2017 NAALJ Annual Conference

Welcome to the 2017 NAALJ Annual Conference in New York City, the City that never sleeps! The conference will be held from Sunday, October 8 through Tuesday, October 10, 2017, at Fordham Law School’s Skadden Conference Center, at its Lincoln Center Campus. The 2017 conference will focus broadly on themes of access to justice, procedural fairness, diversity and inclusion and ensuring that all voices are heard in administrative law tribunals, and will offer 15 or more continuing legal education credits (based on the New York State 50-minute CLE requirement.)

The programming will cover a wide range of topics, including:

• Access to justice initiatives in state courts and administrative law tribunals, including providing information for unrepresented litigants, plain language initiatives, language access, using technology to enhance court processes and finding ways to offer legal representation and assistance in administrative proceedings
• Creating courtroom environments that embrace principles of diversity, inclusion and cultural competence both before and behind the bench; mentoring judges
• Enhancing effective communication in the courtroom for those with disabilities and disability awareness etiquette
• Procedural fairness, its elements and ways in which judges can ensure it is provided in administrative law proceedings
• The potential expanding role of administrative law tribunals in criminal justice reform initiatives: New York City’s Criminal Justice Reform Act and the transfer of low level criminal violations to the NYC Office of Administrative Trials and Hearings
• Immigration and human trafficking issues to be aware of in the current climate and the intersection with administrative law tribunals; what are sanctuary cities and what do new immigration initiatives mean for administrative law tribunals
• Updates on evidence, including the use of electronic evidence
• Online dispute resolution and its application for administrative law tribunals
• Mediation and ADR in the administrative law context
• Effective and ethical Judicial decision writing
• The field of forensic linguistics and its potential application to administrative law proceedings
• The neuroscience of conflict and skills to enhance judicial settlement practices
• Mindfulness, Aikido and stress management for judges
• Key issues in judicial ethics
• Memory failure and memory distortion and its impact on witness testimony
• International Administrative Law – An overview of administrative law developments in China
• Unconscious bias and awareness of its potential role in judicial decision making
• ALJ Decisions: To publish or not to publish?
SPEAKERS TO INCLUDE
Colin Rule, Chairman and COO of Modria, an online dispute resolution service provider, author and former Director of Online Dispute Resolution at eBay and PayPal

Professor Robert Leonard, Ph.D., Professor of Linguistics, Director of the Graduate Program in Forensic Linguistics, and Director of the Institute for Forensic Linguistics, Threat Assessment and Strategic Analysis at Hofstra University

Dr. Deryn Strange, PhD., Associate Professor of Psychology at John Jay College of Criminal Justice and the Graduate Center of the City University of New York

Daniel Weitz, Esq., Director, Division of Professional and Court Services and Coordinator, Office of ADR and Court Improvement, New York State Courts

Charles Colten, Director and Founder of Aikido in the Schools, faculty member of the Administrative Judicial institute at the Office of Administrative Trials and Hearing (OATH) and Board member of the Independent School Health Association (ISHA)

Bruce Gitlin, Esq., Founder and Executive Director, New York Center for Law and Justice Melissa Kubit, Esq., Assistant Director of Career Services, St. John’s University Law School

Victor Calise, Commissioner, New York City Mayor’s Office for People with Disabilities Kleo King, General Counsel and Deputy Commissioner, New York City Mayor’s Office for People with Disabilities

Pierre-Paul Lemyre, Director of Business Development, Lexum