Creative Advocacy Outside of the Courtroom
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About
This Course
Despite providing direct representation as attorneys by advocating in the courtroom, there are countless opportunities for advocacy outside the courtroom. Lawyers who know how to harness their advocacy skills beyond the courtroom – using powerful language and messaging strategies, reaching new audiences, collaborating effectively with communities, and leveraging media and storytelling – can critically influence the thinking of policymakers, social influencers, and public opinion. These are powerful levers to drive social justice change.
Attorneys will learn ways to expand their advocacy and become more effective change agents through the fundamentals of communication, language, collaboration, campaigns, storytelling, and messaging.
This session is geared towards legal professionals providing direct representation who are looking to collaborate with communities as an advocate outside of the courtroom and drive systemic change around issues they care about.
This course is designed for attorneys with any amount of experience.
Learning Objectives:
- Recognize the importance of engaging in systemic advocacy outside of court
- Explore the various methods of advocacy you can pursue both inside and outside the courtroom and the office
- Identify systemic advocacy initiatives through collaboration with communities impacted by your work
- Discover how intentional language and advocacy storytelling can be powerful tools for advocating
- Use expertise, experiences, and other methods to craft consistent and coordinated messaging
Production Date: 12/7/2024 | Closed captioning (CC) available
About the Presenters
Alexzandria Poole, Esq.
Zealous
Practice Area: Non-Profit (+ 2 other areas)
As Director of Defender Initiatives at Zealous, Alexz serves as the point-person for public defender offices in which Zealous is working nationwide, trains defenders and their allies on non-traditional systemic advocacy tools, and supports advocacy campaigns in collaboration with communities impacted. She jointly develops and supervises law school clinical projects, co-develops and co-teaches law school curriculum for law schools throughout the country and is Lecturer in Law at the University of Chicago Law School.Prior to her work at Zealous, Alexz spent her legal career serving as a public defender in New York City and Detroit. In addition to being a ...
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Asia Johnson
Zealous
Practice Area: Other
Asia Johnson is a writer, storyteller, and filmmaker who has worked with several organizations in the criminal justice reform space, including The Bail Project, cut50, Shakespeare in Prison, Prison Creative Arts Program, Hamtramck Free School, and the Michigan Prison Doula Initiative. Asia is a 2019 Right of Return Fellow, 2019 Room Project Fellow, 2021 Brennan Center for Justice Fellow, 2022 Art for Justice grantee, and a 2022 Highland Leader. Her Chapbook, An Exorcism, was released in 2018 and her directorial debut, Out of Place, was released in 2022.Asia studied at University of Michigan-Dearborn and is the Manager of Storytelling and ...
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Crystal Maloney, Esq.
Zealous
Practice Area: Civil Rights (+ 2 other areas)
Crystal Maloney is a movement lawyer and Managing Director at Zealous. She co-developed the first national training for public defenders moving their advocacy outside of court and continues to develop and teach this curriculum with Zealous. Crystal leads Zealous’s multidisciplinary advocacy work across the country with attorneys, advocates, artists, and people directly impacted by the criminal legal system to achieve transformative policy changes.Crystal previously worked as the Coordinator of Media Advocacy at Brooklyn Defender Services and Social Media Editor at The Appeal. In Oregon, she has worked on indigent defense cases and provided legal support to protestors. Crystal is on ...
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