2020 Teaching Innovation Award in Interdisciplinary Legal Studies Teaching
CULJP Awards
2020 Winner of Teaching Innovation Award in Interdisciplinary Legal Studies Teaching
The Consortium for Undergraduate Law & Justice Programs is pleased to announce that the recipient for the 2020 Teaching Innovation Award in Interdisciplinary Legal Studies is Professor Chrysanthi Leon, Department of Sociology and Criminal Justice, University of Delaware, for the undergraduate sociolegal research course sequence titled Sociology of Law and Law and Social Science INSIDE OUT taught at the Baylor Women’s Correctional Institution (BWCI) in Delaware.
While the INSIDEOUT program is a well established one, two innovative techniques were the creation of the prison intersectionality exercise initiated by an incarcerated student and the use of "I Poems" in a law and social science class. Prof Leon utilized an intersectionality exercise that introduced a set of biographies that in the process prompted an incarcerated student Nicole to come up with a “prison intersectionality” exercise based on inmate experiences and created a new set of biographies. As the nomination letter notes, “It is very effective in making explicit the specific and multiple disadvantages faced by incarcerated people and provides a tangible application of the intersectional theory developed by black feminists Kimberlé Crenshaw and Patricia Hill-Collins.”
The second innovation was the utilization of the "I Poem" model created by Marie Bailey Kloch that was the basis of a class exercise involving an interpretive approach to oral history transcripts of Chicano/a activists. Students highlighted the “I” statements, and then pulled those statements out to create a poem and discussed and edited them collectively. These innovative exercises in the classes allowed initiation of teaching innovations from the incarcerated and also connected approaches from law and humanities and social sciences in a creative way. We congratulate Professor Leon for her innovative teaching.
The Honorable Mention for the 2020 Teaching Innovation Award in Interdisciplinary Legal Studies is Professor Jonathan Marshall, Director of the Legal Studies Undergraduate Program at the University of California, Berkeley, for the undergraduate course Legal Studies 123: Data, Prediction, and Law. Now in its third year, LS 123 trains students to critically interrogate and actually apply the use of quantitative data analysis in sociolegal research, legal decision-making, and law and policy.
The course, which currently enrolls more than 50 students, employs innovative approaches. In one assignment, students conduct big data analyses of race, social class, and spatial dynamics of the use of force by U.S. police officers. In another assignment, students work with digitized textual data from the Old Bailey, which contains 197,000 case records spanning 1674 to 1913 from the central London criminal court. As the nomination letter notes, “The question is not only how to technically conduct such an analysis, but also centrally what one’s analyses mean substantively.... In this way, while students learn about law, legal institutions and data science, they also learn about how to pose meaningful theoretical and policy-oriented research questions, make meaningful data analytic interpretations, and become conversant with research methodology.” The course brings sociolegal studies into conversation with data science in innovative ways, with potential for broad impact on sociolegal and legal education more generally. We congratulate Professor Marshall for his accomplishment.
While the INSIDEOUT program is a well established one, two innovative techniques were the creation of the prison intersectionality exercise initiated by an incarcerated student and the use of "I Poems" in a law and social science class. Prof Leon utilized an intersectionality exercise that introduced a set of biographies that in the process prompted an incarcerated student Nicole to come up with a “prison intersectionality” exercise based on inmate experiences and created a new set of biographies. As the nomination letter notes, “It is very effective in making explicit the specific and multiple disadvantages faced by incarcerated people and provides a tangible application of the intersectional theory developed by black feminists Kimberlé Crenshaw and Patricia Hill-Collins.”
The second innovation was the utilization of the "I Poem" model created by Marie Bailey Kloch that was the basis of a class exercise involving an interpretive approach to oral history transcripts of Chicano/a activists. Students highlighted the “I” statements, and then pulled those statements out to create a poem and discussed and edited them collectively. These innovative exercises in the classes allowed initiation of teaching innovations from the incarcerated and also connected approaches from law and humanities and social sciences in a creative way. We congratulate Professor Leon for her innovative teaching.
