus for other community activities and initiatives intended to support programs of equity and inclusion at the College.
- LexScholars
Willamette Law joins LexScholars, an initiative launched by AccessLex Institute designed to enhance law school diversity. The LexScholars program offers promising underrepresented candidates whose applications did not make the initial cut--but who complete the program--guaranteed admission and an accompanying scholarship. Brian Gallini, the dean and a professor at the °µÍø½ûÇø College of Law, told Reuters that “this partnership is squarely in line with our fundamental goal to create equity across everything we do.”
- Faculty Development Conversation Series
°µÍø½ûÇø College of Law’s Faculty Development Conversation Series is a semi-monthly forum where faculty meet to workshop ideas around research and scholarship, teaching, and service. Most recently, the Law faculty participated in a live webinar discussing what law professors should and should not do when they make a mistake or a comment in the classroom that is racist/ sexist/ homophobic/ classiest/ ableist or otherwise offensive.
- Student Bar Association adds VP of Equity
Changing the SBA Constitution for the first time since 1996, the °µÍø½ûÇø College of Law student body voted in favor of the addition of a Vice President of Diversity & Inclusion to the SBA Executive Committee. Current student Brooke Trujillo now serves as the first VP of Diversity & Inclusion. At the time of her election, she said: "I feel so honored that the EDI Committee has the confidence in me to represent their voices on the SBA Board. Every student should feel free to approach me about anything they think can better our diverse legal community[,] [e]specially if students want to talk about ways to ensure that our community has the tools to create classroom environments in which all our students feel seen, heard, valued, and respected."
