SHN ILLINOIS COALITION

Students Return from Pro Bono Service Trip to NOLA

Illinois state law schools sent over 50 students to the Gulf Coast during the early weeks of January 2007. More information will be posted within two weeks regarding individual school projects, student perspectives on the issues of rebuilding and the continued need for support from the legal profession.

Also be looking for a SHN event to be held here in Chicago during the second full week of February. Area law firms, their pro bono coordinators and SHN representatives will be part of an event designed to increase awareness regarding the Gulf Coast rebuilding and what action Chicago law firms can take to assist in the many legal matters facing residents, institutions and organizations.

If you have any questions regarding this information, please email us at: [email protected]
Kayleigh Van Poolen
DePaul University College of Law
2009 Candidate for Juris Doctor

Fundraising Ongoing for Winter Break Trips

We are currently raising funds to support student pro bono trips to the Gulf Coast for the Winter Break.

If you are interested in lending support to these efforts, please read the following letter we sent to area law firms. There is information on the effort as well as instructions on how to donate to our efforts.

We believe strongly in these trips as a means of rebuilding the Gulf Coast and appreciate the assistance of all who contribute.

SHN Illinois Coalition.

**********************************************************

SHN Illinois Coalition: Illinois law students dedicated to rebuilding the Gulf Coast

Email us: [email protected]

https://www.studenthurricanenetwork.org/illinois

Nobember 20, 2006

SHN Illinois Coalition Pro Bono Service Trip January 2007

The legal profession acknowledged the necessity to provide legal services for all who require legal assistance during Pro Bono Week this past October. The week is an effort to educate the public and legal communities regarding the need for services and available resources. The state of Illinois and city of Chicago both acknowledged this distinctive educational effort with proclamations; the local legal profession offered several events including a career fair and a challenge to the profession to provide pro bono services. Local law students are also contributing to the pro bono challenge by reaching out to an area that desperately needs assistance.

Even though the media attention and the relief efforts have shifted focus away from the Gulf Coast, the efforts to rebuild this vital part of America continues and the need for assistance is great. As part of these efforts, The Student Hurricane Network (SHN) is an initiative started by law students and run entirely by law students. SHN formed at the 2005 Equal Justice Works Conference in the months immediately following the aftermath of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, now more than 80 law schools are connected to the network. With this many students involved, the impact has been monumental. Recently, SHN’s efforts were recognized with the Lexis-Nexis® Martindale-Hubbell® Exemplary Service Award at the October 2006 Equal Justice Works conference.

SHN’s law students continue to make extensive progress in renewing these affected communities by bringing pro bono legal services, research support, volunteers and one-to-one advocacy for displaced residents. From the SHN national organization, Illinois-based law student institutional liaisons formed the first SHN regional group, SHN Illinois Coalition. Our main purpose is to present a united effort of Illinois law schools to achieve as large an impact as possible by sharing resources, experiences and ideas towards the revitalization efforts.

In an effort to continue building for success, SHN Illinois Coalition is sending students to the Gulf Coast during winter and spring breaks. The immediate project involves a trip to New Orleans in early January 2007 to provide pro bono advocacy support and community rebuilding service. We are also targeting Spring Break trips to the Gulf Coast throughout March 2007. We invite you to be a part of this volunteer effort by contributing to the SHN Illinois Coalition. With your support, the legal and Illinois communities enable a significant number of student volunteers to provide as much service as possible via SHN pro bono opportunities.

If you have any questions or if we can provide additional information, please call Kayleigh Van Poolen at 312.498.5943 or email us at [email protected]. Our efforts will be meaningful and have an impact that will reach beyond this coming year. We appreciate your contribution in creating that impact and sustaining the vibrant communities of the Gulf Coast.

In addition to this letter, we are providing information about the Student Hurricane Network and the Illinois Bar Foundation (IBF). The IBF is acting as our fiscal sponsor and we greatly appreciate their assistance in facilitating the tax-deductible donation process. At the end of this letter is a response form that you can use to provide support to SHN Illinois Coalition.

Sincerely,

Austin Kaplan, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Joel Roberson,  Chicago-Kent College of Law
Kayleigh Van Poolen,DePaul University College of Law
Ryann Zalewski,DePaul University College of Law
Sarah Simonson, The John Marshall Law School
Susan Clark, Chicago-Kent College of Law

 

Student Hurricane Network: http://www.studenthurricanenetwork.org

The legal questions and problems facing the individuals and communities throughout the Gulf Coast region are monumental in scale, and will remain for months and years to come. In order to address this need, law students from across the country formed the Student Hurricane Network (SHN), a national association dedicated to providing assistance to communities affected by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita.

            Illinois Bar Foundation: http://www.illinoisbar.org/ibf/index.html

As the charitable arm of the Illinois State Bar Association, the
Illinois Bar Foundation's mission is to serve the people of Illinois by
contributing to programs dedicated to improving the administration of
justice and sustaining and enhancing the ideals of the legal profession.
This year, the Foundation will distribute more than $300,000 in grants
to programs that enhance our system of justice, in scholarships to
encourage the worthiest of law students, and in subsistence payments to
lawyers or their survivors who have fallen on hard times due to age or
infirmity.

· Preserve documents of legal significance;

· Assist members of the Bar and/or their families in need of financial aid.

SHN Illinois Coalition Support Form

Thank you for your willingness to support the pro bono trips to the Gulf Coast.

