Major organizations, public figures, and social media users called on everyone to #WearOrange on Thursday, as part of a campaign to create awareness about gun violence. The campaign was created by the Everytown for Gun Safety Support Fund, which declared on the campaign’s official site that the color orange was chosen because it “symbolizes the value of human life” and “hunters wear orange in the woods to protect themselves and others.”

June 2 is official National Gun Violence Awareness Day. This year, it immediately followed Wednesday’s murder-suicide incident at UCLA, which led to the death of a professor and forced the campus on lockdown during one of its busiest times of the year.

Here’s a sampling of some of the responses on social media:

We cannot accept our level of gun violence as the new normal. We must take action to prevent this from happening again & again. #WearOrange

— President Obama (@POTUS) June 2, 2016

These gals are down for the cause #WearOrange @Everytown pic.twitter.com/osycQmyAUo

— Amy Schumer (@amyschumer) June 2, 2016

Trying to force a smile as I do this today. We are all Bruins! https://t.co/cmWiGKg9BT #WearOrange pic.twitter.com/ei2Q70JR6S

— Perez (@ThePerezHilton) June 2, 2016

The noise around gun violence is loud. Orange is louder. Join me today and #WearOrange. pic.twitter.com/DRuiikzrgm

— Mike Bloomberg (@MikeBloomberg) June 2, 2016

It’s gun violence awareness day #wearorange pic.twitter.com/FpK8Ninueb

— Kim Kardashian West (@KimKardashian) June 2, 2016

Comedy Central posted a clip from “Inside Amy Schumer” that provided a humorous look at the absurdities surrounding U.S. gun laws:

Spreading awareness the only way we know how. #WearOrange https://t.co/Gi2DvzGwpXhttps://t.co/BiAF42yn2x

— Comedy Central (@ComedyCentral) June 2, 2016

But this campaign expanded well beyond simple wardrobe choice: #WearOrange events were held around the country to bring people together in solidarity for the cause.

With 372 mass shootings in 2015, this campaign has never felt more timely and necessary.

Mariam Jaffery

Mariam was an Executive Assistant at Law Street Media and a native of Northern Virginia. She has a B.A. in International Affairs with a minor in Business Administration from George Washington University. Contact Mariam at mjaffery@lawstreetmedia.com.

The post #WearOrange Brings Attention to Gun Violence in America appeared first on Law Street.

Research and analysis done by Law Street’s Law School Rankings team: Alexis Evans, Hyunjae Ham, Symon Rowlands and Toni Keddell.

Click here to read more coverage on Law Street’s Law School Specialty Rankings 2015.

Click here for information on rankings methodology. 

Alexis Evans

Alexis Evans is an Assistant Editor at Law Street and a Buckeye State native. She has a Bachelor’s Degree in Journalism and a minor in Business from Ohio University. Contact Alexis at aevans@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Top 10 Law Schools for Civil Rights Law: #10 University of California-Los Angeles School of Law appeared first on Law Street.

The d, the i, the d, the d, the y, the d, the I, the d is diddy just got arrested. Again.

Sean “Diddy” Combs was arrested by the UCLA Police Department on Monday afternoon on a charge of assault with a weapon–a kettle ball. He was released several hours after his arrest by posting bail, but he wasn’t able to Diddy Bop out of there with just a slap on the wrist.

The hip-hop music legend has officially been charged with three counts of assault with a deadly weapon, one count of making terrorist threats, and one count of battery.

According to Bruin Report Online, the incident began early that morning when Diddy’s son, Justin Combs, was attending an off-season workout on UCLA’s field. After Combs missed some recent workouts and a few other minor offenses, one of the team’s coaches kicked him out.

“I don’t care if your dad’s here,” Coach Sal Alosi said. “This is UCLA. I’m going to treat you just like I treat everyone else.”

Diddy was reportedly upset with Alosi’s behavior, because he felt that the coach was trying to humiliate both him and his son in front of the entire team. So when he went to the coach’s office to discuss the issue, the coach refused to see him, and threatened to call security if he didn’t leave. The coach’s diss set Diddy OFF.

Reports claim Diddy replied, “Fine, I’ll call police,” and Alosi snapped–going after Diddy with his hands. It was reported that Diddy then grabbed a kettlebell and held it up in a defensive position, but did not attack with the intent to injure the coach.

When Alosi instructed interns outside of his office to alert campus security, an unclear riff-raff between the two went down, which resulted in scratches on Alosi’s face and a ripped shirt. While interns were able to remove Diddy from the office and into the next room, it was there that Diddy reportedly picked up a kettle bell and swung it at one of the interns.

