Civil Rights, Human Rights and Race:

An Applied Legal Scholarship Symposium

Co-Sponsors:

Download Schedule in pdf format (74 kb)

Friday December 14, 2007

Opening Plenary: Anti-discrimination versus Non-discrimination: Which Way Towards Racial Justice?
(3:00 – 4:45 pm)

Marjorie Cohn
Associate Professor, Thomas Jefferson School of Law

Aderson B. Francois
Assistant Professor and Director of Civil Rights Clinic, Howard University School of Law

Stephen Menendian
Kirwan Institute for the Study of Race and Ethnicity; The Ohio State University Law School [moderator]

Ronald Turner
George Butler Research Professor and Alumnae Law Center Professor of Law, University of Houston Law Center [respondent]

Saturday December 15, 2007

Panel 1
Educate or Incarcerate: Zero-Tolerance Policies, Student Discipline and Discrimination
(9:30 – 11:00 am)

Bernardine Dohrn
Children & Family Justice Center, Northwestern University School of Law [respondent]

Maya Harris
Executive Director, ACLU-Northern California [moderator]

Damon Hewitt
NAACP-LDF

Liz Sullivan
National Economic and Social Rights Initiative

Deborah Fowler
Legal Director, Texas Appleseed

Break (11:00-11:15 am)

Panel 2
The Right to Return: Katrina, the Rights of Internally Displaced Peoples, and Discrimination
(11:15 am – 12:45 pm)

Kali Akuno
Executive Director, Peoples’ Hurricane Relief Fund

Lisa Crooms
Professor and Director, Howard University School of Law Constitutional Law Center

Monique Harden
Advocates for Environmental Human Rights

Cheryl Harris
Professor, UCLA Law School [respondent]

Avis Jones-Deweever
National Council of Negro Women

Break 12:45 – 1:00 pm

Lunch

Roundtable Discussion: Addressing Racial Discrimination Is There Value Added by Shifting from Civil Rights to Human Rights?
(1:00 – 2:30 pm)

Barbara Arnwine
Executive Director, Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law

Ajamu Baraka
Executive Director, US Human Rights Network

Salih Booker
Executive Director, Global Rights

Wade Henderson
Executive Director, Leadership Conference on Civil Rights

Dean Kurt L. Schmoke
Howard University School of Law (moderator)

Theodore Shaw
Director Counsel, NAACP-LDF

Break (2:30-2:45 pm)

Panel 3
Crime and Suffrage: Felony Disfranchisement, the Right to Vote, and Discrimination
(2:45- 4:15 pm)

Margaret Huang
Director, Program Director, U.S. Racial Discrimination Program (moderator)

Ryan King
Policy Analyst, The Sentencing Project

Nsombi Lambright
Executive Director, ACLU Mississippi

Anthony Witherspoon
President, NAACP-McComb County, Mississippi Branch

Marcia Johnson-Blanco
Staff Attorney, Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights Under Law

Closing Session (4:30 – 5:15 pm)

Human Rights and Discrimination: The Way Forward

Gay McDougall
Distinguished Scholar in Residence, Washington College of Law, American University

Lisa Crooms
Professor, Howard University School of Law
Director, Constitutional Law Center

This event is free, but space is limited.
If you would like to attend, please respond to raceandrights@gmail.com.

All panels will be held at the
Howard University School of Law
2900 Van Ness Street, NW
Washington, DC

Van Ness/UDC stop on the Metro Red Line.