The Young Lawyers Law School Initiative (“LSI”) is a subcommittee of the DRI Young Lawyers committee and its goal is to increase DRI membership among law students. To that end, the LSI is networking through various law schools and law firms around the country to recruit law student members. The Young Lawyers LSI subcommittee is chaired by Paul Gordon (Kansas City, MO) and vice-chaired by Mike Huff (Huntsville, AL).

We encourage law firms to sponsor memberships for their summer law clerks. This Sponsor Your Law Student Program continues to be a great way to introduce law students to DRI and to draw in new student members. As a part of this program, DRI members are asked to pay for the price of membership for each of their firm’s law clerks/students. A law student membership in DRI is $20 and includes a subscription to For The Defense, free admission to all seminars, the opportunity to publish in The Whisper, and numerous other benefits. This is an investment in the law student and an opportunity to take advantage of the law student membership at no cost to the law student.

In order to help in the transition from law student member to lawyer member of DRI, DRI has recently added yet another benefit for law student members. When a law student member becomes a lawyer member, they will receive one free seminar and have their first year’s membership fee as a lawyer member waived.

DRI’s LSI committee has also continued its goal of increasing the number of student members by establishing DRI law school chapters around the country. Each chapter is organized by an ambassador, who is a DRI member, and a liaison, who is a student at the school. With the ability to add numerous law school students from each participating school, this project has enormous potential and will be a great “feeder” into DRI’s Young Lawyers Committee.

We were thrilled to see law student members from the Tulsa Law School Chapter attend the DRI Annual Meeting in Chicago this past October.

Anyone interested in participating in the summer law clerk program should contact Paul Gordon at pfg@stb-law.com or Mike Huff at mhuff@babc.com.

The Consumer Goods and Office Equipment Specialized Litigation Group invites you to attend this year’s DRI Product Liability Conference - The Masters of Products: The Stars Come Out to Shine. The conference will take place April 7-9, 2010 at The Venetian in beautiful Las Vegas, Nevada. In addition to all that Vegas has to offer, the seminar promises 18.5 hours of outstanding CLE, including 2 hours of ethics credit.

We are extremely excited for this year’s Consumer Goods and Office Equipment Specialized Litigation Group’s Break Out Session. Our Break Out Session will feature the following sensational presentations: “The Compliance and Practical Solutions for Industry’s Approach to the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act (The CPSIA to the CPSIA)”; “Is the Foreign Supplier All In?-Service and Personal Jurisdiction in a Global Economy”; and “Claims in Public Courts Based on Consumer Protection Standards-The CPSC Is Not the Only Enforcer”.

In addition to the Break Out Session, the main program features presentations by Inez Moore Tenebaum, Chair of the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission; Steven Gensler, Professor at the University of Oklahoma College of Law; Honorable Lee H. Rosenthal, United States District Court, Southern District of Texas; outside and in-house counsel experienced in managing global product liability litigation, trial of difficult cases including wrongful death and class actions, the use of demonstrative evidence and other trial tactics in product liability litigation, the new CPSIA and the reporting database, and the art of storytelling as a trial lawyer.

Register for this conference NOW on line, by logging on to www.dri.org or by printing the registration form on the back of the conference brochure and either fax or mail it in. You can also call DRI Customer Service at 312.795.1101 for more information.
Ante up! DRI Products is a sure bet!