When UCPD arrived and the situation had calmed, everyone believed nothing would come of the incident. But with the UCLA training facility security cameras, police were able to watch the altercation and subsequently arrested Diddy.

According to TMZ reports, this is not Diddy’s first altercation that has resulted in police presence. In 2011, he settled a lawsuit from a shooting that occurred in a night club in 1999 that left about three victims injured.

While Puff had no right to assault the coach for giving his son some tough criticism, we all know Diddy has a temper. I bet the coach thought he was handling the situation appropriately by immediately asking him to leave, but we all know Diddy doesn’t play that way. Whether or not Diddy will actually have to pay a price for his actions however, remains to be seen.

Angel Idowu

Angel Idowu is a member of the Beloit College Class of 2016 and was a Law Street Media Fellow for the Summer of 2015. Contact Angel at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Diddy Did It Again: Rapper Arrested After Altercation at UCLA appeared first on Law Street.

Yes, you read the title right. Incorporating elements of pop culture, like “Breaking Bad,” into the classroom has become a popular new trend for undergraduate and graduate schools looking to engage their students. Schools such as the University of New Mexico have begun using pop culture case studies as instructional tools, while others major universities including Rutgers, the University of South Carolina, UC Berkeley, and Georgetown have opted to design courses dedicated entirely to singers, movies, television shows, sports, and other celebrities.

Have you ever considered the legal ramifications that fictional meth producers Walter White and Jesse Pinkman would have faced in the real world, as well as the questionable legal practices of defense attorney, Saul Goodman? A class at the University of New Mexico Law School analyzed the legal issues surrounding this popular television show and published their findings in a student-run journal for the school.

From The New Mexico Law Review “Breaking Bad” edition. http://t.co/xSmSg84ONg pic.twitter.com/1gYrz12VQy

— Ed Bott (@edbott) May 20, 2015

The students of this criminal law class, as well as the other contributing professors who helped to create this journal, found a multitude of legal issues within “Breaking Bad.” They discovered the actions of the show’s DEA agents to be controversial in certain instances and obviously illegal at other times, and yet these fictional agents were never stopped or questioned.

Saul’s practices as a lawyer are very shady and illegal, as he is known for laundering money to drug lords and going beyond his legal reach. When examining how Walter would likely be prosecuted, the students concluded that he would most likely receive a harsh sentience but avoid the death penalty in real life since the practice is no longer used in the state of New Mexico. While this show was very entertaining for viewers, it was not always realistic due to the exaggerated and felonious actions of most of the characters.

Other universities have chosen to create classes entirely pop-culture themed. At the University of New Hampshire, a class was created to analyze Deflategate–the recent scandal where the New England Patriots football team was accused of deflating its footballs before a game–as well as other sporting events and how they relate to the legal system. UCLA Law School has also joined in on this trend with a course called Law and Pop Culture, where students are assigned the task of watching popular television shows or films relating to the legal system, including lawyers, the criminal justice system, and the jury, which they will later apply to their coursework.

There are also many options available for undergraduate students who are interested in learning about their favorite pop-culture subjects. Famous singers such as Lady Gaga, Miley Cyrus, and Beyonce now all have classes devoted to them and studying their fame, allowing students to draw connections to subjects like sociology and philosophy.

According to the Mother Nature Network (MNM), movies such as Harry Potter, Spiderman, and Star Trek are all subjects of classes analyzing the popular franchises. MNM also noted that many popular television shows have become the core focus of several college classes throughout the country, such as The Simpsons, Judge Judy, and Days of Our Lives.

Times are changing, and as a result universities are beginning to recognize that in order to better accommodate and attract students to their schools, they have to vary their course offerings. No matter what you are interested in, there is probably a course out there that would appeal to you. Comparing core principles of classes to new themes could actually be a very effective way of maintaining students’ attention, as well as give them new ways to better comprehend course material.

What topics would YOU like to see being incorporated into your classes?

Toni Keddell

Toni Keddell is a member of the University of Maryland Class of 2017 and a Law Street Media Fellow for the Summer of 2015. Contact Toni at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Law School Uses AMC’s ‘Breaking Bad’ as Teaching Tool appeared first on Law Street.

Like anything with a life, survival is a germ’s end game. When it faces a challenge, it will adapt. Some germs adapt alarmingly well to the challenge of modern medicine. They’re called superbugs because they’ve evolved to survive the challenges we throw at them, including antibiotics.

Do we have a counterattack against these superbugs? Let’s find out.

Superbugs in the News

Superbugs have been making headlines lately. Here’s what’s happening in case you missed it.

