Rachelle Sico, 3L
Beazley Institute for Health
Law and Policy Fellowship
Rachelle chose to attend law school
at Loyola University Chicago so that
she could benefit from its exceptional
health law program and participate
in a clinical experience like the Health
Justice Project.
“I am grateful for the fellowship I
received as a 3L. In addition to helping
with the costs of tuition, Loyola has
provided me with the invaluable
opportunity to become an advocate for
physicians and patients.”
››
Your support helps students
pursue their dreams. Make your
gift online at
LUC.edu/law/give
.
To read more about Rachelle and
other scholarship recipients, visit
LUC.edu/law/scholarship
.
Your Gi .
eir Opportunity.
Our Future.
SCHOOL
of
LAW
LEGAL BRIEFS
››
DEPARTMENT UPDATE
U
nder the direction of
Diane Geraghty, the
Civitas ChildLaw Center
continues to expand
its participation and influence in
international child and family law.
“There are so many reasons to
be involved and get our students
involved in international work,”
says Geraghty. “It broadens all our
perspectives, giving us insight into
our own judicial system’s strengths
and weaknesses. Seeing how other
countries are dealing with the same
issues sparks ideas and different ways
of doing things.”
Although the United States
is not a signatory to the United
Nations Convention on the Rights
of the Child (CRC), the Civitas
ChildLaw Center models its work
on the philosophy and provisions
of the CRC. The center maintains a
global leadership role in children’s
rights, and its faculty members
are increasingly being asked to
consult internationally. Geraghty has
consulted extensively with UNICEF,
particularly in Thailand and Vietnam.
She and her team recently assessed a
pending surrogacy law in Ghana and
developed materials—later broadly
distributed in other countries—to
train clinical law faculty in Ethiopia.
This spring, the center
announced its partnership with
the London-based International
Juvenile Justice Observatory to
establish a North American Council
for Juvenile Justice. “Together,
we’ll sponsor programming and
participate in other initiatives aimed
at ensuring establishment of juvenile
justice laws, policies, and practices
that comport with the requirements
of the CRC,” Geraghty explains. Similar
regional councils exist in Europe,
Latin America, Asia, Africa, and the
Asia-Pacific region.
In another recent development,
Geraghty participated in a clinical
legal education/child rights workshop
sponsored by Bridges Across Borders
Southeast Asia in Myanmar. She
also is part of an international team
working with UNICEF to write a
children’s rights act in Libya—a
challenging but meaningful task in a
country that has no constitution and
is not yet stable, she says.
The Civitas ChildLaw Center’s
high level of faculty involvement on
international issues extends to its
students, who frequently participate
in domestic and international
internship programs. In recent years,
students have completed internships
with nongovernmental organizations
and institutions in South Africa,
Kenya, Cape Verde, and Ghana, and
carried out special projects such
as juvenile justice system mapping
and adolescent health initiatives in
Cameroon and Ethiopia.
Most years, Geraghty teaches
a comparative law seminar in
which students spend spring break
immersed in a family law or children’s
rights issue in another country. Past
sites have included Tanzania, Turkey,
and Thailand, among others.
“Students learn a new topic, see
it firsthand, and have an opportunity
to advance their own careers through
scholarship,” Geraghty says. Student
research papers from this course
have an excellent track record of
publication, with at least one and as
many as three articles published in
law journals every year.
Civitas alumni frequently go on to
international work in children’s rights,
and stay connected to the center.
Josh Dankoff (JD ’11) now works with
UNICEF in Sierra Leone, and recently
spoke to Loyola students during a
trip to the US. Working for the Oak
Foundation, an international human
rights organization, Bridget DeLay (JD
’06) was able to facilitate a grant to
help the center work on international
issues of child sexual abuse.
The center continues to serve as
lead entity for Illinois in the Models
for Change juvenile justice reform
initiative, funded by the John D. and
Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation.
“Our work with this initiative has been
much enriched by our experiences
with other juvenile justice systems
around the world,” Geraghty says.
■
Diane Geraghty is the A. Kathleen Beazley Chair in ChildLaw and director of
the Civitas ChildLaw Center.
Civitas ChildLawCenter
expands global initiatives
F O R M O R E I N F O R M A T I O N O N T H E C I V I T A S C H I L D L A W C E N T E R ’ S I N T E R N A T I O N A L E F F O R T S , V I S I T
L U C . E D U / C H I L D L AW
.
(CONTINUED FROM PAGE 3)
E
xcelling at advocacy means
preparation, practice . . . and
thinking on your feet. A team of
Loyola students’ ability to pivot
between following a familiar script
and fielding unexpected questions
garnered a first-place win in oral
arguments at the prestigious Willem
C. Vis International Commercial
Arbitration Moot competition
in Hong Kong in April.
Ninety-nine schools from
28 countries competed in the
2014 Vis Moot East; Loyola
bested the University of Amsterdam
in the final round to take the
oral arguments championship,
while written memoranda were
won by Harvard University and
NALSAR of India. Loyola team
members were ErinWenger, Jennifer
Fair, Kelsey Leingang, and Jan
Greszta. The four were coached by
Professor Margaret Moses, John
Calhoun, Joshua Heffernan (JD ’09),
and Michael Viglione (JD ’09).
“The Vis East and Vis Moots are
probably the most internationally
diverse law student moots in the
world,” says Calhoun, a former vice
president and associate general
counsel at Quaker Oats Co. “They
allow students to meet and compete
against peers from around the world
and to do so in front of international
judges who do that work in real life.”
Pulling off the win meant
combining the unique skills of all
four team members.
“The Loyola team in Vis East
and Moot Shanghai consists of four
hard-working, talented students
who all contributed to the team’s
success,” says Calhoun. “Everybody
had to do well for us to even get
into the playoff rounds, and every
member of the team successfully
argued in at least one of the
elimination rounds in Hong Kong.”
These students, another four
who competed in the Vis Moot
in Vienna, and eight others were
enrolled in Moses’s International
Commercial Arbitration and the
United Nations Convention on
Contracts for the International Sale
of Goods (CISG) course. Selected
problems involving interpretation
of the CISG are the basis of the
Vis competitions, and the course
combines classroom learning about
arbitration and the CISG with hands-
on practice for competition.
According to judges in Hong
Kong, Loyola students’ ability to
answer questions while still
returning to their original
argument was one of the factors
that set the team apart. Other
competitors had high-quality
scripts, but showed less aptitude
for improvisation.
Prior to Hong Kong, Loyola
competed in Moot Shanghai (a
practice event using the same
problem and rules as the Vis).
Leingang won a Second Runner-up
Award for Best Individual Oralist,
and Greszta received an Honorable
Mention in that same category.
In Hong Kong, Loyola competed
in general rounds against Universitas
Padjadjaran (Indonesia), Leibniz
University of Hanover (Germany),
Chinese University of Hong Kong,
and Hidayatullah National Law
University of Raipur (India), and
won elimination rounds against
Universidad Nacional Autónoma
de Mexico, Pepperdine University,
Ludwig Maximilian University of
Munich, China-EU School of Law,
and, finally, University of Amsterdam.
Both Greszta andWenger also won
individual Honorable Mention
Awards for Best Oralist.
■
Loyola wins Vis Hong Kong competition
TOP HONORS
Front row from left: Jennifer Fair, Kelsey Leingang, Erin Wenger, and Jan Greszta, with coaches Joshua Heffernan (back row, left) and John
Calhoun, won the Willem C. Vis International Commercial Arbitration Moot in Hong Kong.
SPRING 2014
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LOYOLA LAW
