C|M|LAW Professor Gwen Majette and Associate Dean and Professor Heidi Gorovitz Robertson participated in the Cleveland Metropolitan Bar Association’s Medical-Legal Summit at Cleveland’s Global Center for Health Innovation on April 12, 2014. Professor Majette served as a panelist addressing the bio-ethical issues of physician interactions with drug and device companies in the context of the Physician Payment Sunshine Act. Associate Dean Robertson introduced a showing of a film,”Bringing Henrietta to Life,” which was a creative commentary on the award-winning book by Rebecca Skloot, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks. The film was intended to highlight the ethical and legal issues presented in Skloot’s book and to serve as a catalyst for discussion. The film was a joint project of students and faculty from CSU’s College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences, in particular,the Departments of English, Drama, Communications, and Dance. Joining Dean Robertson as panelists were C|M|LAW Health Law students Linda Herman and Blair Barnhart-Hinkle.
Author Archives: CSU|LAW
Majette Begins 2-year Term on AALS Law, Medicine and Health Care Team
C|M|LAW Professor Gwen Majette has begun a two-year term as an at-large member of the AALS’ Law, Medicine,and Health Care executive team. As a member of this group, she will help set the agenda for the section, including helping plan the section’s events at the AALS Annual Meeting.
Weinstein Speaks to Law Directors on Regulation of Signage
Professor Alan Weinstein
On May 8, C|M|LAW and Levin College of Urban Affairs Professor Alan Weinstein provided a 1-hour CLE session titled, “Legal and Practical Issues in Regulating Signs & Billboards,” to the Northeast Ohio Law Directors Association. The Association members serve as law directors for cities, villages and townships. Professor Weinstein’s presentation focused on how a city’s sign regulations can balance first amendment concerns, principally content-neutrality, with achieving land-use regulatory goals of traffic safety, effective way-finding and aesthetics. He noted that one effective technique is to key regulation to events rather than to sign-content. Thus, for example, instead of the code defining the content of a “construction” sign and regulating when/where such a sign may be displayed, the code defines the event of “construction” and then regulates when/where a sign may be displayed on that site regardless of content.
Majette Serves on ACA Panel at Washington Bar Association Symposium
On Tuesday, March 18, 2014, C|M|LAW Professor Gwen Majette served as a panelist for a program entitled, “The ACA, the Truth, the Whole Truth, and Nothing But the Truth” at the 14th Annual Symposium of the Washington Bar Association’s Judicial Council. The symposium is organized by members of the judiciary and targets the judiciary, attorneys, and the public. The other panelist included the Executive Director of the DC Exchange, the Director of Federal and Family Advocacy for AARP, the Director of State Issues for the American Hospital Association, and the Director or Clinical Transformation and Delivery at the Center for Health Care Reform at Brookings who previously worked in the White House on health care reform matters.
Majette Moderates Panel on Health Disparities
On Thursday, March 27, C|M|LAW Professor Gwen Majette served as the moderator for a panel entitled “Health Care Disparities: The role of Title VI Past, Present and Future” at a conference on role of the law in reducing health care disparities. The conference, “Sick and Tired of Being Sick and Tired: Putting an End to Separate and Unequal Health Care in the United States 50 Years After the Civil Rights Act of 1964”, was held at Case Western Reserve University Law School and drew an interdisciplinary group of leading scholars and governmental officials. The goal of the conference was to put together an action plan to eliminate health disparities in the Midwest and in Ohio, in particular.
From the Audience at The Madison Show, Majette Joins in a Discussion of ACA
Professor Gwen Majette
On Thursday, March 13, 2014, C|M|LAW Professor Gwen Majette attended a broadcast of “The Madison Show.” The live broadcast on Sirius XM radio included a discussion entitled the “ACA: A Prescription for Health.” The roundtable included Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, Congresswoman Donna Christensen, the Founder and Executive Director of the Young Invincibles, a representative from the White House Office of Public Engagement, and a former HHS staffer. During the broadcast the host told the listeners that they had a law professor in the audience from Cleveland State and asked Professor Majette to describe some of the benefits of the ACA. Professor Majette shared with the listeners how the ACA benefits Americans and helps America adhere to its international obligations under the International Convention to Eliminate Racial Discrimination. She also shared with the audience how the US spends the most on its health care system, but our performance on several key health indicators is worse than many developed countries that spend less.
Mika Speaks on Re-writing as Compared to Writing from Scratch as Tools for Teaching Editing
C|M|LAW Legal Writing Professor Karin Mika presented “Flipping the Assignment and the Theory of Desirable Difficulty” at the University of Las Vegas, on March 29, 2014, at the Rocky Mountain Regional Legal Writing Conference. She presented the same paper on April 25, 2014, at the Southeast Regional Legal Writing Conference. Mika’s presentations covered her endeavors to use rewriting poorly written memos and motions as the basis of assignments rather than having the students write memos and motions from scratch. The theory is that students are less able to critique their own writing than others’ writing, and thus, rewriting a poorly written memo or motion is more difficult than writing something from scratch and may provide more of a pedagogical benefit to first year students.
Sagers’ Work on Statute Names to Appear in the Georgetown Law Journal
Professor Chris Sagers
C|M|LAW’s James A. Thomas Distinguished Professor of Law Chris Sagers’s essay on naming traditions in federal legislation will appear in the Georgetown Law Journal in 2014. The essay, entitled A Statute by any Other (Non-acronomial) Name Might Smell Less Like S.P.A.M., or, The Congress of the United States Grows Increasingly D.U.M.B., was featured earlier this year in a column by New York Times legal affairs analyst Adam Liptak. It documents a rapidly rising trend of sloganeering and manipulation in statute titles, and considers what these evolving trends say about the state of affairs in our federal Congress.
May Speaks on Inviting Student Creativity into the Legal Writing Classroom
Legal Writing Professor Claire Robinson-May
C|M|LAW Legal Writing Professor Claire Robinson-May presented “Enhancing Understanding by Inviting Student Creativity into the Legal Writing Classroom,” on April 26, 2014, at the Southeastern Legal Writing Conference held at Stetson University College of Law. In her presentation, May noted that teachers of legal writing rarely offer students an opportunity to be creative. Rather, they regularly ask students to produce research logs, memos, motions, and other documents that are similar to those produced by their peers. But, in addition to teaching legal writing, May is also pursuing an M.F.A. in creative writing. She brought that experience into her legal writing classroom and invited her law students to bring in their creativity as well. May’s presentation described an assignment in which she required students to outline and analyze a statute and then convey the information to the class through a creative presentation. Student group presentations included an original song, an interactive game, a comic strip, a public service announcement, an original children’s book, and more. May believes the assignment enhanced student understanding of the material by engaging student creativity in the learning process.
Falk to Serve on Cuyahoga County Prosecutor’s First Conviction Integrity Unit
Professor Patricia J. Falk
C|M|LAW Professor Patricia J. Falk has been appointed to serve on Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Timothy McGinty’s newly announced Conviction Integrity Unit. Falk, along with the other members of the group, will review innocence claims made by felons convicted of crimes in Cuyahoga County. In particular, the group will review applications from prison inmates, attorneys and felons who believe they were wrongly convicted.
For a Plain Dealer article on the topic, as well as a link to the Prosecutor’s Office’s full policy on the topic,click here:
http://www.cleveland.com/court-justice/index.ssf/2014/04/new_conviction_integrity_unit.html
CSU Law Faculty 