The Honorable Mention for the 2020 Teaching Innovation Award in Interdisciplinary Legal Studies is Professor Jonathan Marshall, Director of the Legal Studies Undergraduate Program at the University of California, Berkeley, for the undergraduate course Legal Studies 123: Data, Prediction, and Law. Now in its third year, LS 123 trains students to critically interrogate and actually apply the use of quantitative data analysis in sociolegal research, legal decision-making, and law and policy.
The course, which currently enrolls more than 50 students, employs innovative approaches. In one assignment, students conduct big data analyses of race, social class, and spatial dynamics of the use of force by U.S. police officers. In another assignment, students work with digitized textual data from the Old Bailey, which contains 197,000 case records spanning 1674 to 1913 from the central London criminal court. As the nomination letter notes, “The question is not only how to technically conduct such an analysis, but also centrally what one’s analyses mean substantively.... In this way, while students learn about law, legal institutions and data science, they also learn about how to pose meaningful theoretical and policy-oriented research questions, make meaningful data analytic interpretations, and become conversant with research methodology.” The course brings sociolegal studies into conversation with data science in innovative ways, with potential for broad impact on sociolegal and legal education more generally. We congratulate Professor Marshall for his accomplishment.
2020 Winner of Best Undergraduate Student Paper Award in Interdisciplinary Legal Studies
The Consortium for Undergraduate Law & Justice Programs is pleased to announce that “Accessing a (W)hole New Life: Resident Pathways to Coping While Living in Restricted Housing Units” is the recipient of the 2020 Best Undergraduate Student Paper Award in Interdisciplinary Legal Studies. In bestowing this award, the committee recognizes the outstanding accomplishments of Bryce Kushmerick-McCune and Heather Pickett, George Mason University Criminology, Law and Society students, for their outstanding research project. Kushmerick-McCune and Pickett’s research paper addresses a question of enormous practical and academic significance: how do prison inmates cope with the highly punitive conditions of solitary confinement? Adopting an interdisciplinary approach that draws heavily on the literatures in psychology and criminology, the authors conducted an in-depth, qualitative study of residents living within solitary confinement units within four state penal institutions, as well as the correctional staff working within these units. This paper is marked by clear topic definition, a highly important research question, excellent background literature research, lucid and compelling argumentation, and impressive research design and analysis.
The committee would also like to award an honorable mention to Lauren Yehle’s “Movement and Countermovement Dynamics Between the Religious Right and LGB Community Arising from Colorado’s Amendment 2.” Yehle, a University of Denver Political Science student, provides a novel, timely, and important investigation into the social movements active in Colorado’s Amendment 2, which prevented the passage of anti-discrimination legislation that would protect sexuality as a class. This well-researched and sophisticated paper provides substantial insight into LGBTQ+ rights and social movements more generally.
The committee would also like to award an honorable mention to Lauren Yehle’s “Movement and Countermovement Dynamics Between the Religious Right and LGB Community Arising from Colorado’s Amendment 2.” Yehle, a University of Denver Political Science student, provides a novel, timely, and important investigation into the social movements active in Colorado’s Amendment 2, which prevented the passage of anti-discrimination legislation that would protect sexuality as a class. This well-researched and sophisticated paper provides substantial insight into LGBTQ+ rights and social movements more generally.
2019 Winner of Teaching Innovation Award in Interdisciplinary Legal Studies Teaching
Douglas Smith, Lecturer in Legal Studies at Brandeis University and Joshua A. Guberman Teaching Fellow
The Consortium for Undergraduate Law & Justice Programs is pleased to announce that Brandeis University's clinical course on Human Rights Advocacy in the Immigration System is the recipient of the 2019 Teaching Innovation Award in Interdisciplinary Legal Studies Teaching. In bestowing this award, the committee recognizes Douglas Smith, Lecturer in Legal Studies at Brandeis University and Joshua A. Guberman Teaching Fellow, whose course design is truly innovative and experiential.
