EVENTS AND TRAINING CALENDAR - LISTING

Criminal Defender Training Program - Summer Series (June Sessions)
06/03/2010 - 06/03/2010

Download Summer Registration Materials (PDF)
Click here for complete details

Criminal Defender Training Program - Summer Series (July Sessions)
07/01/2010 - 07/01/2010

Registrations are due by May 28, 2010, for June sessions and by June 25, 2010, for July sessions. Space is limited, so please register early to guarantee seating. Late registrations will be accepted on a space-available basis. Course materials will not be given out at the sessions, but will be available before each session on the web at www.pdsdc.org.

All sessions are free, and will begin promptly at 5:30 p.m.
Please note that the doors to the building will close at 6:00 p.m. and that participants arriving after 6:00 p.m. will not be granted entrance.

CLE credits are available.
Please note that some sessions will now run for two (2) hours and that CLE credit will be granted accordingly. Those sessions expected to run for three (3) hours are indicated as such. Participants attending sessions designated as two hours that run longer will receive additional CLE time in half-hour increments.

Download Summer Registration Materials (PDF)

Keeping Children in the Community: Cross Disciplinary Legal Strategies
07/13/2010 - 07/13/2010

Registration has been closed as of July 12.

The Georgetown Juvenile Justice Clinic, in collaboration with the Public Defender Service, University Legal Services, the Children’s Law Center, The Washington College of Law at American University, the David A Clarke School of Law, and the CCAN Office of Superior Court, will host this one-day conference which will provide instruction on litigation strategies to obtain therapeutic services for children and youth.  The speakers will present research on the effectiveness of residential placements, best practices in community based services, and an in depth look at intensive therapeutic services available to youth and their families. Experts in mental health law, child welfare law, and special education law will discuss legal entitlements including an overview of constitutional, state, and local law; and provide a unique cross training workshop that will give practitioners advocacy tools and litigation strategies to ensure that youth have access to community-based alternatives to residential treatment.

The workshop will include training on monitoring out-of-home placements and strategies for litigating effective to home based services. Attorneys who attend the conference will be offered the opportunity to partner with University Legal Services to litigate cutting edge issues focused on keeping children out of residential placements. Registration is required and open to all Family Court panel attorneys.  Others may apply and will be admitted as space allows on a case-by-case basis. Attorneys who can attend the entire conference will be given preference. CLE credit is available for Juvenile, CCAN, and Special Education panel attorneys. 

Agenda

9:00am – 10:45am:
The Use and Overuse of Residential Placements
Wallace J. Mlyniec, Lupo-Ricci Professor of Clinical Legal Studies; Director, Juvenile Justice Clinic, Georgetown University Law Center.

Professor Mlyniec will provide a national and historic perspective. He’ll discuss the recent McArthur study on residential placements, the preliminary findings that extensive stays in institutional placements have no measurable results for youth convicted of serious offenses, and the recent report of University Legal Services, Out of State, Out of Mind, which examines D.C. practices in sending youth committed to CFSA and DYRS to residential treatment.
 
A Treatment Center You Can't Leave is Still a Prison - Voices of Young People Who Have Been Through the System
Brian Lombrowski.

Brian Lombrowski, President of the Community Alliance for the Ethical Treatment of Youth (CAFETY) and the Youth Involvement Specialist for the New York State Office of Mental Health, has been involved in the mental health service system as a youth recipient, family member, youth advocate, and professional for the last 16 years.  He will speak about the importance of youth participation, voice, and involvement and the rights of youth within the social service system, including private "therapeutic" programs.

11:00am – 1pm:
Best Practices in Community-Based Therapeutic Services for Children
Panel:  Shannon Hall, Executive Director, D.C. Behavioral Association; Karis Callahan, Clinical Director, Capital Region Children’s Center; Laura Townsend, Children’s Law Center; Laurie Ellington, MA, LPC, System of Care Practice Manager, Office of Program Policy and Planning, District of Columbia, Department of Mental Health
Moderator:  Yael Cannon, Practitioner-in-Residence, Disability Rights Law Clinic, Washington College of Law at American University.

Yael Cannon, a seasoned advocate on behalf of children with mental health needs and Practitioner-in-Residence with the Disability Rights Law Clinic at the Washington College of Law at American University, will moderate a panel that will focus on community-based mental health services and DC care providers available to children and adolescents with the most intensive needs, ways to access those services, and best practices in community-based therapeutic services and service delivery for children.

1:15pm – 1:45pm
Lunch  (lunch provided)
Luncheon Speaker: The Honorable John McCabe

2pm– 5pm 
Advocacy Workshop
Panel: Jennifer Lav, Managing Attorney, University Legal Services, Yael Cannon, AU, Craig Hickein, Staff Attorney, PDS; Laura Rinaldi, Clinical Instructor with the Juvenile and Special Education Law Clinic, the University of the District of Columbia’s David A. Clarke School of Law; Laura Townsend, CLC.

An expert panel will lead participants in an interactive lecture and workshop focused on legal entitlements and litigation strategies. The panel will provide participants with strategies in delinquency, neglect, and special education matters, as well as matters dealing with the needs of children with intellectual disabilities and mental health needs.

CLE credit available for Family Court panel attorneys

Discover the PATH to Becoming a Public Defender
07/31/2010 - 07/31/2010

Discover the PATH to Becoming a Public Defender

PATH is designed to provide law students considering or planning careers in indigent criminal defense representation information and guidance about how public defender offices hire, train and provide advocacy to indigent defendants. You have the opportunity to choose from 12 sessions on the different PATH tracks, all of which are calculated to help you understand what it means to be a public defender.

LAA/PDS 50th Anniversary Celebration
11/18/2010 - 11/21/2010

LAA/PDS 50th Anniversary Celebration

November 18th –21st, 2010

Join the Public Defender Service for the District of Columbia as we
celebrate our 50th anniversary with four days of special events beginning
with the presentation to PDS of the Southern Center for Human Rights
2010 Frederick Douglass Award.


Thursday, November 18th
Southern Center for Human Rights Awards Dinner

Friday, November 19th
Tour of “451 Indiana Avenue” Building
 (Now home of D.C. Court of Appeals)
& LAA/PDS Reception

Saturday, November 20th
Buffet Dinner and Dancing

Sunday, November 21st
Brunch

DETAILS TO FOLLOW