UA School of Law to Host National Symposium on Americans With Disabilities Act

TUSCALOOSA, Ala. ‚ The University of Alabama School of Law will present a national symposium on the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) March 3-4 in Tuscaloosa.

The symposium, titled “ADA: A Ten-Year Retrospective,” will feature ADA experts from across the country discussing the ADAís effect on legal issues for persons with disabilities and its far-reaching impact on American life and culture.

“Through this significant conference, The University of Alabama School of Law will play a key role in analyzing the ADA, studying the future of the ADA in the lives of individuals facing challenges, and making recommendations about the legal landscape in disability law,” said Ken Randall, dean of the UA School of Law.

The program will begin at 8:30 a.m., Friday, March 3, at the UA Law School with a session on “The History of Disability Law, Definitions, and Employment,” and continue Friday afternoon with a session on “Health Care, Psychiatric Disability, and Enforcement.” The symposium will conclude Saturday, March 4, with a session on “Higher Education, Federalism, and the Future of Disability Policy.”

Speakers will include:

Peter David Blanck, professor of law at the University of Iowa, a member of the Presidentís Commission on Employment of People with Disabilities and author of “The Americans with Disabilities Act and the Emerging Workforce;”
Peggy Mastroianni, associate legal counsel for the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, whose responsibilities include developing EEOC guidelines under federal discrimination statutes including ADA;
Michael Perlin, professor of law at New York Law School, author of the three-volume work “Mental Disability Law: Civil and Criminal,” member of the Task Force on Legal and Ethical Issues of the Presidentís Commission on Mental Health, and an advocate for people with mental and developmental disabilities for more than 30 years;

Laura Rothstein, professor of law at the University of Houston and author of “Disability and the Law” and several other texts, and former chair of the Association of American Law Schoolsí special committee on disability issues.
Robert Silverstein, director of the Center for the Study and Advancement of Disability Policy at George Washington University, who served for 10 years as chief counsel for the U.S. Senateís Subcommittee on Labor and Human Resources, where he was one of the architects of ADA and other disability-related bills.
Susan Stefan, professor of law at the University of Miami and a former staff attorney for the Mental Health Law Project in Washington, D.C.
Bonnie Tucker, professor of law at Arizona State University, co-author of “Legal Rights of Persons with Disabilities; An Analysis of Federal Law,” editor of the National Disability Law Reporter and a reviewer for Issues in Law and Medicine;
Mark Weber, professor of law at DePaul University and a member of the Special Education Commission of the Illinois Attorney Generalís Disability Rights Advocacy Council;
Mary Crossley, professor of law and associate dean at the University of California at Hastings; and
James Leonard, professor of law and director of the Bounds Law Library at the UA School of Law;

The symposium is cosponsored by the UA School of Law, the Disability Law

Institute, the Alabama Disabilities Advocacy Program and the Alabama Law Review.

For a complete schedule of events, contact the UA School of Law at 205/348-5752.