Student Activities

Pre-Law Undergraduate Scholars Program at UNM This Summer — Spaces Still Available!!!!

Matthew L.M. Fletcher

UNM School of Law Sponsoring An All-Expenses-Paid Pre-Law Summer Program

for Native American College Freshmen and Sophomores

NA PLUS Flyer

The UNM School of Law, in conjunction with the American Indian Law Center, was awarded a grant through the Law School Admissions Council’s DiscoverLaw.org Plus Program to conduct a four-week pre-law program targeting undergraduate students at the end of their first or second year of college.  Students will attend classes in the UNM School of Law.  Students will engage in academic coursework focusing on Indian Law and Native legal issues, receive career and academic advising, learn more about the law school admission process, and receive mentoring by Native attorneys, judges, law school faculty, and students. The program will run from June 3 to July 6, 2010 on the UNM campus and applicants will come from all across the United States.

The program builds on a very successful pre-law program that has been running for 40 years at the University of New Mexico that is also a joint project between the School of Law and the American Indian Law Center.  That program, which is geared toward students in the summer before they enter law school immediately, has helped the ranks of American Indian lawyers grow nationally from a handful to more than a thousand in the last several decades.  This new DiscoverLaw.org PLUS program is intended to make a similar difference with a younger cohort to create a better pipeline to law school for American Indians.

UNM School of Law Dean Kevin Washburn, a member of the Chickasaw Nation and a graduate of one of the American Indian Law Center’s summer programs, credits the program with helping him complete law school and succeed in practice:  “The Pre-Law Summer Institute at UNM gave me support and direction for what has been a very successful career in the law; I could not imagine my career without this seminal experience and I hope that others find their way through this new program.”

Continue reading →

Michigan Indian Law Day Agenda (UPDATED) — April 2

Matthew L.M. Fletcher

University of Michigan NALSA

2010 Indian Law Day Schedule

Looking Inward: Tribal Governance

Blessing

1:00 – 1:10

Joseph Brave-Heart

Keynote Speaker

1:10 -1:40

Frank Ettawageshik

Former Tribal Chairman, Little Traverse Bay

Bands of Odawa Indians

Tribal Constitutions

1:45 – 2:25

Allie Maldonado, Assistant General Counsel,

Little Traverse Bay Bands of Odawa Indians

Mike Phelan, Office of the General Counsel

Pokagon Band Potawatomi Indians

Tribal Courts

2:30 – 3:10

Prof. Matthew Fletcher, Michigan State University College of Law

Amy Kullenberg, Pokagon Band of Potawatomi Indians

Break/Refreshments

3:10 – 3:25

Tribal Economic Diversification

3:25 – 4:05

Zeke Fletcher, Associate, Rosette & Associates

Prof. Matthew Fletcher, Michigan State University College of Law

Dance for Mother Earth Powwow — April 10-11, Saline Middle School

Matthew L.M. Fletcher

Materials here.

Press Release – 2010 Powwow

ANN ARBOR, MI—For the second year in a row, the University of Michigan campus will not hear the sound of powwow drums, singing, and jingle dancing. Nor will it host some 5,000 Native dancers, drummers, artisans and other powwow people at the annual event—one of the largest student run powwows in the country.

The Native American Student Association (NASA) at the University of Michigan announces its decision to keep the Dance for Mother Earth Powwow from the campus of the University of Michigan.  The 38th Annual Dance for Mother Earth Powwow again will be held at Saline Middle School April 10-11, 2010.

The reason? In honor of their ancestors, they are continuing their protest of the University’s ongoing failure to return ancestral human remains to tribes—and to meet federal requirements to engage tribes towards that end.

According to federal inventories, the University Of Michigan Museum Of Anthropology holds 1,390 individuals in its archaeology “collection.” Despite three years of advocacy on the part of many tribal, student and faculty groups, archaeology curators have been steadfast in resisting legal and ethical calls for the reburial of these individuals. Michigan tribes have officially and unofficially notified the museum that by failing to proactively pursue consultation with tribes, the university is in violation of a federal law.  The Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act, passed in 1990, requires museums to conduct tribal consultation and to apply due diligence in obtaining it.

Last October—nearly two decades after NAGPRA was passed—U of M got serious about developing appropriate protocols about Native human remains in its “collection.” The U announced the formation of a committee to develop “advice that is pro-active, respectful and responsive to all interested parties.*

Continue reading →

U-M Law Day 2010 Poster (April 2, 2010)

Matthew L.M. Fletcher

U-M Law School, April 2, 2010, at 1-5 PM.

Confirmed speakers include Frank Ettawageshik, Matthew Fletcher, Allie Maldonado, Mike Phelan, and Zeke Fletcher.

NNALSA Moot Court Competition Results Press Release

Matthew L.M. Fletcher1 Comment

Schlender, Jr. wanted this up as soon as possible. 🙂

NNALSA Moot Court 2010

The text:

Wisconsin wins the 18th Annual NNALSA Moot Court Competition

In a riveting performance Dan Lewerenz and William Dalsen of the University of Wisconsin Law School won the 2010 NNALSA Moot Court Competition held in Vermilion, South Dakota, February 19-20, 2010. The University of South Dakota hosted this most impressive event.

