For the third year in a row, this week we will be partnering with a former FSU College of Law Alum to help support his non profit organization Help Sierra Leone. Mo Haidara is a practicing attorney in Jacksonville, Florida, and in his spare time he actively fundraises and collects clothing and other items for the people of Sierra Leone. He was born in Sierra Leone, but moved to the states in 1993. After doing an externship with the Special Court of Sierra Leone, Mo made it his mission to help the people of his country who are still living in extreme poverty. This is the third year the law school will be putting on this fundraiser for Help Sierra Leone, which consists of a lunch event featuring Mo describing his last trip to Sierra Leone and what he was able to do there with the funds he raised, and a follow up social that night. We ask students to give the equivalent of a cover to go towards the organization. Last year we were successful in raising a large amount of money. We hope to surpass that amount this year by aggressively publicizing the lunch event and social!
We are also in the midst of a clothing drive for the local homeless shelter, offering students discounts on FSU law school tshirts with a donation.
A few weeks ago, our dean gathered a few students to meet with Judge William VanNortwick, and Shiela Meehan and Adrienne Davis of Florida Legal Services, Inc. to discuss pro bono in Florida. I guess not very many lawyers participate, and the Florida Bar is brainstorming how to change this pattern. They have developed the structure for a program which will encourage more participation in pro bono among the legal community. The project is called the One campaign. The idea is to push lawyers to take ONE case per year. By making it manageable, the idea is that lawyers will enjoy the experience, and be more likely to continue dedicating some of their time to pro bono. The three pro bono advocates I named above, are particularly interested in partnering with law school organizations to mold the law school community into pro bono advocates from an earlier age. Judge VanNortwick has an idea to pair law students as mentors with kids in the community, I believe as sort of a supplement to Guardian Ad Litem. I hope I have gotten these facts right, it has been a few weeks! But I actually immediately thought of FPSN as a perfect liason for the Florida Bar to use to promote this type of project among all the law schools, since one of the goals of FPSN is to be a network. I mentioned the organization in the meeting, and all three seemed very interested. I don’t know really where to go from here, but just thought I would give you a heads up about a potential project if FPSN was interest in participating!
Check out this article about the One Campaign: http://www.floridabar.org/DIVCOM/JN/JNNews01.nsf/8c9f13012b96736985256aa900624829/2dae1eed640a6ae98525763800605a41!OpenDocument
Posted by yaral 