CRE Outbreaks

CRE stands for carbapenem-resistant Enterobacteriaceae, a type of bacteria resistant to carbapenem antibiotics. CRE resists nearly all antibiotics and can cause death in about 50 percent of infected patients because most people who become infected are already sick and have weakened immunity. Most recently, CRE killed two people in an outbreak at the Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center in Los Angeles and one person in a Charlotte, North Carolina hospital.

A duodenoscope, a device that drains fluids from the pancreatic and biliary ducts, stands out as the main suspect in the UCLA outbreak. Duodenoscopes probe the body, making infection easier for hitchhiking germs, especially superbugs like CRE. The particular duodenoscope implicated in the UCLA outbreak boasts an intricate design that unfortunately makes it difficult to clean properly even through reprocessing, the multi-step sanitation process designed for reusable devices. So this particular model of duodenoscope picked up some potent CRE that withstood reprocessing and infected several patients.

C.difficile Infections on the Rise

C. difficile infections happen when the harmful bacterium Clostridium difficile (C.diff) overpowers the otherwise harmless and helpful bacteria living in the intestines. Antibiotics kill bacteria, including the good kind that help fight off C.diff, so sick people who have taken antibiotics for long periods of time become especially vulnerable to C.diff. Since C.diff resists antibiotics, once good bacteria succumbs, zero defenses stand between it and the multiplication that causes deadly intestinal infections. C.diff preys on the sick and spreads wildly through hospitals. It ranks as one of the three most common infections acquired in hospitals and still cases are growing. Confirmed C. difficile infections doubled from 2000-2009 according the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

In Short, Superbugs Threaten Hospitals

As you can see from the cases above, superbugs thrive in hospitals where sick people with weakened immune systems squeeze together in close contact. Our usual sanitation tricks don’t stop them. Even when healthcare workers practice sanitation that could kill the flu virus, these superbugs stick around, hiding out in bathrooms, hospital beds, and on medical equipment. Since superbugs resist antibiotics, once the inevitable infection does occur, it’s extremely hard to fight and could lead to death. For example, CRE kills almost half the people it infects.

Public health officials working on the UCLA outbreak have sprung to action to contain the spread. They’re finding people who might have been exposed to CRE via use of the potentially faulty duodenoscope. They’ve issued warnings about the devices so other hospitals don’t run into similar problems.

But after two deaths in California and one in North Carolina in 2015 so far, many have asked: how can we prevent superbug outbreaks in the first place?

Preventing Superbug Outbreaks

To fight superbugs, experts recommend combating the antibiotic resistance that produced them in the first place, becoming better at monitoring and controlling them, and developing innovative techniques for prevention and control.

Combating Antibiotic Resistance

The CDC’s report Antibiotic Resistance Threats in the United States, 2013, inspired government action that fights the antibiotic resistance that produces threats likes superbugs. Their recommendations include prevention, tracking, changing antibiotic use, and developing new drugs and diagnostics.

In actual practice, the CDC has encouraged hospital antibiotic stewardship programs, which combat overprescribing and incorrect prescribing of antibiotic drugs. The programs push for evidence-based assurance that antibiotics are necessary and effective for the condition in question. For example, in antibiotic “time-outs,” doctors revisit the need for antibiotics after receiving diagnostic lab results. Often antibiotics are prescribed as a precaution while waiting for medical tests, but this practice encourages doctors to reassess the need for the drugs with medical test results in hand. These programs are voluntary, and so far California is the only state that requires antibiotic stewardship programs by law. Experts, including President Obama’s science advisers, are pushing to make stewardship programs a requirement for hospitals and nursing homes that want to receive Medicare payments.

Additionally, President Obama’s FY 2016 budget shoots to double federal spending to fight antibiotic resistance that would help move the National Strategy for Combating Antibiotic Resistant Bacteria along.

Read More: Are We Doing Enough to Prevent Antibiotic Resistance?

Monitoring the Spread of Superbugs

Tracking is crucial to understanding where superbug infections might happen and what efforts might be needed to control them.

One recommended control measure requires all patients admitted to hospitals be screened for CRE. CRE squats in the guts of many people, but only creates problems when they’re weakened by sickness or too many antibiotics. Knowing who carries CRE would help control potential problems before they happen.

In terms of general tracking, there’s no requirement that state health agencies track and monitor antibiotic-resistant bacteria, but luckily, many of them do. According to an Association of State and Territorial Health Officials survey of antibiotic resistance-related state health agency activity, about half of them collect surveillance data about occurring infections. Federal requirements could lead to all states performing valuable surveillance activities.

