Peter K. Yu, the Kern family chair in intellectual property law and the founding director of the Intellectual Property Law Center at Drake University Law School, will serve as a keynote speaker at this year’s Conference of the Asian Pacific American Law Faculty (CAPALF).
Held to commemorate the conference’s 15th anniversary, the event will take place at the University of California Davis School of Law on March 27-29.
Since its launch in 1994, CAPALF provides an annual national gathering for Asian Pacific American law teachers. As a not-for-profit organization, CAPALF offers a professional network and hosts conferences for faculty and graduate students in law and related disciplines. It also seeks to promote the well-being of Asian Pacific American communities.
The theme of this year’s conference is “Asian-Americans: Linking Asia to America.”
In addition to offering his keynote luncheon address on “A Roundtrip Dialogue on Asian Scholarship,” Professor Yu will chair a panel, titled “Crossing Borders: Asian/American Faculty Engagement.” He also will serve as a commentator in a work-in-progress session.
“CAPALF provides a unique opportunity for APA law professors to share their experience and explore challenges in academia,” said Yu, who served as the host of the 11th Conference of the Asian Pacific American Law Faculty in September 2004 when he taught at Michigan State University.
“Celebrating its 15th birthday is a major landmark for the group,” Yu added. “The participants are unbelievably supportive of each other, and we all feel like part of a large ever-growing family. ”
Before joining Drake, Yu served on the Board of Directors of the Asian American Bar Association of New York. He is also a Wenlan Scholar chair professor at Zhongnan University of Economics and Law in Wuhan, China, and a visiting professor of law at the University of Hong Kong Faculty of Law.
Drake Law School’s commitment to equality and diversity dates back more than 125 years ago to its very founding by Chief Justice Chester Cole of the Iowa Supreme Court. In 1868, Chief Justice Cole held in Clark v. Muscatine School Board that racial segregation of public schools was unconstitutional under the Iowa Constitution.
A year later, the Iowa Supreme Court admitted to the bar Arabella Mansfield, the first woman admitted to the practice of law in any state in the nation. The first building for the Law School was named Cole Hall in honor of Chief Justice Cole.
Today, the Law School boasts one of the higher number of minority professors in law schools in the Midwest. Its Opperman Law Library also houses the archives of the National Bar Association, which was established before the American Bar Association began accepting African American lawyers as members.
In addition, Professor Ellen Yee has been active in the Annual Asian Heritage Festival in Des Moines every year. She is the faculty adviser of both the Asian Pacific American Law Students Association and the Drake Chinese Students Association.