Category: Law School News

From an all-Iowa art show to a trip to San Diego, Drake Law School's Agricultural Law Center is celebrating its 25th anniversary with myriad events and special guests.

Drake law students packed the courtroom of the Neal and Bea Smith Law Center on Nov. 1 to watch oral arguments heard before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 8th Circuit. The court, which is immediately below the U.S. Supreme Court, last held hearings at Drake in 2004.

At its Midwest Clinical Conference on Oct. 12-14, Drake University Law School's Legal Clinic hosted keynote speakers and legal clinic faculty from all over the Midwest to explore key topics.

David S. Walker, dean of Drake University Law School and the Dwight D. Opperman distinguished professor of law, has notified the University and the Law School that he will resign as dean at the end of the 2007-08 academic year and return to the faculty.

The Drake University Law School will kick off the 25th anniversary celebration of its Agricultural Law Center with "Rural Lands Rural Livelihoods: Using Land and Natural Resources to Revitalize Rural Iowa," a conference and art show beginning Thursday, Sept. 20.

Emma Jordan, professor of law at Georgetown University Law Center, will open the 2007-08 Constitutional Law Distinguished Lecture Series at 2 p.m., Friday, Oct. 5, in room 213 of Cartwright Hall. The lecture, which is free and open to the public is titled "Wealth and Inequality: Thinking about Communities and Individualism."

The Iowa State Bar Association (ISBA) recently recognized four Drake Law School alumni James Carney, LW'75, David Brown, LW'75, Jane Lorentzen, LW'91, and Dan Moore, LW'77.

While law schools across the Midwest and even the nation saw an average decrease in applicants by 4.3 percent this year, Drake Law School broke the trend with a 6% increase in applicants for the year.

In its fourth annual collaborative issue with the American Judicature Society, the Drake Law School published the proceedings of their joint symposium on judicial selection and judicial independence. The issue titled "Symposium on Judicial Independence: The Continuing Effect of White on State Judicial Selection," was nationally distributed and well received by both federal and state judges.

From publishing articles to winning cases to preparing students, the Drake University Legal Clinic faculty members deserve a round of applause.