Implementing Innovative Practices

Superbugs challenge our sanitation practices and antibiotic use. The race is on to develop new techniques to fight them so we can replenish our defenses instead of relying on old practices. Here are a few new interventions considered for fighting superbugs. Warning…don’t read this while eating.

• Fecal transplants: Nope, that’s not a typo. This procedure is exactly what it sounds like. Fecal matter is collected from an ideal donor and placed into the gut of another individual whose population of good bacteria might have been compromised through antibiotic use. In the case of C.diff, a fecal transplant can replace good bacteria that keep infection at bay. It might seem strange, but the procedure has proven 90 percent effective at curing C.diff infections. These unorthodox transplants work better than many other cures.
• Sanitizing robots: A concentrated hydrogen peroxide solution poses a threat to superbugs. It can be toxic to humans, so at Johns Hopkins University Hospital they’ve enlisted impervious robots to help them sanitize hospital rooms. After a human technician seals the room, a bot blasts the air with 35 percent hydrogen peroxide solution that reaches every inch of the room, even cracks and crevices. A second bot dries up the room so no residue remains. This results in a completely pristine hospital room, medical equipment and all.

• New antibiotics and alternative therapies: Superbugs grow accustomed to existing drugs and we haven’t created new ones that shock their systems. This is partly because 99 percent of living species (plants and fungi) that produce promising new antibiotics will not grow in lab conditions. If they can’t grow in a lab, scientists can’t study them to make them into medicine. Recently, scientists tapped into this 99 percent horde of potential antibiotics by tricking the microbes into thinking they were in a natural environment by stuffing dirt in between two membranes. The extracted antibiotic is known as Teixobactin and has proved successful in battling antibiotic resistant MRSA and TB in mice. It hasn’t been tried on humans yet, but the methods scientists used to grow “ungrowable” cultures in laboratory conditions hold promise for the future.

Antibiotics are also overused in agriculture to treat animals raised in conditions that lead to persistent infection. Hyun Lillehoj, an avian immunologist at the Beltsville Agricultural Research Center, has discovered promising new treatments for diseases affecting poultry that would render antibiotics unnecessary. She’s found promise in using food supplements, probiotics, and phytochemicals to enhance a bird’s natural immunity and ward off infection in the first place.

On a sweeter note, Lund University found promise in the lactic acid bacteria hiding in honey bee stomachs. Lactic acid bacteria contains antimicrobial properties and has proven effective in fighting resistant MRSA. Honey processing kills the good bacteria, so store-bought honey has no antibiotic properties. The researchers reintroduced the natural bacteria into honey and used it on horse wounds. All horses were healed when no other antibiotics or steroids had worked.

Legal Challenges of Superbugs

Superbugs involve a liability hotbed because they’re changing the rules. Healthcare professionals adhere to strict rules and protocols proven to prevent the spread of infection. Unfortunately, following those rules doesn’t prevent the spread of infection from superbugs. So when something goes wrong, who is liable? The new proliferation of superbugs presents a legal problem without precedence. Courts will look at whether a hospital has taken reasonable actions to promote safety, unfortunately with a lack of history in the case of antibiotic resistance laws, what actions might be considered reasonable are not yet clear. Upcoming decisions might afford more clarity.

California Congressman Ted W. Lieu requested a hearing from the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform (OGR) to discuss the sterilization issues with duodenoscope that led to the UCLA CRE outbreak. Family members of affected patients are also filing suits against the manufacturer of the duodenoscope that led to their infections, citing grievances like negligence and fraud. Decisions in these cases could influence future arguments.

Are superbugs under control?

As alarming as recent superbug growth might be, so far the situation is under control. However, the outbreak and C.diff growth calls attention to the need to prepare our defenses for the growing threat of superbugs. Antibiotic resistant germs prey on the weak, making hospitals and nursing homes vulnerable targets for devastation.

The government and medical professionals have jumped on the case with their efforts to combat antibiotic resistance, stop the spread of superbugs, and develop new treatments. While antibiotic resistance presents a challenge, consider how antibiotics themselves have been around for less than a hundred years. While their invention was considered a medical miracle, we surely have more miracles up our sleeves to get past this new challenge.

