Mitchell Hamline School of Law (St. Paul)
Contact/ Disability Resource Center
Using a social justice model, the Office of Disability Services seeks to ensure equal access while creating an inclusive, barrier free campus community and universally designed learning environment. Mitchell Hamline School of Law is committed to ensuring equal access to educational opportunities, programs, and services for all qualified students in accordance with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, and does not discriminate on basis of disability in the administration of its education-related programs.
875 Summit Avenue
St. Paul, MN 55105
Phone: (651) 695-7700 | (888) 962-5229
Fax: (651) 290-7538
Email: [email protected]
Courses
Mental Health and the Law: Mental health diagnoses impact the daily lives of many young people and adults in the United States. This course will engage in a survey of legal issues that impact the rights of people with mental health diagnoses including civil commitment, police response to mental health crisis, competency in criminal court, discrimination and reasonable accommodation under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and the Minnesota Human Rights Act (MHRA), and competency in immigration court. This course will apply the lessons of the Disability Justice movement in the United States by contextualizing the practice of law within intersecting systems of power and oppression including race, age, gender, national origin, and sexuality. This course will also contextualize these legal issues within current events including the isolation and disruptions of the COVID-19 pandemic; the reckoning of the impact of police violence on the lives of Black people and people of color; and movements to limit conversion treatment for LGBTQIA+ individuals.
Mental Health Law Seminar: Covers the nature of mental illness, intellectual disabilities, and other mental disabilities; the provision of treatment and services for mental disabilities: financing, regulation, and administration; involuntary hospitalization and treatment; the right to treatment and services; incompetence and substitute decision-making mechanisms; informed consent; confidentiality, privacy, privilege and the duty to warn; mental disability and the criminal justice system; lawyering and mental disabilities; ethical and practical issues; sexually violent predator civil commitment laws; international human rights norms. This course will be co-taught by a forensic psychiatrist.
University of St. Thomas School of Law (Minneapolis)
Contact/ Disability Resource Center
The mission of Disability Resources at the University of St. Thomas is to make reasonable effort to provide all qualified students with disabilities equal access to all university courses, services, programs, employment and facilities. Our goal is to enable students with disabilities to maximize their educational potential and to develop their independence and self-advocacy skills to the fullest extent possible within the university curriculum.
Mailing Address:
Attn: Kimberly J. Schumann
MHC 110
2115 Summit Avenue Mail 4016
Saint Paul, Minnesota 55105
Phone: (651) 962-6315
Email: [email protected]
Clinics
Special Education Clinic: The Special Education Clinic provides pro bono assistance to the families of elementary and secondary students who have been identified as qualifying for special education services pursuant to an individualized education program (IEP). Students gain an understanding of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) in order to apply it when reviewing IEPs and advising clients. Clients are referred to the clinic through community partners, and not through self-referrals.
Courses
Disability Law: the course explroes the legal protections afforded to persons with disabilities. Through a focus on the federal Americans with Disabilities Act, Rehabilitation Act, and Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, student examine the rights of individuals with disabilities in education, public accommodations, government programs, and the workplace.
Employment Discrimination: This course will examine the federal laws prohibiting discrimination in the workplace, including Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Age Discrimination in Employment Act, the Equal Pay Act and the Americans with Disabilities Act. Students will learn about basic requirements for proving discrimination, by both overtly discriminatory employment policies and facially neutral rules with a discriminatory impact. Topics also will include affirmative action, pregnancy in the workplace, sexual harassment and reasonable accommodation under the A.D.A.
University of Minnesota Law School (Minneapolis)
Contact/ Disability Resource Center
The University of Minnesota values diverse identities and experiences, and honors disability as an important aspect of human diversity. The DRC partners with students, faculty, staff, and guests of the University to facilitate accessibility and reduce barriers on campus to improve access for disabled people through:
- Consulting on strategies to provide access and inclusion;
- Determining and implementing reasonable academic, workplace, and guest accommodations;
- Partnering with University offices to support meaningful physical and technological access.
Phone: (612) 626-1333
Fax (612) 626-9652
Email: [email protected]
Clinics
Civil Rights Enforcement Clinic: Civil Rights Enforcement Clinic offers second and third-year students the opportunity to enforce the civil rights laws of the United States by assisting in the investigation and litigation of cases in the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Minnesota in Minneapolis.
The Clinic includes both classroom seminars and fieldwork. Classroom instruction will focus on the Civil Rights Act, the Fair Housing Act, the Americans with Disabilities Act, the Equal Educational Opportunities Act, the Uniformed Service Members Employment and Reemployment Rights Act, and the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd, Jr., Hate Crimes Prevention Act, along with segments on statutory interpretation and federal investigation techniques and procedure.
Courses
Disability Law: This class explores legal issues relating to physical and mental disabilities in the contexts of employment, governmental services, public accommodations, and education. The principal regulatory focus is on the Americans with Disabilities Act. Legal issues under that statute include determining who is disabled, proving discrimination, and the concepts of reasonable accommodation and undue hardship. Other statutes covered include the Family and Medical Leave Act, the Rehabilitation Act, and Individuals with Disabilities Education Act.
Employment Discrimination: This course considers the principal statutory and constitutional prohibitions on employment discrimination. It focuses most prominently on Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, which prohibits employment discrimination based on "race, color, religion, sex, or national origin." The course considers the basic frameworks for proving discrimination under Title VII and the jurisprudence defining Title VII's protected classes. The course also investigates newer Title VII fields, such as the law of sexual harassment and pregnancy discrimination. Using Title VII as a basis for comparison, the course then examines the constitutional law of employment discrimination, Title I of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), the Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA), and various state and local statutes addressing emerging issues in employment discrimination law, such as employment discrimination based on weight or attractiveness.