A crowd of more than 300 attendees on Zoom and at the Moakley Courthouse heard U.S. District Court Judge Patti Saris, Judge Nancy Gertner (Ret.), Justice Fernande R. V. Duffly (Ret.), and Judge Angel Kelley, talk about the inequalities, biases, and other barriers that stood in the way of their path to the bench, and how they overcame them.

Last week, 26 middle schools kicked off Discovering Justice’s Spring Mock Appeal Program as students worked with their legal mentors starting in on their legal briefs and learning how the appellate court system works.

The Spring Appeal Program follows Discovering Justice’s Fall Mock Trial Program in which nearly 300 jurors in courthouses across Massachusetts ruled on the Fourth Amendment case Ross v. Clearmont High for 29 student teams. Student attorneys came back this week and rejoined their legal mentors to appeal the jury’s verdict.

“My experience serving as a juror for the Mock Trial program was a big factor in my decision to ask my colleagues to join me in volunteering this semester as legal mentors. The program ran so well, and I was happy to be a part of it,” said Kate Cruickshank, an attorney from Murphy & King, P.C. and one of Discovering Justice’s newest legal mentor volunteers. These dedicated legal mentors will volunteer one afternoon a week through May to work with teams of 10-15 student attorneys to help them explore the Ross v. Clearmont High case and build their arguments.

Erin Sulva, Cruickshank’s colleague, shared her enthusiasm for the program. “I look forward to collaborating on something fun and meaningful with my coworkers, and the opportunity to hear perspectives of kids from the community. It will be cool to have a mostly female team to show the students that there are successful women in law.”

The Mock Appeal Program will culminate the last week of May, with students arguing their case before a panel of three judges in the Moakley Courthouse and courthouses across Massachusetts.

Highlighting the need for more equitable and robust civic education across the Commonwealth, legislators, teachers, students, and advocacy leaders called on the Massachusetts Legislature to increase investment in civic education to help prepare the next generation to steward the Commonwealth’s and nation’s democracy.

At the event, the Massachusetts Civic Learning Coalition (MCLC) released data on three years of grantmaking from the Civics Project Trust Fund that showed that less than half of the proposals from local school districts were funded due to the Fund’s limited amount of money.

Discovering Justice brought the wisdom and experience of federal and state judges into more than 200 K-12 classrooms during Massachusetts’ Third Annual Civics Learning Week.

During the “Zoom with a Judge” events held the first week of March, elementary students learned about the justice system and the role of a judge through an interactive game, thought critically about a hypothetical case where they had to decide what justice would look like, and got their questions answered by the judges.

Judge Paige Kelley, Judge Donald Cabell, Judge Julie Bernard, and Justice Diana Maldonado spoke with the more than 3,000 students in K-5 and middle and high school students learned about the importance of juries in our justice system with Judge Denise Casper and Judge William Hadley.

To keep up with the growing number of tour and field trip requests, Discovering Justice held docent training for eight new volunteer docents, which included college students and former educators.