Stakeholder Workshop: Inequality, Access to Justice, and the Rule of Law

Presented in collaboration with the American Academy of Arts & Sciences, Equal Justice Works, the Association of American Law Schools, and the Center on the Legal Profession, this Stakeholder Workshop brings together ~30 leaders from across the access to justice community, including the judiciary, legal aid, government, private practice, legal education, movement leaders, and others to discuss how to redesign legal aid and increase A2J. The Workshop is entirely interactive.

The Workshop is invitation-only, however if you are interested in attending, please email [email protected].

Harvard Law School Campus
Pound Hall
Room 201
(View a map of HLS here)

8:00 – 8:30 – Check in 

Breakfast provided for attendees

8:30 – 10:10 – Defining and Understanding the Challenge

Kellye Testy (AALS) and Verna Williams (EJW) welcome participants to the workshop. 

Dan Yi (HLS) will intro the day and set out the goals

Participants will, during this session, break out into three teams, each focused on their major A2J challenge.  

Team 1: How might we transform the labor side of the A2J equation? How can we dramatically change the number and capabilities of legal professionals serving low-income individuals who need legal services? 

Team 2: How might we catalyze, incentivize, and allow to flourish new, scalable ideas for legal solutions? 

Team 3: How might we increase the fairness and navigability of legal processes for those who do not have access to legal representation, or only have access to minimal assistance? 

Each team will move through an interactive, facilitated exercise to identify opportunity areas within their challenge.

10:10 – 10:20 – Break
 
10:20 – 12:00 – Developing Ideas

Each team will move through a facilitated exercise to develop and surface as many ideas as possible for opportunity areas identified in the morning session.

12:00 – 1:00 PM – Lunch 

Professor Jim Greiner’s Access to Justice Lab has a long track record for running rigorous randomized control trials to evaluate potential solutions in access to justice. During lunch, Prof. Greiner will discuss which solutions have worked, which haven’t, and some actionable lessons from his lab’s findings. 

1:15 – 2:20 PM – Focusing on Best Bets

Each team will move through a facilitated exercise to coalesce around a proposed solution with which to move forward. 

2:20 – 2:30 PM – Break

2:30 – 3:15 PM – Modified Business Model Canvas

For their proposed idea, each team will collaborate to identify the following key considerations:

Key Stakeholders – People we need to be on board if this solution is going to happen
Key Actions – Steps and activities that need to happen if this solution is going to happen
Key Resources – The assets we will need to make this idea happen, and who controls them. 
Key Risks – What are the biggest factors that may derail this solution from happening, and how do we overcome them? 

3:15 -3:30 PM – Next Steps and Adjournment