Resources

Primary

CDC: Lethal, Drug-Resistant Bacteria Spreading in U.S. Healthcare Facilities

FDA: Design of Endoscopic Retrograde Cholangiopancreatography (ERCP) Duodenoscopes May Impede Effective Cleaning

U.S. National Library of Medicine National Institutes of Health: Clostridium Difficile Infection: New Insights Into Management

CDC: Vital Signs: Preventing Clostridium Difficile Infections

California Department of Public Health: The California Antimicrobial Stewardship Program Initiative

CDC: Core Elements of Hospital Antibiotic Stewardship Programs

USDA ARS: Alternatives to Antibiotics in Animal Health

Additional

Network for Public Health Law: Superbug Prevention and Hospital Liability

Kaiser: UCLA Bacteria Outbreak Highlights the Challenges of Curbing Infections

USA Today: Dangerous Infections Now Spreading Outside Hospitals

International Business Times: Drug-Resistant Bacteria A ‘National Security Risk’

US News & World Report: Patients File Lawsuit Against Medical Scope Maker in Hospital Superbug Infection

Washington Post: New Class of Antibiotic Found in Dirt Could Prove Resistant to Resistance

CNN: Superbug Cases Reported in North Carolina; One Dead

Food Safety News: The Search For Alternatives to Antibiotics

Food Safety News: White House Wants to Nearly Double Funding for Antibiotic Resistance Fight

Nature: A New Antibiotic Kills Pathogens Without Detectable Resistance

ASTHO: State Strategies to Address Antimicrobial Resistance

Ashley Bell

Ashley Bell communicates about health and wellness every day as a non-profit Program Manager. She has a Bachelor’s degree in Business and Economics from the College of William and Mary, and loves to investigate what changes in healthy policy and research might mean for the future. Contact Ashley at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Superbugs: How to Fight the Evolving Menaces appeared first on Law Street.

Earlier this month, book publishers appealed their Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals win against Georgia State University in a closely watched copyright case. In a surprise to many, the publishers have requested that their case be heard en banc, which means that a case is heard before all the judges of a particular court–in this case the Eleventh Circuit.

The publishers have asked for an en banc hearing based on what they argue was the Eleventh Circuit’s faulty analysis and alleged errors. According to Publishers Weekly, “two of the three judges in the unanimous opinion ‘contradicted Supreme Court and Eleventh Circuit precedent.'” Tom Allen, President and CEO of the Association of American Publishers, added that the request is pivotal because of “the vibrant educational publishing market that develops and provides quality content for students and teachers is at stake.”

The events that facilitated the lawsuit against Georgia State University date back to 2008. Three publishers–Cambridge University Press, SAGE Publications, and Oxford University Press–claimed that Georgia State University made thousands of their works available online through Georgia State University’s e-reserves, where students could print and download the works for free without seeking the copyright holder’s permission. The three publishers then sued four university officials of Georgia State University for direct, vicarious, and indirect copyright infringement.

In 2009, Georgia State University changed its copyright policy, where each professor who wanted to post a copyrighted material or excerpt of copyrighted material on its e-reserves would have to complete a fair use checklist to see if the professor’s proposed use qualified.

In 2010, a federal Georgia court held in favor of Georgia State University because there was not enough evidence to prove that the defendants engaged in copyright infringement. In particular, the four fair use factors–the purpose and character of the work; the nature of the copyrighted work; the amount and substantiality taken of the work; and the effect of the use on the potential market–favored Georgia State University because the purpose of the excerpted works was educational and non-commercial, the nature of the works was scholarly, a small amount of each excerpted work was taken, and there was little effect on the potential market of the excepted works.

Last month, however, the Eleventh Circuit reversed and ruled in favor of the publishers.  Although the publishers won, insiders noted that the Eleventh Circuit rejected the publishers’ main arguments and remanded the case to the district court.

You may have wondered in the past how professors and teachers were able to print and distribute excerpts of copyrighted works in their classrooms without a license. The answer is fair use. To claim fair use, a particular use has to pass the aforementioned four-factor test. No factor carries considerably more weight than the other.

However, not every use is a fair use, and thus, not every excerpt that a teacher or professor uses counts as fair use (for instance, it would likely not be fair use if a professor or teacher printed and distributed packets to students that contained 3/4 of “To Kill a Mockingbird” because the amount taken of the work would likely be too much, despite the non-commercial purpose and scholarly nature of the excerpted work).

This case is extremely important because it will immediately impact the classroom and determine what teaching tools and materials can be freely used. Moreover, according to The Chronicle of Higher Education, there is also a similar case pending against the University of California, Los Angeles.

These two cases have the ability to determine the future of higher education.

Joseph Perry

Joseph Perry is a graduate of St. John’s University School of Law whose goal is to become a publishing and media law attorney. He has interned at William Morris Endeavor, Rodale, Inc., Columbia University Press, and is currently interning at Hachette Book Group and volunteering at the Media Law Resource Center, which has given him insight into the legal aspects of the publishing and media industries. Contact Joe at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Publishers Appeal Win in Georgia State University Copyright Law Case appeared first on Law Street.