The committee appreciates the strong public-facing outreach component of the course in addressing deficiencies in the availability of legal services to marginalized immigrant communities and the organizations that advocate on their behalf.
In developing and institutionalizing the course, Professor Smith spent considerable time and energy cultivating long-term commitments with a community law office and also navigating resistance from leading Boston-area immigrant legal advocacy organizations concerned with protecting their turfs.
Professor Smith met with three students in the aftermath of the 2016 presidential election and identified this course as "the optimal vehicle to implement their idea of an effective student-centered service delivery and advocacy model for area immigrants."
The committee also wishes to recommend Doing Public Sociology, taught by Associate Professor Ellen Berrey in Crime, Law, & Society Program of the Department of Sociology at the University of Toronto Mississauga, for an honorary mention. This senior seminar has a remarkable public outreach component, as students spend the semester conducting research on their selected socio-legal topics, and then develop multimedia presentations based on their research for non-academic audiences.
The committee appreciates the strong public-facing outreach component of the course in addressing deficiencies in the availability of legal services to marginalized immigrant communities and the organizations that advocate on their behalf.
In developing and institutionalizing the course, Professor Smith spent considerable time and energy cultivating long-term commitments with a community law office and also navigating resistance from leading Boston-area immigrant legal advocacy organizations concerned with protecting their turfs.
Professor Smith met with three students in the aftermath of the 2016 presidential election and identified this course as "the optimal vehicle to implement their idea of an effective student-centered service delivery and advocacy model for area immigrants."
The committee also wishes to recommend Doing Public Sociology, taught by Associate Professor Ellen Berrey in Crime, Law, & Society Program of the Department of Sociology at the University of Toronto Mississauga, for an honorary mention. This senior seminar has a remarkable public outreach component, as students spend the semester conducting research on their selected socio-legal topics, and then develop multimedia presentations based on their research for non-academic audiences.
2019 Winner of Best Undergraduate Student Paper Award in Interdisciplinary Legal Studies
The Consortium for Undergraduate Law & Justice Programs is pleased to announce that ‘Only a Matter of Crime: Immigration Politics and Executive-Judicial Relations in Argentina,’ is the recipient of the 2019 Best Undergraduate Student Paper Award in Interdisciplinary Legal Studies. In bestowing this award, the committee recognized the outstanding accomplishment of Matthew Martin, a University of Massachusetts Legal Studies Student whose sophisticated, well-researched, and well-written honors thesis is more than deserving of the award.
Mr. Martin’s research paper provides a unique, well documented look into how the immigration plays a key role in Argentinean politics. The paper included a wide, well-researched literature review and was based on a discourse analysis of all the public statements of the Macri Administration regarding immigration (in Spanish, then translated into English).
Mr. Martin’s work speaks to very important questions that take place in Western established democracies and beyond.
The committee would also like to give an honorable mention to another paper we also found exciting, sophisticated and well-researched: Gihad Nasr’s ‘Carceral Space: The Interaction between the Physical and the Social’ (nominated by Sida Liu, University of Toronto). This was an excellent undergraduate research paper of a quality that is very rare to find in a stand-alone undergraduate course. Having read her work, we also share Professor Liu’s excitement about Gihad Nasr’s research interest and prospective studies at the graduate level.
Mr. Martin’s research paper provides a unique, well documented look into how the immigration plays a key role in Argentinean politics. The paper included a wide, well-researched literature review and was based on a discourse analysis of all the public statements of the Macri Administration regarding immigration (in Spanish, then translated into English).
Mr. Martin’s work speaks to very important questions that take place in Western established democracies and beyond.
The committee would also like to give an honorable mention to another paper we also found exciting, sophisticated and well-researched: Gihad Nasr’s ‘Carceral Space: The Interaction between the Physical and the Social’ (nominated by Sida Liu, University of Toronto). This was an excellent undergraduate research paper of a quality that is very rare to find in a stand-alone undergraduate course. Having read her work, we also share Professor Liu’s excitement about Gihad Nasr’s research interest and prospective studies at the graduate level.
