Campus News

Conference to explore practical ways to address poverty issues

The School of Law aims to explores practical methods of lawyering that can best serve the poor in its second annual Working in the Public Interest Law Conference March 30–31.

The student-organized conference seeks to bring together eminent practitioners, students and faculty to discuss practical solutions to today’s social justice issues.

The conference will include a variety of panel discussions and roundtables on matters relating to poverty law, addressing such topics as education, affordable housing, juvenile delinquency, immigration, community economic development, voting rights, workers’ rights, health care and indigent defense.

Panelists include Roy E. Barnes, former governor of Georgia; Jonathan Blazer, the public benefits policy attorney for the National Immigration Law Center; Emmett Bondurant, a member of the Georgia Public Defender Standards Council; Linda Couch, deputy director for the National Low Income Housing Coalition; Ryan King, a policy analyst for The Sentencing Project; Michael Monahan,  director of the Pro Bono Project for the State Bar of Georgia; and Joel Packer, the director of education policy and practice for the National Education Association.

The conference will open March 30 at 5:30 p.m. with a keynote address by Western Circuit Superior Court Judge Steve C. Jones, the chairman of the anti-poverty initiative Partners for a Prosperous Athens. Fifteen panel and roundtable discussions will be held March 31, as well as a career networking reception. Stephen Bright, the president of the Southern Center for Human Rights, will deliver the closing keynote speech at 4:30 p.m.

The conference is open to the public, but registration is required by March 27.