Research and analysis done by Law Street’s Law School Rankings team: Anneliese Mahoney, Brittany Alzfan, Erika Bethmann, Matt DeWilde, and Natasha Paulmeno.

Click here to read more coverage on Law Street’s Law School Specialty Rankings 2014.

Click here for information on rankings methodology.

Featured image courtesy of [Coolcaesar via Wikipedia]

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Top 10 Law Schools for Entertainment Law: #4 UCLA School of Law appeared first on Law Street.

Research and analysis done by Law Street’s Law School Rankings team: Anneliese Mahoney, Brittany Alzfan, Erika Bethmann, Matt DeWilde, and Natasha Paulmeno.

Click here to read more coverage on Law Street’s Law School Specialty Rankings 2014.

Click here for information on rankings methodology.

Featured image courtesy of [Coolcaesar via Wikipedia]

Anneliese Mahoney

Anneliese Mahoney is Managing Editor at Law Street and a Connecticut transplant to Washington D.C. She has a Bachelor’s degree in International Affairs from the George Washington University, and a passion for law, politics, and social issues. Contact Anneliese at amahoney@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post Top 10 Law Schools for Business Law: #8 UCLA School of Law appeared first on Law Street.

The topic of diversity in law schools is one that I have a vested interest in. I’m a Black male. I went to what, in my opinion, was an excellent law school in the District of Columbia. My law school was one of the “better” ones when it came to both racial and gender diversity: more women than men and more Latino students than even Black students. I don’t think I ever felt isolated. I certainly never felt my views were discounted or presupposed to be a certain way based on my race. However, I also recognize that my experience in law school may have been unique in many regards.

Far too often, minorities in law school do feel isolated. The comments of their classmates often betray the sheltered upbringing they have had when it comes to issues of race or gender and the law. One’s experiences shade what one considers reasonable, or appropriate, or even fair. I think the most eloquent expression of what many minorities face in law school came in the form of a video produced by law students at UCLA. Take a look:

The discussion about diversity in law school is often seen through the lens of statistics — minority applicant numbers, average LSAT scores, yield rates, and so on. But what that video beautifully illustrates is the human perspective behind the debate. Through first-hand testimonials, it shows just how striking the effect of underrepresentation can be on the student. Yet many still ask: “Why should there be more minorities in law schools?” “If there aren’t more,” they say, “there must not be many qualified applicants applying.” But even this notion fundamentally misunderstands the call for greater minority representation in law schools and the legal community.

While I’ve noted that diversity in law classrooms should be more than about sheer numbers, numbers certainly help inform the debate. So a certain amount of counting must be done to set the stage for the analysis.

In fall 2010, when a young Dominic began law school in the nation’s capital, the Law School Admissions Council reports that 60,400 individuals were admitted to law schools across the country. Of those admitted applicants, a scant 4,680 self-identified as African American. I’m not so good at math [that’s why I chose the law] but the calculator app on my iPhone says that’s around 8 percent of admitted students. Some might say that is pretty good, but let’s drill down and take things school by school.

According to the most recent data provided to the American Bar Association, Harvard Law School reports that 8.9 percent of its JD enrollment identify as African American and 8.8 percent as Hispanic. At Columbia University, 7.1 percent identify as African American and 7.4 percent as Hispanic. Moving over to the west coast, Berkeley School of Law reports that a mere 3.9 percent of its JD enrollment identify as African American.That’s 33 individuals out of about 900 total. At the University of Michigan Law School, only 36 of 1,124 students identify as African American. The University of Chicago Law School: 38 of 610. Without belaboring the point, from these numbers it is quite easy to see how these students might yearn for more diversity in their 1L classes.

What becomes problematic for the minorities pursuing their legal education are the responses they often receive from peers and commentators in the media. Much of the response to the UCLA law students was centered on the theme of “you-should-have-known-what-you-were-getting-into.” Because putting the onus on the student for the amazing lack of diversity is sooooo the right thing to do.

The personal reasons a student of color might want diversity in the classroom are adequately portrayed in the video. From a macro perspective, the nation’s premier law schools feed into the nations’ premier law firms and the halls of government. From my humble perspective, it only makes sense that as our country becomes more diverse, the people who largely write our nation’s laws and set the national debate at the highest levels should reflect that very same increase in diversity. Not for selfish reasons, or from some sense of racial entitlement, but rather from a pragmatic perspective.

Without a doubt some law schools are trying, but in today’s competitive law school market, where spaces at premier schools are finite and legal jobs even more so [I’m pretty sure something is either finite or it isn’t, but whatever], law schools are struggling to keep standards high. Often this means sacrificing other metrics that might enliven the discourse in the classroom. Racial identity and socioeconomic status are eschewed in favor of median GPAs and LSAT scores — each student boiled down to what US News says a law school should value rather than recognizing the unique contribution minority students can bring to classrooms.

