Van Jones Visits Santa Clara
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THE ADVOCATE Santa Clara University School of Law School of Law Newspaper Since 1970 Thursday, April 21, 2016 Volume 46 Issue 6 SCU Law Hosts Celebration of Achievement Awards By Nikki Webster man for others,” as demonstrated by his Editor Emeritus commitment to excellence, ethics, and social justice. Boscia says that his calling Every year, Santa Clara Law and is to serve others and to do good in its Alumni Association host the the world. He encourages law students Celebration of Achievement to “honor to find a cause, pursue it, and make a lawyers who lead.” On March 19th, difference. our legal community gathered at the Katherine Alexander, the founder of Fairmont Hotel to recognize this the Katherine and George Alexander year’s award recipients. Community Law Clinic, received the Professor Emeritus Father Paul Santa Clara Law Amicus Award this year. Goda introduced the event by Since 2009, we have given the award defining achievement: to stand to recognize a true friend of the law something on its head, to come to school. The recipient is someone who an end. Father Goda expounded INSERT CAPTION AND GIVE CREDIT TO JOANNE has demonstrated the highest level of that we were gathered both to leadership in the legal profession and the honor and to build upon the Celebration of Achievement Awards Ceremony. Photo Credit: Adam Hayes community, and who has significantly honorees’ contributions. Celebrating celebrated their dedication to our community. advanced the mission and reputation of achievement is about more than just giving This year’s Young Alumnus Rising Star went to Santa Clara Law. Renowned for her tenacity in commendation or recognition; its purpose is also Christopher Boscia, J.D. ’08. This award recognizes representing her clients, Alexander was a public to encourage our entire community to grow the a Santa Clara Law alumnus who has distinguished defender for 25 years who committed her career legal profession in positive directions. him/herself within ten years in practice and has to equal application of the law and access to The prior year’s honorees shared their awards demonstrated impact in the community through justice. She is a protector of the downtrodden, by introducing this year’s stars. A brief video service and commitment to the law. Currently the people who are often forgotten in our society. accompanied each introduction, showing the serving as Deputy District Attorney for Santa Katherine Alexander stated that Santa Clara Law honoree and his or her friends and colleagues. Clara County, Boscia has shown his commitment is a treasure, and that once we join the Santa Clara As each of the five honorees ascended the stage to the community through legislation, litigation, See Page 5 “Celebration of Achievement Cont.” to accept his or her award, we in the audience and volunteer work. He is known for “being a Van Jones Visits Santa Clara Law By Devin Hyver In March 2015, these goals came to fruition when 80 billion dollars a year from government funds Staff Writer #cut50 hosted the first Bipartisan Summit on while failing to rehabilitate or reduce crime rates. Criminal Justice Reform in Washington D.C. After outlining these many problems Van Jones, CNN commentator and social Jones kept with the underlying message of circulating the current state of the criminal justice entrepreneur, spoke during the Wednesday #cut50 during his hour-long discussion at Santa system, Jones opened the floor to questions lunch hour on April 13th to an auditorium Clara. Jones framed mass incarceration as a from the audience. During this time the Santa of Santa Clara Undergraduate Clara community, including the and Law School Students and undergraduate student body Faculty. Jones is a Yale Law School president, law students, and graduate who gained national faculty members engaged with recognition through his work as Jones about the many mitigating a social activist and White House factors of criminal justice reform. policy advisor under the Obama One volunteer pointed out the administration. In the media, perpetuation of misinformation Jones co-hosted CNN’s Crossfire by acknowledging the potential with former Speaker of the House, for public officials to lower Newt Gingrich. Outside of this incarceration numbers by merely capacity, Jones has founded Dream transferring prisoners out of the Corps, Rebuild the Dream, Green area. Another inquired about for All, and The Ella Baker Center the various ways technology for Human Rights and Color of professionals in the bay area could Change. Students meet with Van Jones. Photo Credit: Jo Jo Choi get involved with the initiative and Hosted by the American incorporate their specific skill sets. Constitution Society, Jones’s discussion gave human problem that goes beyond party lines By the