First General Session: Keynote Address (Amy June Rowley)
On the 25th anniversary of the landmark Rowley case, Amy June Rowley will share her experiences as a plaintiff in this major IDEA lawsuit. Her presentation will be accompanied by contributions from among our own expert legal scholars: Dixie Snow Huefner, Julie Mead, and Philip T.K. Daniel. This presentation will address equal educational opportunity, the vitality of the Rowley decision in current case law, and the impact of the No Child Left Behind Act on IDEA and on the children whom IDEA serves.

  Keynote Speaker:

Amy June Rowley
Amy June Rowley is an Assistant Professor at California State University- East Bay just across the bay from San Francisco. She coordinates the American Sign Language Program. She graduated from McDaniel College (formerly called Western Maryland College) with a Master’s degree in Deaf Education and American Sign Language Specialty. She is currently writing her dissertation for her Ph.D. Studies in Urban Education with a major in Second Language Acquisition. She currently resides in the East Bay area, with her husband and three children. As a parent, she is going through some of the same issues with special education that her parents went through more than 25 years ago.  Her two oldest daughters who are deaf, Neva, 6, and Reza, 4, attend California School for the Deaf in Fremont, California, and she has a baby 15 months old who is hearing.

  Panel of Experts:

Dixie Snow Huefner
Dixie Snow Huefner is an Emeritus Professor of Special Education at the University of Utah. She retired June 30, 2007. She has an undergraduate degree in political science from Wellesley College, and graduate degrees in special education and law from the University of Utah. Her training and perspective provided an unusual advantage in teaching and writing about special education law. Her articles have appeared in leading education and law journals. She is the author of Getting Comfortable with Special Education Law (2000, 2nd ed. 2006) and a co-author of Education Law and the Public Schools: A Compendium (2nd ed.). She has been a frequent presenter at national and regional conferences and training institutes, and Dixie served on the ELA Board of Directors from 1994-1996. She recently finished a term as Chair of the Utah Parent Center, Utah’s federally funded Parent Training & Information Center.

Julie Mead
Julie Fisher Mead is an associate professor in the Department of Educational Leadership and Policy Analysis at the University of Wisconsin at Madison. Dr. Mead researches and writes about topics related to the legal aspects of education. Her research centers on legal issues related to special education and legal issues raised by various forms of school choice. She is co-author with Preston Green of Charter Schools and the Law: Establishing New Legal Relationships, published by Christopher-Gordon Publishers and co-author with Julie Underwood of Legal Aspects of Special Education and Pupil Services published by Allyn & Bacon. In addition to these books, she has published numerous articles in both education and law journals. She is a member and regularly presents at the annual meetings of the American Educational Research Association, the Education Law Association (serving on the ELA Board from 2000-2002), and the University Council on Educational Administration. Dr. Mead is a former special education teacher and administrator.

  Facilitator:
Philip T.K. Daniel
Flesher Professor of Educational Administration    and Higher Education
School of Educational Policy & Leadership College of Education
The Ohio State University
Columbus, OH

Second General Session: Diversity, Pluralism, and Student Assignment Plans
This general session features a discussion of the United States Supreme Court decision in Parents Involved in Community Schools v. Seattle Public School District No. 1 and Meredith v. Jefferson County Pub. Schools with focus on the plurality opinion of Justice John Roberts, the dissenting opinion of Justice Steven Breyer, and the concurring opinion of Justice Anthony Kennedy. The speakers will deliberate upon the reasoning of the case and the potential impact on education institutions.

Philip T.K. Daniel
Philip T.K. Daniel is the William Ray and Marie Adamson Flesher Professor of Educational Administration and adjunct professor of Law at The Ohio State University. His research focuses on legal research techniques, school law, higher education law, and special education law. At Ohio State he received the university’s highest honor for faculty, the Alumni Award for Distinguished Teaching, in 1993 and was subsequently inducted into the university’s Academy of Distinguished Teaching. He was president of the Education Law Association in 2004, a member of the ELA Board of Directors from 1999-2005, and the 2006 ELA McGhehey Award winner. Daniel is the author of numerous refereed articles, law review articles, book chapters, monographs, and reports and is co-author of the books, Law and Public Education, Education Law and the Public Schools: A Compendium, and the upcoming, Law, Policy and Higher Education. He is a member on the Editorial Advisory Committee of West’s Education Law Reporter and is on the editorial boards of the Brigham Young University Journal of Law and Education, the Journal of Education and Urban Society, and the Journal of the South African Society for Education. He earned his doctorate in education from the University of Illinois, Urbana, and his J.D. from Northern Illinois University, with further study at the Catholic University School of Law. Dr. Daniel did post doctoral work in higher education administration as an American Council on Education (A.C.E.) fellow at Washington University in St. Louis.

William E. Thro
As the State Solicitor General of Virginia, William E. Thro is responsible for the Virginia State Government’s U.S. Supreme Court litigation (except capital cases) as well as lower court appeals involving a constitutional challenge to a statute or involving a politically sensitive issue. He received a National Association of Attorneys General Best Brief Award for the 2003 Supreme Court Term. As a practitioner of education law, he served as General Counsel for Christopher Newport University, Interim General Counsel for Old Dominion University, and as litigation counsel for Colorado State University and the Colorado Department of Education. As a scholar of education law, he has authored or co-authored numerous book chapters, monographs, law review articles, and magazine columns discussing school finance litigation, sovereign immunity, federalism, racial preferences, and Title IX. He serves as Chair of the Editorial Board of the Journal of College & University Law, on the Editorial Advisory Committee of the Education Law Reporter , on the Editorial Board of the Encyclopedia of Education Law, and as a contributing author to the Yearbook of Education Law. In recognition of his contributions to higher education law, he was made a Fellow of the National Association of College and University Attorneys in 2007. Mr. Thro, who was a Harry S. Truman Scholar and a Rotary Foundation Ambassadorial Scholar, received his B.A. Summa Cum Laude from Hanover College and his M.A.with Honours from the University of Melbourne, Australia. His J.D. is from the University of Virginia School of Law.

Third General Session: Supreme Court Update
What issues before the Supreme Court could affect public education? What are their implications for the interplay between the law and education? Get an overview of the record-breaking recent cases, along with cases working their way through the courts.

Thomas Hutton
Thomas Hutton’s work for the National School Boards Association (NSBA) includes amicus curiae advocacy on appellate cases affecting public schools and providing legal resources and support to state school board associations, local school boards, as well as the NSBA Council of School Attorneys. He is a frequent speaker on school law topics and serves as editor of NSBA’s weekly Legal Clips e-newsletter and Leadership Insider, the school law and policy newsletter for NSBA-affiliated school districts.Prior to joining NSBA, Mr. Hutton practiced housing and community development and nonprofit law in the Washington, D.C., offices of Powell Goldstein LLP. He earned his J.D. from Georgetown University Law Center and his B.A. at Connecticut College. Before attending law school, he worked for eight years in state government in Hawaii. Mr. Hutton also is a co-founder and former chair of the board of trustees of Thurgood Marshall Academy, a charter high school in the District of Columbia started by Georgetown law students that has a thematic focus on law and democracy. He currently serves on the board of directors of the 21st Century School Fund, a Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit advocacy, research, and consulting organization that focuses on issues related to school facilities, especially in urban communities.