Alas, it seems minority students at law schools around the country may continue to feel like they have to be the lone voice for their race in a world that has not had to listen to their perspective very much before. Studying the law is an endeavor that should lead to cross-cultural communication. I always felt law school should be more than just learning the black letter, but asking why the law is as it is. Whom does the law serve? Whom does the law benefit? Without a vibrant and active minority opinion present to challenge assumptions, browner voices are often drowned out or discounted. What we don’t want is for law schools to become increasingly more homogeneous with the same views reifying institutions that have always existed to serve the majority.

Maybe more students at more law schools should make more videos.

Dominic Jones

Dominic Jones is originally from Atlantic City, NJ. He attended Morehouse College in Atlanta, Ga. followed by law school at the Washington College of Law at American University in Washington, DC. In his spare time he enjoys art, photography, and documentary films. Contact Dominic at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post In the Law School Classroom, Color Counts appeared first on Law Street.

While most of my posts concern the intersection of race and criminal law in America, I could not help but be moved to write this post on a video that has gained national attention. This video, featuring some of the Black male students at the University of California, Los Angeles, is a veritable cry for help that represents the pathos of Black males throughout most of the nation’s prestigious institutions of higher learning. Take a look at this powerful video first.

There are some stunning statistics in this video that bear repeating. Of the more than 19,000 male  students at the University, only a scant 3.3% are Black. Also, of the 48 Black male freshmen who enrolled last fall, only about 35 are expected to graduate. Some might wonder what the problem with these numbers are. They might point to the demographics of the state, or the admissions policies of the University. Or they might even go so far as to say all of the “qualified” Black males who applied got it, and there just must not have been thousands of qualified Black males applying to the school.

All of these responses are bullshit.

According to the Census Bureau, the total percentage of California’s population that is African American is 6.6%. So even if proportional representation meant true diversity [which it decidedly does not], the University would still be behind the curve. The admission’s policies of the University are of course set by the institution, and, since it is a school in the University of California system, governed by the Constitution of the State of California as a state entity. That’s where the problem lies. The video raises questions about the true meaning of “diversity” and whether Affirmative Action policies can, or even should, play a part in achieving that elusive goal.

Before November 1996, when California’s Proposition 209 passed, the public universities in California could pursue affirmative action policies consistent with the California Constitution and Supreme Court jurisprudence on the issue. The most famous case dealing with California was Regents of the University of California v. Bakke, 438 U.S. 265 (1978). There, the Supreme Court of the United States upheld Affrmative Action policies in a general sense, but specifically invalidated the quota system that was in place at the time at the University of California, Davis School of Medicine. The medical school there was setting aside 16 of the 100 seats in the medical school for African Americans. The Supreme Court squarely rejected this quota system. What emerged in later cases from the Court as acceptable were Affirmative Action policies that considered race in a nuanced way and that aimed for a “critical mass” of minorities such that the diversity pursued educational goals of limiting minority isolation and tokenism.

Nonetheless, in 2009, the citizens of California decided enough was enough when it came to helping those minorities that had historically been systematically excluded from the avenues of higher education, and passed Prop. 209. This ballot initiative banned state institutions from considering race, sex, or ethnicity. Proponents of the the initiative considered it consonant with the Civil Rights Act in banning discrimination. However, it had the terrible effect of banning Affirmative Action policies in California’s public universities. This is how we got here.

Despite Affirmative Action being under attack across the country, officials at UCLA still want to pursue diversity. They lament the statistics highlighted in the video. But their hands are chained by the change to the California Constitution initiated by Prop. 209. More’s the pity.

Diversity is extolled as a virtue in every aspect of society, from academia to the private sector. But I ask, do they want diversity for the inherent benefit of expanding horizons and increasing cross-cultural understanding? Or do they want brown and black faces for brochures? The students in the video suggest the latter. In my own experience, having attended “diversity receptions” at BigLaw firms my 1L year, the answer is complicated. Have I felt that some of those firms truly valued diversity: yes. Have I also felt the push for diversity was an utter joke upon entering the reception and meeting the one female partner and two Black associates: yes. In higher education, diversity should be pursued even more vigorously than in the workplace. It is in the classroom that people engage in the freest flow of ideas and where one, often in close contact by living in dorm rooms with others, can most reach out and experience the life and culture of another. Having only a few token minorities does not accomplish this goal.