Advancing to the final round were Lewerenz and Dalsen of Wisconsin Law against Robert Thompson and Alison Grigonis of the University of California Los Angeles School of Law.

The judges for the Championship round was composed of South Dakota Attorney General Marty J. Jackley, Hon. Robert A. Miller of the South Dakota Supreme Court (Chief Justice, retired), Hon. Jeffrey L. Viken and Hon. Karen E. Schreier (Chief Judge) of the U.S. District Court for the District of South Dakota, and Hon. Roger L. Wollman of the Eighth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

Continue reading →

Minority Student Group Reforms at U-M

Matthew L.M. Fletcher1 Comment

From the Mich. Daily:

Alys Alley, external co-chair of the Native American Student Association, is on a mission to spark dialogue among students about the obstacles minorities face on campus.

Alley, an LSA sophomore who is a member of the Pokagon Band of Potawatomi Indians, began this dialogue last Friday at an event called “Reflect, Remember, Regroup.” Alley led a discussion with about 20 University students in the multicultural lounge in South Quadrangle Residence Hall to talk about past and current cultural barriers for minority students.

Alley began the dialogue with a movie called “Fight Like Hell,” which describes the history of the controversy surrounding the campus senior society Michigamua, now officially called Order of Angell, to show the difficulties minority students and minority groups face on campus.

Order of Angell is a senior honor society formed in 1902. The society allegedly both used Native American artifacts as part of its proceedings, and members spoke in a dialect that mocked Native Americans during group meetings.

In 2007, Michigamua was renamed the Order of Angell and has since remained mostly secretive about its role on campus, though it now releases the names of its incoming members each year. Continue reading →

Events at University of South Dakota School of Law This Weekend

Matthew L.M. Fletcher

Feb. 18

Twenty Year Anniversary of Employment Division v. Smith, Feb 18, Two Panel Symposium

Matthew Fletcher, Dillon Lecture

Feb. 19-20

National NALSA Moot Court Competition

Michigan State Univ. Powwow This Weekend

Matthew L.M. Fletcher

NAISO would like to invite you to the 27th annual student Pow-wow at Jenison, Saturday, Feb.13 & Sunday Feb. 14.  Gates open at 10 am there will be lots of vendors and Native foods available.  If you have never been to a pow-wow you are in for a treat so come and join us.  Admission is free for MSU students with ID or $1 for the general public.  NAISO’s website for more information is www.msu.edu/~naiso

Press Release on National NALSA Moot Court Competition

Matthew L.M. Fletcher

NATIONAL NATIVE AMERICAN LAW STUDENTS ASSOCIATION
MOOT COURT COMPETITION
and
NALSA INDIAN LAW/SOUTH DAKOTA LAW REVIEW SYMPOSIUM
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTH DAKOTA SCHOOL OF LAW

Vermillion, South Dakota
February 18-20, 2010
Sponsorship Opportunity

On February 18-20, the University of South Dakota School of Law will host the nation’s pre-eminent Indian Law event. It will include the National Native American Law Students Association (NALSA) Moot Court Competition, the foremost annual Indian law academic competition. The competition will be conducted in conjunction with a scholarly symposium co-sponsored by the South Dakota Law Review and the USD NALSA chapter and with the biennial Dillon Lecture on Indian law. The symposium represents the first time the annual Law Review Symposium has been combined with the NALSA Indian Law Symposium. The latter has been held biennially for more than two decades, making it the longest-running Indian law symposium in the nation. The Dillon Lecture is one of the Law School’s three major scholarly lectures; it is held biennially in conjunction with the Indian Law Symposium and features a major national speaker on Indian law.

Student teams from across the country will compete in the National NALSA Moot Court Competition. Teams from 55 schools have already registered, including teams from the University of Arizona, Arizona State University, University of California-Berkeley, University of Colorado, Columbia University, Gonzaga University, University of Hawaii, University of Iowa, Kansas University, Lewis & Clark University, University of Michigan, Michigan State University, University of Minnesota, University of New Mexico, University of North Dakota, University of Oklahoma, Stanford University, University of Tulsa, UCLA, University of Wisconsin, and William Mitchell College of Law. Many schools are sending multiple teams; for example, Columbia has registered six teams. The current registration represents a 25% increase over the number of teams that participated in last year’s competition in Boulder, Colorado.

The appellate problem for the competition has been drafted by USD Professor Frank Pommersheim, an internationally recognized Indian law expert who sits on several tribal supreme courts. It will involve issues of free exercise of religion in Indian Country. Judges for the Moot Court Competition will include members of the tribal, federal, and state judiciary and lawyers with expertise in Indian law.

The Dillon Lecture will be presented by Professor Matthew Fletcher (Grand Traverse Band of Ottawa and Chippewa Indians), Director of the Indigenous Law & Policy Center of the Michigan State University College of Law. Professor Fletcher is a co-author of the leading national casebook on federal Indian law and a judge and consultant to tribal supreme courts. Continue reading →

NALSA Panel Event: Tribal Judges

Kate Fort1 Comment

MSU NALSA is hosting a panel of tribal judges on Wednesday, November 11 at 4:30 pm in the Castle Board Room.  Hon. Michael Petsokey, Hon. Holly Thompson and Hon. Matthew Fletcher will be talking.

Food and drink will be served.

NALSA Tribal Judges Event

NALSA logotest