All donations are tax deductible and you will receive an acknowledgement of your donation.

 _____ Silver: $250 to provide housing and food for one student.

_____ Gold: $500 to provide housing, food and transportation for one student.

             _____ Platinum: $1000 to provide housing, food and transportation for two

students.

_____ Other contribution: _______________________ (indicate amount here)

Indicate if you would like your donation to remain anonymous.

Please use this form and enclosed envelope for your donation.

Checks should be made out to the Illinois Bar Foundation

Please add to the memo field: Student Hurricane Network

Checks should be mailed to:

Illinois Bar Foundation – Student Hurricane Network

20 South Clark Street, Suite 910

Chicago, IL 60603

Fundraiser November 9th

Come join us for the first SHN Illinois Coalition fund raiser at Durkin's Tavern. We receive a donation for every person that attends, so there's power in numbers. Come out after class or work and help us to rebuild the Gulf Coast. All proceeds to be shared among the coalition law school members of: Chicago-Kent, DePaul, John Marshall, Loyola-Chicago and University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Here are the details:
When: Thursday, November 9th
Exactly when: 8 - 11 pm
Where: Durkin's Tavern at 810 W. Diversey, a couple of block east of Brown / Purple Diversey EL stop
What's the Deal: $20 all you can drink
What's to Drink? domestic drafts, well drinks, wine and soda

Here's the kicker: we get $6 for every person in the door and that's mighty nice.

So come out and help your fellow law students raise money, we have work to do in the Gulf Coast. So help out by tipping a few for us.

Any questions? Email us at [email protected]

List of Illinois Law Schools in the Coalition

As of Thursday, November 2, 2006, we have the following member schools:

Chicago-Kent
DePaul
John Marshall
University of Illinois @ Urbana-Champaign

And we're working on NIU and SIU too! Any Illinois law schools are welcome to join. Just email us at [email protected]

So what do you get when you have a bunch of law students on a conference call?

You get SHN or the student hurricane network. And then you get a coalition of Illinois law schools together and call is the SHN Illinois Coalition. The reason we started the coalition was to create a support withing the state of Illinois so that we could share resources, contacts, ideas and in general support each other through the law school process. Most of what we do is to build a cooperative regional group to benefit SHN and their pro bono service trips, lobbying efforts, research projects and advocacy for the residents of the Gulf Coast. We are the first official regional group at least in terms of getting cyber real estate and letting everyone know we exist.

So what is SHN exactly? It is definitely a network rather than some highly structured association or organization. Although we know that certain activities require more structure, we try to keep leadership at a committee level. We run things by committee, a more flat structure, and the leaders emerge. A group of law students, on their own and most of them while displaced from the hurricane themselves, formed SHN. After that the initial group formed, the network literally exploded to now include 90 law schools, all contributing in various ways to the effort.

Law students formed the group, the law students support the group and now the ABA, SALT and various other partnerships are joining in supporting us. SHN national recently won the Lexis-Nexis Martindale-Hubbell Exemplary Public Service Award, presented at the Equal Justice Works Conference on October 19th. What stood out for me was that so many people were simply amazed at how much had been accomplished, again by full-time law students and part-time while working students. It was mind boggling for them. It has been an amazing evolution and one that has been quite rapid. Sometimes, we have to sit back and take a deep breath to get our perspective. But I believe that when a group has a purpose that is so profound and yet so simple at the same time, the ability to move the heavens and earth is quite possible.

And then there are the conference calls. If you have ever been part of a large project within a company or firm, you are aware of the communication challenges. Now try and work on multiple projects with law students spread all over the state and the nation. Law students are by nature a rather ambitious group, many have been instrumental leaders in their undergraduate experiences or in their career environments. So try and get us together for a conference call can be excrutiatingly difficult just juggling schedules. It is a daunting task; however, with those tools working with someone in Oregon or DC while sitting in Chicago makes amazing things possible.

We rely on those conference calls, email and Google groups. Amazing that even several years ago the concept of online groups was limited mostly to email and discussion groups. Now we have our own intranet thanks to these online tools. When the net first thrust into our lives, oh ten years ago give or take a few years; advocates of democracy and civic duty types were touting the web as the breakthrough for those disenfranchised by existing structures. All I know is that without this technology, SHN simply would be working far more in isolation rather then emerging as a prominent player in the advocacy for social justice in the Gulf Coast. Instead we have made significant steps in undoing years of social deconstruction have created, it wasn't just a hurricane that wiped out communities, policies, lack of attention and social injustice did their part as well.

So here we are, SHN; we celebrated our first year in existence. SHN Illinois Coalition is less than three months old. We have lofty goals to accomplish; we are planning on being around for many years to achieve those goals.

Just my thoughts as a member of SHN and SHN Illinois Coalition, a law student, another human being. Kayleigh

List of Supporting Law Schools

The SHN Illinois coalition is made up students from law schools including:

• Depaul
• Chicago-Kent
• John Marshall
• University of Illinois
• Loyola University Chicago School of Law

Welcome to the SHN Illinois Coalition

The SHN Illinois Coalition would like to welcome all visitors to this page. We are a group of students from across the great state of Illinois, dedicated to working in hurricane ravaged areas to effect a positive change. Using our legal skills, manpower, and devotion, we will work alongside the local community on the pressing issues that still haunt the gulf coast today.

We ask for your support. Please support our work and our mission by making a donation today.