The sentiment portrayed in the video has been reinforced in my own experience. I attended a Historically Black College. Some of my other Black friends attended what we call PWI or Predominantly White Institutions. Yet it is often these PWIs that identify themselves as paragons of “diversity” despite many of the nation’s top state schools being mostly white. The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill is 66% White, for example. The University of Virginia: 61% white. The University of Georgia: 74% white. UCLA’s highest demographic is Asian. UC Berkeley: 37% Asian and 30% White. Despite the admitted mix, many of these institutions have minority enrollment in single-digit percentages. Not quite the melting pot they tout themselves to be.

More subjectively, the video illustrates the pervasive feelings of isolation that can stem from such limited minority enrollment. The men in the video make the analogy to Rosa Parks. Still more troubling can be the feeling of spokesmanship. In this instance, one must always signal that one is not speaking on behalf of the entire race. Similarly, one often encounters tokenism – the feeling from Whites that the minority was less qualified and got in solely based on race – whether or not race-based Affirmative Action policies are even legal or practiced a the institution.

The video has gained national attention and in many ways has fed the flame of the debate over Affirmative Action and the place minorities have in higher education. But have no fear, Black men out there, as the video poignantly notes, if you can play football extremely well, you can write your own ticket to just about any flagship state school in the nation.

Better start practicing, brothas.

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Featured image courtesy of [BrokenSphere via Wikipedia]

Dominic Jones

Dominic Jones is originally from Atlantic City, NJ. He attended Morehouse College in Atlanta, Ga. followed by law school at the Washington College of Law at American University in Washington, DC. In his spare time he enjoys art, photography, and documentary films. Contact Dominic at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

The post A Cry For Help appeared first on Law Street.

Right of publicity, the newer and increasingly more significant area of intellectual property law, has something stimulating for us this week. Former college athletes have alleged that the National Collegiate Athletics Association (NCAA) conspired to keep them from capitalizing off of their images, names, and likenesses. The NCAA attempted to dismiss these antitrust claims, covering the use of the athletes’ overall likenesses in video games and television. However, the four-year-old suit was denied dismissal in a California district court on October 25.

So what are the arguments here? Well, the NCAA subscribes to the traditional school of thought that college athletes are amateurs and as such aren’t entitled to compensation for the use of their images, which I think is completely ludicrous. Ed O’ Brannon, the UCLA basketball forward who brought the suit, contends that amateurism doesn’t justify the notion that student-athletes have no rights to commercial gain from the use of their own images. This as an obvious assertion. Honestly, as I’m reading through all of the NCAA’s contentions on this matter, all I’m hearing is ‘you can’t eat the apple you picked because you’re too young to appreciate it.‘

Among the conspiracy allegations is a claim that the NCAA conspired with Electronic Arts (EA), the well-known video game production company, to bar student-athletes from being monetarily rewarded for the use of their likenesses. EA has agreed to settle the claims against it and pay athletes $40 million.  As they should. After all, it’s the players who put in the hours during practice to create an image that generates income in the first place.

But here’s the thing, the Supreme Court has already upheld the proposition that college athletes shouldn’t be paid for the use of their images, names, and likenesses in order to “preserve the quality and character of college sports.” Well, compensating athletes while in college could beget a subculture of pompous attitudes and ostentatious presence on the court. Oh wait – that’s already happening. But a decline in quality and character of the sports? I’d like to see the facts, counsel.

Hear me out. The amount of money that colleges bring in for winning championships — or even just being invited to one — is ridiculously absurd. Not to mention money produced from ticket sales and paraphernalia.  Consumers pay to watch college athletes who subject themselves to injury and exhaustion for the betterment of their colleges‘ reputations. So how are they not laboring? Oh wait, they are.  Many colleges give athletes scholarships for tuition in exchange for a commitment for a player to join their team. Not to mention that they aren’t recruited as students – they’re recruited as athletes. Is the NCAA saying that they’ll pay for the labor but not allow for all the fruits of such labor? Why should compensating an athlete for the use of his likeness, formed from his goodwill, suddenly deviate from the proposed “quality and character of college sports?”

I understand that the NCAA wants all of the players to operate as a team, and not to be concerned that one student-athlete is “bringing home” more than another. However, players are already competing against each other to be spotlighted! It’s the nature of being a competitive athlete. Compensating them for using an image they’ve worked so hard to create for themselves wouldn’t change that.

Gena.

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Featured image courtesy of [Acid Pix via Flickr]

Gena Thomas

Gena Thomas, a recent graduate of Howard University School of Law, was born and raised in Lafayette, Louisiana. A graduate of The University of Texas at Austin, she enjoys watching scary movies and acquiring calories from chocolates of all sorts. Contact Gena at staff@LawStreetMedia.com.

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