end of the hour, Jones helped the Santa context to his newest advocacy project facilitated and political ideologies. According to him, Clara community to engage with the complexities by Dream Corps and spearheaded by Santa Clara criminal justice reform is an initiative everyone of mass incarceration without shying away Law alumna, Jessica Jackson, called #cut50. can get behind to combat both social harm and from the hard topics of racial inequality, fiscal #cut50’s mission is to reduce the United States undue economic waste. Jones provided factual responsibility, and bipartisan solutions. prison population by half over the next 10 years. support for these claims, informing the room Finally, Jones issued a challenge to the room. By sparking a national dialogue of the negative that in the current criminal justice scheme Specifically, he highlighted the duty of young, effects of mass incarceration, #cut50 hopes African Americans are six-times more likely to educated professionals to seek solutions to the to uncover bipartisan solutions to the many be incarcerated and the United States accounts complex problems that plague various areas of challenges of criminal justice reform while raising for 25% of the global prison population. With a society. But more importantly, Jones reminded the awareness of the burden mass incarceration places total of 2.2 million people currently incarcerated, room that by utilizing your voice and engaging in on communities, economies, and society as whole. Jones points out that mass incarceration leaches community dialogue, solutions are possible. 2 THE ADVOCATE April 2016 The Advocate remembers a Rumor Mill student who left us too soon: By Susan Erwin Senior Assistant Dean I’m concerned that student voices are falling on deaf In Memory Of: ears at Santa Clara Law. While I feel a strong sense of Hi All, community amongst my peers and faculty, I no longer You might have heard that the law school has had a feel that the administration is a part of our community. few meetings lately about budgeting issues. The faculty I can’t tell you how sad I am to read this, even more started a discussion a couple of weeks ago and will so considering that this opinion may have been formed continue those talks at the faculty meeting in May. Last after the two miscommunications above. I’ve worked week, Dean Kloppenberg hosted a town hall meeting for in higher education for about 30 years and I can tell the staff to discuss these same issues. From the rumors you that Dean Kloppenberg is one of the most honest I have been hearing, I’m guessing that some of these and transparent deans I’ve ever seen. We are very lucky conversations have been shared – and then repeated in to have her here. Again, after finals, in the fall, we will various degrees of accuracy – to some of you. schedule an early date to have a town hall. As you probably know from pretty much everything you read lately – law schools across the country are Why did you cancel the Low Income Taxpayer Clinic? seeing sharp declines in law school applications. This Why didn’t anyone ask the students opinions first? translates to smaller classes, which translates to smaller This is a great example of how we did listen to revenue. Two years ago, we restructured to decrease students. Over a number of years, with repeated attempts expenditures to cope with the smaller classes. Now, we to improve student interest, the enrollment numbers are going through the process again. The Dean started remained very low. Students voted with their feet. We the process by reaching out to the law school faculty and tried various ways to boost enrollment for a number staff to solicit cost-cutting ideas. We then investigated of years and nothing worked. Enrollment in Federal Jonah Piston these ideas and calculated rough cost savings and came Income Tax, which is the feeder class to the clinic, has up with lists. These lists were presented to the faculty also been dropping over the last few years. The decision and staff this month for discussion. That’s all we have was especially hard because Prof Chen is such an September 11, 1985- done so far. No unilateral decisions, no hiding the ball, awesome instructor and a great part of our community October 9, 2015 just discussions geared toward creating solutions. and we will miss her. The SBA recently sent me an email that contains comments they have received from a few students I haven’t heard anything about rankings lately. What regarding all of this: are you doing to fix this? Why haven’t you shared STAFF information about this with the students? Editor-in-Chief I’ve heard that students are worried because they feel Actually, in Issue 4 of this newspaper the Rumor Mill Stephanie Britt like they are out of the loop and powerless to affect explained why we were anticipating a drop in the yet- Managing Editor change.